The Phantom Corsair is a prototype automobile built in 1938. It is a six-passenger coupé that was designed by Rust Heinz of the H. J. Heinz family and Maurice Schwartz of the Bohman & Schwartz coachbuilding company in Pasadena, California. Although sometimes dismissed as a failure because it never entered production, the Corsair is regarded as ahead of its time due to its futuristic features and styling cues such as a louvered nose, fully skirted wheels, totally flush fenders, lack of running boards, extremely small windows (even for its time), telescoping bumper supports, and unique headlights and a low profile.

To match the advanced design, Heinz chose the most advanced chassis available in the United States to fit the body on, the Cord 810. The V8 engined Cord was equipped with front wheel drive and an electronically operated four speed gearbox. To accomodate the large body various changes were carried through on the chassis. The slippery body enabled the 190 bhp Phantom Corsair to reach speeds of up to 115 miles per hour.
Though the Phantom rode the Cord's 125-inch wheelbase, it was bigger: 76.5 inches wide, 237 inches long (eight inches longer than the 1958 Lincoln!), and only 57 inches high. And at nearly 4,600 pounds, it was so heavy that the Cord V-8 was reportedly tweaked from 125 to 190 bhp.

The sleek envelope design of the 1938 Phantom Corsair was Heinz's, developed with clay models. B&S provided much of the finer detail, such as the delicate center peak running the length of the car and the subtle rounding of the rear section. Body panels were made of hand-beaten aluminum and fitted over a tubular frame.

Entry was via electric pushbuttons, and small panels above the side windows popped up to make it easier. Inside, occupants found an unusual 4+2 seating arrangement. Because of the front seat's five-foot-plus width, it held four people, one seated to the driver's left. The back seat was extremely cramped, due in part to space-robbing beverage cabinets. Instrumentation came from the Cord, supplemented by a bevy of gauges including a compass and altimeter. And -- lo and behold -- a console above the narrow three-layer safety-glass windshield told the driver when a door was ajar or the radio or lights were on.

Rust Heinz planned to put the Phantom Corsair, which cost approximately $24,000 to produce in 1938 (equivalent to about $370,000 in 2010), into limited production at an estimated selling price of $12,500. Heinz also made arrangements to display the car at the 1939 New York World's Fair. However, Heinz's death ; he was only 25 years old, in a car accident in July 1939 ended those plans, leaving the prototype Corsair as the only one ever built. A brochure had been prepared and the price set at $14,700, but at nearly triple the price of a Cadillac V-16 sedan, no orders materialized.
Over the years, the 1938 Phantom Corsair saw many owners, among them TV star Herb Shriner, who owned it from 1951-1970 and had it customized. Now restored to its original form, its home is in the National Automobile Museum (also known as The Harrah Collection) in Reno, Nevada.

• The automobile was featured as the "Flying Wombat" in the David O. Selznick film The Young in Heart (1938), starring Janet Gaynor, Douglas Fairbanks, Jr., Paulette Goddard, and Billie Burke.
• The Corsair was featured in a segment of the Popular Science film series in 1938.
• it appeared on the March 1938 cover of Motor Age
• The car is one of the rare vehicles that is unlockable during free roam in the 2002 video game Mafia: The City of Lost Heaven.
• The Corsair is one of the 15 rare drivable vehicles featured in the 2011 video game L.A. Noire