The Transitional 1949 Dodge Wayfarer Line

The "Big Three" American automobile makers -- General Motors, Ford Motor Company and Chrysler Corporation -- held off introducing post- World War 2 redesigns until the 1949 model year.  (Exceptions were 1948 Cadillacs and Oldsmobile 98s.)

The prewar notion that streamlined-looking fastback styling was the wave of the future was largely abandoned, though every GM division did market some fastback models for 1949.  Chrysler did the same, but on a much smaller scale.  Plymouth built an entry-level fastback 2-door sedan, and Dodge had a semi-fastback similar in character to Mercury's '49 roofline.

And there was even more Chrysler experimentation in Dodge's Wayfarer line.  This experimentation required extra tooling expenses for what turned out to be fairly low-volume cars.  In those days, Chrysler Corporation ranked ahead of Ford in sales and was doing well financially, so its management must have thought that the risk of losing some money to gain market knowledge was worthwhile.

Let's take a look at Dodge's Wayfarer line.  Color images are of cars that were on Internet for-sale sites.

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Let's first view a 1949 mainstream Dodge Coronet 4-door sedan to provide context.  The sun visor above the windshield was a popular accessory in the late 1940s and early 50s.

This is a 1949 Wayfarer business coupe.  Business coupes had only one bench seat, but this allowed for larger trunk space for hauling business-related items.  That body style was dropped early in the 1950s.

And here is the Wayfarer Roadster, essentially a convertible version of the business coupe.  Only a small proportion were true roadsters with side curtains instead of roll-up windows -- most Dodge "Roadsters" were built with the latter.

Front three-quarter views of '49 Dodge Wayfarer sedans.

A 1950 Mercury showing its semi-fastback / semi- bustle-back styling.  The Dodge's bustle-back is smaller and gives the impression of being mostly a fastback.

Rear view of a '49 Wayfarer.  Compare this to the 1949 Plymouth P-17 fastback below.

This car and the Dodges shown above used the same roof tooling, the main difference is that the Dodge's B-pillar slants and the Plymouth's is vertical.  The Dodge bustle-back is due to a 4-inch longer wheelbase and 14 inches (35 cm) more overall length.  This added length would have required a different, more expensive fastback roof shape towards the rear, so the cheaper semi-fastback option was taken.

Finally, the Dodge Wayfarer sedan's fastback competition, a 1949 Pontiac Streamliner 2-door.  Much sleeker than the Dodge, but perhaps with a bit less trunk space -- a problem that led GM to dropping  fastbacks after the 1952 model year.

Plymouth Valiant Begets Dodge Lancer

Detroit's Big Three car makers launched lines of compact (in the American context) cars for the 1960 model year.  I wrote about Chrysler Corporation's version, the Plymouth Valiant, here.  (To be historically accurate, for 1960 the car was simply "Valiant," becoming the Plymouth Valiant for 1961.)

In a move to spread the tooling costs of the Valiant over more cars sold, Chrysler added a facelifted Valiant to its product line in the form of the 1961 Dodge Lancer (Wikipedia entry here).  Valiants and Lancers using the Virgil Exner influenced styling continued through the 1962 model year.

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This is an entry-level 1960 Valiant four-door sedan.

Here is a press-release photo and caption announcing the 1961 Dodge Lancer: click to enlarge.  The car is a two-door hardtop coupe, the Plymouth Valiant also getting this new model for 1961.  Note that it has fixed side windows towards the rear that are the same as those seen on the Valiant four-door.  To create the coupe, the B-pillars were eliminated from the greenhouse and the front doors lengthened while, of course, the rear doors were eliminated.  As for distinctive Lancer features, the front fender blade was given a reverse-slanted bend at its rear.  The grille/headlights/bumper ensemble was replaced, creating a more conventional (for the times) wider appearance compared to the Valiant's taller, more classical grille.  This change required a small area of different sheet metal at the front of the hood.

Rear 3/4 view of a 1960 Valiant.

This RD Classics photo of the rear aspect of a 1961 Lancer reveals that even fewer changes were made here in the transformation from Valiant to Lancer.  Aside from different side chrome trim, the Lancer got a different bumper and restyled rear fender tips and tail lights.  The greatest change was the elimination of the faux- spare tire cover from the trunk lid: this required revised body stamping, probably in the form of a fewer pass or two plus separate stampings for the cover.

All things considered, the Valiant was a quirky design.  The Lancer, on net, was a reasonable clean-up job.  The grille area relates better to the rest of the front.  Eliminating the spare tire cover motif on the trunk was an important improvement. The tiny blades/fins detailing atop the aft part of the rear fenders was a minus: the Valiant's treatment here was cleaner and better.

The Fencer's Mask Grille Fad of 1936

Even when American automobile design was evolving from discrete collections of parts to unified, "envelope" bodies during the period 1929-1949, fad and fashion did not take a holiday.

One styling fad was that of the "fencer's mask" grille that started in the 1935 model year, peaked in 1936 and was largely done by 1937.  These grilles were convex affairs that extended engine compartment ensembles about as far forward as the fronts of the fenders.

Which I think is why the fad collapsed so quickly.  Even in fairly minor frontal collisions, fenders and grilles could suffer damage.  The fenders could be pounded back into shape fairly easily in such events.  But the grilles with all their decorative bars and other details were more expensive to fix or replace.  So 1937 models featured grilles that were moved back a short ways and lost much or all of their convex shapes.

Roughly two-thirds of American brands took part in the fencer's mask fad.  Those that essentially didn't included Cadillac, LaSalle, DeSoto, Ford, Lincoln-Zephyr, Packard and Studebaker.  Those that did are shown below.

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1935 Oldsmobile
One the first fencer's mask grilles was on redesigned 1935 Oldsmobiles such as this one I photographed in Brussels a  few years ago.

1935 Pontiac with actress Helen Twelvetrees
The other early "mask" was on the '35 Pontiac that shared the Olds' body.  It also was the first year for the brand's famous (at the time) Silver Streaks.

1936 Buick - Barrett-Jackson photo
When Buicks were re-bodied for 1936, they too received a fencer's mask style grille.

1936 Chevrolet
The Chevrolet version's convexity was more restrained.

1936 Chrysler Airstream - for sale photo
Chrysler's fencer's mask fronts were extreme versions of the style.

1936 Dodge with movies star Ginger Rogers
Dodge shared Chrysler's body, but its grille is more restrained.

1936 Plymouth Mayflower - Mecum Auctions photo
Chrysler Corporation's entry-level Plymouth's grille thrusts about as far forward, but the painted central strip visually counteracts part of the convex effect.

1936 Hudson
Hudsons were redesigned for 1936 and received an especially fussy convex front.

1936 Nash Ambassador
The Nash fencer's mask version was clean-looking and raked back.

1936 Graham Cavalier - unsourced photo via Flicker
Like Plymouth, sheet metal diminishes the fencer's mask appearance on the Graham.

1936 Hupmobile - Streetside Classic photo
Hupp's grille is raked back in Nash's manner but nevertheless follows the fashion.

2015 Chrysler 200
This recent Chrysler 200 does not have a fencer's mask grille.  But its above-the-bumper grille-plus-headlights ensemble illustrates a theme on current cars that strikes me as being just as fad- or fashion-like as those grilles of 80 years ago were.

1940 Dodge's Segmented, Dual-Symmetrical Grille Design

While gathering images for my book How Cars Faced the Market, I noticed an unusual characteristic of the Dodge grille for the 1940 model year.  It was doubly-symmetrical with its four segments clearly defined.

Of course, simple geometric shapes can be symmetrical along two orthogonal axes.  A circle, for instance.  Or ovals, squares and rectangles.  Grilles with these shapes can be found -- especially the non-circle variety.

But the 1940 Dodge grille does not have a simple outline.  That, and the segment dividers are what make unique, or nearly so.

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Just for scene-setting fun, here is an advertising spread illustrated by Arthur Radebaugh (1906-1974), a guy who made many World of Tomorrow type images from the 1930s into the 1960s.

And here is what seems to be a factory photo of a '40 Dodge.

Now for that grille.  There is side-to-side symmetry if the axis of rotation is the prow of the car.  That is, the left and right sides have the same two-dimensional design.  Most automobile grilles can make this claim.  But then there is that painted metal running across the middle of the grille.  The parts above and below it (again from a two-dimensional, flattened perspective) can be pivoted on that axis bar.  This and the non-geometric outline of the grille are the unusual features.  Photo from Mecum auctions.

Angled Four-Eyed American Cars

Quad headlights, despite whatever technological improvements they embodied, had a negative impact on automobile aesthetics -- something I've always believed.  The reason is that the front of a car is its face.  Insects and a few other creatures excepted, we expect to see only two eyes, not one or four or more.  Four eyes or headlights seems unnatural.

Quads began appearing on some 1957 model U.S. cars and were common by the following model year.

A reader reminded me in an email that some quad headlights were arranged in a slanted manner rather than being placed vertically or side-by-side, and thought that might be a good subject for a blog post.  He was right, and this is that post.

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1958 Chevrolet Corvette
I think the quad-headlight facelift of 1957 Corvettes was a design-destroying event.  The side-by-side positioning seen here is the most common quad arrangement.

1956 Lincoln - Mecum Auctions photo
Let's now follow Lincoln headlights for model years 1956-1960.  The 1956 Lincoln in the above photo has conventional headlights.

1957 Lincoln
Lincolns were given a major -- unsuccessful -- facelift for 1957.  Quad headlights were introduced, and stylists gave them a stacked arrangement.

1958 Lincoln - Auctions America photo
1958 saw a complete redesign for Lincoln that resulted in a huge, unitary body.  Stylists apparently decided that side-by-side and stacked quad headlights were not very creative solutions to the four-headlight problem.  Their solution was to place them at an angle with the uppermost lights closest to the body's edge.

1959 Lincoln - Mecum Auctions photo
The 1959 facelift retained the angled arrangement, but include the headlights in the grille ensemble.

1960 Lincoln - Barrett-Jackson photo
1960 was the last year for this Lincoln body and the front end was lightly facelifted.  Redesigned 1961 Lincolns got side-by-side headlights.

1959 Buick - auction photo
Buick used slanted headlights only on its 1959 line.  This design is busy, but more successful than the others shown here thanks to the chromed strip along the front of the hood that continues along the sides of the car.

1961 Chrysler Newport - Barrett-Jackson photo
Chrysler went to angled headlight for 1961 and 1962.  Unlike the 1959 Buick, this design is uncluttered.  But the slanted lights created some unfortunate fussiness in the form of the oddly-shaped parking lights.

1961 DeSoto - RM Auctions photo
1961 was the last model year for DeSotos, and few were built.  The bumper, headlight positioning and parking lights are the same as that for the Chrysler in the previous photo.  The overall front ensemble is an ugly mess largely due to the odd upper grille element.  What a sad way for a fine brand to die.

1962 Chrysler Newport - sales photo
The main front-end change from 1961 is the grille detailing, though the headlight assemblies have darker background panels.  A more important change is the elimination of tail fins.

1962 Dodge Polara - Barrett-Jackson photo
Dodge stylists got "creative" with angled headlights for the 1962 Polara model, pulling an Old Switcheroo by having the highest headlights inbound and the lower ones at body's edge.

1963 Dodge Polara - Auctions America photo
The following year Polaras went to the conventional angle arrangement.

Thus more or less ended the American romance for slanted quad headlights.

Chrysler Cordoba 1975-77 Classical Details

Chrysler has a history of careening from prosperity to near-failure and back ... over and over again.  During the second half of the 1970s the corporation was in yet another downward drift, running out of money to develop new products while trying to comply with the increasing burden of government regulation of products.  Management became cautious regarding styling, in some cases marketing cars that looked quite similar to competing models.

There were a few exceptions, however.  One was the subject of this post, the Chrysler Cordoba (1975-1983), a sporty two-door model that sold well: background here.  Cordobas were given a facelift for 1978 that detracted from the initial styling theme, so I'll deal mostly with 1975-77 Corbodas here.

What interests me about 1975-77 Cordoba Styling is the inclusion of details borrowed from cars of the past.  There are three that matter.  One is the prominent rectangular grill and its integration to the hood.  This was nothing new, as Lincoln's Continental Mk. III of 1969 used Rolls-Royce as inspiration, and other makes were doing the same regarding Mercedes-Benz, as I posted here.  Another detail was small "opera windows."  The third was the arrangement of round headlights and running lights borrowed from Jaguar (see below).

What all this added up to was not "advanced" styling, but nevertheless a pleasant looking car until the facelift intervened and marred the theme.

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1975 Chrysler Cordoba

1975 Dodge Charger SE
To save its dwindling cash supply, Chrysler Corporation resorted to badge engineering on the Cordoba.  Above is the nearly-identical Dodge Charger.  The main differences are the grilles and the opera window treatment.

1961 (ca.) Jaguar Mark X
Compare this early-1960s Jaguar front end ensemble with that of the Cordoba and Charger shown above.

1976 Chrysler Cordoba - brochure spread
This shows rear-end styling.

1977 Chrysler Cordoba - front
The final front end before the facelift.

1978 Chrysler Cordoba - front
The facelifted front.  In place of the nice classical round lamps we find those ugly rectangular ones that polluted many designs during the 1970s and 80s.

America's 1970s Opera Window Fad

I'm inclined to blame management rather than styling staff for the fad featured in this post.  That's because the feature in question was essentially a non-functional (aside from generating sales) frivolity.  It was what was called "opera windows," perhaps a reference to features of certain horse-drawn carriages.

For mid-1970s American cars, opera windows were small windows placed on C-pillars so that distinguished back-seat passengers on their way to cultural events presumably could discretely peek out at the unwashed masses along the way.  Actually, I doubt that was ever the intent; the real intent was to add a bit of retro-sophistication to certain car models.

One thing I find a little puzzling is that they appeared in classical form on 1973 Lincolns while in the same model year some General Motors cars introduced somethings fairly similar in spirit.  Those were small rear-quarter windows that could be interpreted as large opera windows.  I suspect the reason for this same-year introduction by two different firms had to do with the usual auto industry grapevine along with reports from stylists hired from competing companies.

By the late 1970s every American car maker was selling some models with some sort of opera window feature.  And opera windows rapidly disappeared on 1980s models.

Below is a gallery showing some of those opera windows.

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1973 Lincoln Continental Mk. IV - Barrett-Jackson auction photo
An early instance on Ford's luxury brand.  The small oval window can be seen on the C-pillar.

1978 Lincoln Town Car - auction photo
Five years later there is one on a Lincoln four-door sedan.  Most cars featuring opera windows or something similar were two-door models.

1974 Mercury Cougar XR-7 - sales photo
Here is a squared-off opera window.

1977 Ford Thunderbird Coupe
An unusual variation is the small window on this Thunderbird's B-pillar.

1977 Ford Granada Sports Coupe
And then there are the louvered slit windows on this small Ford.

1973 Chevrolet Monte Carlo
The same year as the Lincoln in the top photo General Motors placed small quarter windows on this body used by several of its brands.

1978 Buick Riviera Coupe
Five years later we find a smallish quarter window surrounded by vinyl.

1975 Chrysler Cordoba
Chrysler did the same thing for its Cordoba.

1977 Chrysler New Yorker
An interesting variation on this New Yorker.  Note the unusual shape of the roof vinyl covering and the large C-pillar zone.

1975 Dodge Charger - auction photo
This Dodge has slotted opera windows.  Stylists seemed to be working overtime to come up with distinctive variations on the concept, as these images indicate.

1977 Plymouth Gran Fury Brougham
Chrysler's entry-level brand got a scaled-down version of opera window and vinyl shape as compared to the New Yorker shown earlier.

1978 AMC Concord D/L
Even American Motors, the smallest car maker, felt the need to join the opera window rush.