Once the proud symbol of a great Independent automaker. The last car bearing the Nash name was made in 1957, but in 1954, Nash merged with another independent automaker, Hudson to form American Motors. Nash, first under the leadership of George Mason, and then George Romney, was a pioneer in building small, well-equipped, economical compact cars, successfully marketing the Nash Rambler in 1950-1955, the tiny Austin-powered Metropolitan in 1954-1961, and the smaller on the outside, but larger on the inside, Rambler of 1956 that replaced the full size Nash by 1958, and pushed AMC from 11th to 6th in the Industry at a critical time in the late fifties and early sixties when Americans began to turn away from big, gas-guzzling cars to smaller, more economical cars. AMC went on to compete toe to toe with the big three for some time, including some memorable performance machines like the Rebel, the Javelin, and the AMX.