Earl "Madman" Muntz was one of the most interesting practitioners of the art of hucksterism that America has ever known. He was a self-taught engineer, an outrageous personality and the inventor of the Muntz Stereo-Pak 4-track system.

Muntz was a high school dropout and a tinkerer. Like Bill Lear, the father of the 8-track, Muntz's tinkering led to some great machines. Lear had his Lear Jet and Muntz created the Muntz Jet, a souped-up sportscar that sold for $5,500 -- big bucks in the early 1950's. Muntz also was an audio nut. According to Billboard, he developed the first known car stereo -- a 110-volt system that was modified to run on the car's own battery to avoid the risk of electrocution.

Earl Muntz began his career as a used-car salesman. He began appearing on radio and television to promote his cars beginning his notoriety. Muntz is credited with starting the "this guy's insane, come take advantage of his crazy prices" school of salesmanship. In some commercials, he would promise to take a sledgehammer and smash a car on television if the car wasn't sold that day. He screamed and proclaimed, "I buy them retail and sell 'em wholesale -- it's more fun that way!"

Muntz would do anything for publicity. During the height of the McCarthy era, he even contemplated joining the Communist Party in order to get more exposure. Muntz made $72 million in the car business, and in the process he became a celebrity. Bob Hope and Jack Benny used his name as a punch line, tour buses regularly stopped at his lot and in 1943, pranksters at the Rose Bowl spelled out his name at halftime.

Muntz went from cars to televisions and distinguished himself by making a fortune and by skimping on components in order to keep his prices low. Engineers of a certain age still refer to the practice of "Muntzing," which means reducing something to the absolute minimum number of parts it requires in order to run. Muntz was famous for walking up to his engineer's workbenches and snipping out capacitors that he considered to be "extra." He reportedly always carried a pair of insulated nippers with him.

In the early 1960s, he began producing the Muntz Stereo-Pak, a 4-track system. Bill Lear took a ride in a car with a Muntz stereo in 1963 and was so impressed that he immediately drove over to see Muntz and signed a distribution deal. Lear installed Muntz players in several Lear Jets, and began taking the players apart to find ways to improve upon their design. And so the 8-track was born.

Muntz died in 1987. By that time he had shifted the focus of his business to cellular phones. There were many other ventures -- projection TVs (he named his daughter Tee Vee, although she is usually called Tina) and aluminum houses, to name two. Muntz was married seven times and drove a custom Lincoln Continental with a TV built into the dashboard.