I visited a museum exhibit about Tesla and saw the car that allegedly inspired Elon Musk to start making electric vehicles

Tesla cybertruck on view at the Petersen Automotive MuseumSamantha Delouya

• The Petersen Automotive Museum recently debuted a new exhibit, "Inside Tesla: Supercharging the Electric Revolution."
• It includes an up-close view of Tesla's famous offerings, like the Cybertruck and the "Optimus" AI robot.

The Petersen Automotive Museum in Los Angeles just opened a new in-depth exhibit of the history of Tesla called 'Inside Tesla: Supercharging the Electric Revolution.'

A deconstructed Model Y on display at the exhibit shows the relative simplicity of EVs compared to the 30,000 components that make up gas-powered cars.      Samantha Delouya

I recently visited the exhibit and got to see Tesla's many products and learn more about the long history of electric vehicles before Tesla.

I'm pictured standing with a 2009 Tesla Model S prototype.      Samantha Delouya

The exhibit has many of Tesla's vehicles on display, including some that haven't yet been released.

Tesla's electric Semi truck was first unveiled in 2017 and was supposed to start production in 2019. After a series of delays, Tesla announced that the truck began production earlier this month.      Samantha Delouya

One example: Tesla's Cybertruck. Though it was announced in 2019, CEO Elon Musk said it would not be available until 2023.

Tesla's Cybertruck will start at $39,900.      Samantha Delouya

When the Cybertruck was revealed to the public in 2019, Tesla chief designer Franz von Holzhausen cracked the truck's windows with a sledgehammer and steel ball while trying to showcase the car's supposed indestructibility.

Musk later tweeted that the sledgehammer cracked the base of the glass, which caused the window to crack when a steel ball was thrown at it.      Frederic J. Brown/AFP

Source: Twitter

The exhibit even included that original hammer and ball.

The famed sledgehammer and ball that took out Tesla's Cybertruck prototype.      Samantha Delouya

It was fascinating to learn the history of electric vehicles. According to the exhibit, nearly 40% of cars were electric at the turn of the 20th century. There was even an electric vehicle from 1908 on display.

The Columbia Victoria Phaeton from 1908 was an early electric vehicle model.      Samantha Delouya

However, the exhibit argues that the production of Henry Ford's Model T made gas-powered cars more available and affordable than EVs, changing the course of history.

Henry Ford installed moving assembly lines at his car factories in 1913, reducing the amount of time it took to build his Model T cars.      Library of Congress

While there were some attempts to revive EVs in the 20th century, none successfully broke into the mainstream.

The General Motors EV1 was leased to customers starting in 1996. It was an unprofitable venture, and by 2003, GM recalled all EV1s, and most were destroyed.      John Hillery/Reuters

While Toyota's 1997 hybrid Prius began to soften opinions of gas alternatives, the exhibit shows that Tesla, with help from Elon Musk, was the primary car company that helped bring about the acceptance of battery EVs.

Tesla was founded in 2003. By 2004, Elon Musk became the company's largest shareholder and chairman of its board. He became CEO in 2008.      James Leynse/Corbis via Getty Images

Tesla has produced electric vehicles since its founding. Most major car companies, including BMW, GMC, and Ford, have pledged carbon neutrality and are rolling out new EVs.

The GMC Hummer EV Edition 1.      Tim Levin/Insider

According to the exhibit, the 1997 electric sports car, called a tzero, served as the inspiration for Tesla's first electric car. I got to see one up close.

The AC Propulsion tzero was a handmade electric sports car built in 1997. According to the exhibit, an impressive test drive of the tzero convinced Musk to invest in Tesla.      Samantha Delouya

The exhibit delved into the stages of production for a Tesla vehicle, showing a robotic arm that Tesla factories use to build segments of a car’s body…

The Kuka robotic arm and other factory robotics help produce Tesla vehicles. Musk conceded in 2018 that he sometimes relied too heavily on automation.      Samantha Delouya

Source: WSJ

…and even a Model Y crash test vehicle.

Tesla's Model Y received a 5-star crash-test rating from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.      Samantha Delouya

Source: Insider

The exhibit wasn't only about cars, though. It had childhood photos of Elon Musk and a timeline that went through his early career as the head of the software company Zip2 and later X.com, which became PayPal.

A childhood photo of Elon Musk from the Petersen Automotive Museum.      Samantha Delouya

The exhibit even had a collection of first-edition copies of some of Musk's favorite science-fiction novels, including "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy."

"['Hitchhiker's Guide' is] quite positive, I think," Musk once said, and "it highlighted an important point, which is that a lot of times the question is harder than the answer."      Samantha Delouya

Source: Insider

It also had some of Tesla’s non-automotive offerings on display…

Tesla has sold tequila, red satin shorts, and a kids' "Cyberquad" that was recalled earlier this year.      Samantha Delouya

Source: TechCrunch

…including the Tesla Optimus robot, which is currently a prototype, but Musk said it would one day be able to do "boring, repetitious and dangerous" work.

The AI humanoid bot was first introduced at Tesla's AI event in 2021, though in its initial debut, the "bot" was revealed to be a person in a costume.      Samantha Delouya

Source: Insider

The exhibit is open until October 2023.

Tesla Model X prototype      Samantha Delouya