Even so there’s a sort of connection between the Mafia kingpin, the American metropolis that was notorious for crime in the 1920s, and the city in south-western Germany.
Without the prohibition on alcohol in the US at that time and the crime it spawned, the jewel in Opel’s classic collection would simply be called a sport cabriolet.
Instead it has a name that references the nocturnal trips taken by the smugglers illegally bringing alcohol from Canada into the US.
“Thanks to Al Capone, it goes by the name Moonlight Roadster," says Opel Classic spokesman Uwe Mertin.
One only has to look at crime reports from the 1920s to see why. To get their illegal booze across the border and into the the bars of Chicago, the Mafia used fast, low-to-the-ground sports cars.
In the moonlight, they were able to shoot under customs barriers that were designed for trucks.
That practice inspired Opel to give their car a name that sounded more seductive and racy.
The 2-seater, rear wheel drive convertible cabriolet was painted "moonstone grey" and first hit the road in 1933. By then alcohol was legal again in the US, but the Moonlight Roadster name stuck.
Low profile and beguilingly beautiful
In looks, the car certainly lives up to its name. With its latticed grille in front of the long hood, rakishly angled windshield, doors that open backward, round brass headlights, and an elegant boat tail with a razor-sharp crease, it has a seductive design that’s hard to resist.
What's more, it drives in a way that bootleggers in America would have liked. This sprightly pensioner can still move.
Driving this 90-year-old car today takes a bit of getting used, but the six-cylinder, 1.8-litre engine still packs a punch, despite having only 34 horsepower. It helps that the car weighs barely 900 kilos.
The car only has three gears, but for city driving you don’t need to get out of second gear anyway.
But once you hit the open road, third gear is required and before you know it the speedometer needle in the smart cockpit is trembling towards the 90kph mark.
Then the wind reaches hurricane force and you find yourself ducking deeper into the brittle leather of the driving seat.
Limited production run
The Moonlight Roadster was built by the body maker Deutsch in Cologne and was based on the 1.8, Opel’s entry into the mid-range class long before the Vectra or Insignia.
The 1.8 was well received, and unlike most of its competitors, which offered only four-cylinder engines, it had six. Opel built over 32,000 of them.
However, only 51 Moonlight Roadsters were ever built. Does that rarity make them very valuable today?
"A real market value can hardly be determined for such an exotic," says classic car specialist Frank Wilke of Classic Analytics.
Pre-war cars are relatively underpriced and as well Opel is a purely German brand that’s unknown in America or Asia.
"A seller will therefore hardly earn more with it than some new Opels cost," Wilke says.
However, it’s largely a hypothetical question as only two of the 51 Moonlight Roadsters built are known to still exist, according to Opel’s Uwe Mertin.
That makes the car in the Opel Classic collection of inestimable value, even if it's only insured for a modest six-figure sum.
