BY TORI RODRIGUEZ

Despite other claims to mudflap fame, there’s no disputing the original image that obviously inspired the design.

I have always been intrigued and slightly delighted with the Mudflap Girl — that pretty, perky silhouette that famously graces the mud flaps of some trucks. I often wondered about the origin of the image, and it’s an amusing full-circle situation to have realized who actually inspired her — none other than the Queen of Pinups herself.

The design is said to have been created in the 1970s by Bill Zinda for his truck and auto accessory business in Long Beach, California. “It is variously claimed to be modeled on Leta Laroe, a famous exotic dancer at the time,” or on the mother of the guy who bought the trademark for the design in 2010, according to Wikipedia. The latter version has been repeated in Wired, BUST and elsewhere.

I hereby declare that neither of those claims are accurate, unless one of the women happened to be a Bettie impersonator who had this photo of her and studied, practiced, embodied, and copied it to a tee – highly unlikely. What’s far more likely is that Zinda simply based his design on this shot of Bettie from the 1950s.

I think you’ll agree that the Mudflap Girl image is in fact a slightly exaggerated Bettie Page – the pose, the hair, the posture, the body, just everything. It’s clearly her.

But wait! Check out Bettie’s sister Goldie doing mudflap pose, below right, on one of the beach towel designs available in our shop along with the Mudflap Bettie towel. This shot of Goldie is from a photo set of Bettie and Goldie at Coney Island, featured in the book Bettie Page: The Lost Years. (The photog who shot the Mudflap Bettie pic is unknown.) We’ll never know which sis did it first, but the Mudflap Girl design is most certainly modeled after Bettie. ♥