due to lack of industry-wide standardization. In addition, since the 1920s the center of the steering wheel had typically held the horn button. While some cars of the late 50s had horn rings, some drivers instinctively hit the steering wheel center in an emergency, sometimes causing them to either damage the controls or cause an unexpected, hazardous gear change (occasionally causing transmission damage). The Edsel's system included an electro-hydraulic inhibitor switch activated by transmission fluid pressure which virtually eliminated the possibility of this happening. The single circumstance under which a Teletouch could be put into gear with the car moving at greater than three to five miles per hour was if the neutral button was depressed first, thereby removing hydraulic pressure from the inhibitor switch, and then the reverse or park button pushed. These actions would, as a result, either shear off the parking pawl or suddenly set the rear wheels turning in the reverse direction, effectively locking them up against the road surface and possibly damaging the reverse bands in the transmission. Ironically, the failed Autolite Packard system protected against this set of circumstances by locking out not only reverse and park, but also neutral while the car was moving with any significant speed. For the 1959 model year, Edsel dropped Teletouch as an option, and began the process of abandoning the automotive market by dropping its Mercury-based cars, and eliminating the Citation, and Pacer cars as well as the Bermuda and Roundup station wagons. Steering wheel-mounted transmission controls have made a comeback since the mid-1990s introduction of Porsche's Tiptronic system, although the controls for the selection of park, reverse, and neutral are almost always located elsewhere. They also invariably have the buttons or "paddles" for the functions that are on the steering wheel quite near the rim, for true "both-hands-on-the-wheel" functionality. References Old Car Weekly News page 1 Vol. 37 No. 42 References Automatic transmission tradenames