Standing maybe five-feet, nine inches tall, I take issue with the age-old adage that "size matters". Yes, I'll never play center for the Knicks or middle linebacker for the Jets but that has (or had) more to do with my lack of elite athletic ability than how tall I am. Yes, that's puckish, 13-year old me. Hapless center and linebacker for the Baldwin Bombers (Long Island, New York) back in 1977 and 1978.
If you're familiar with the story of Dodge's 1962-1965 880's, it seemed as though "size" was the impetus for its very existence in the first place. However, in my humblest of opines, it had less to do with size but with the styling of the car it technically replaced in the Dodge lineup. Our Facebook Marketplace find here is a 1963 Dodge Custom 880.
Legend has it that at a cocktail party at the Gross Pointe Country Club (above) in Detroit in late spring or early summer of 1960, then Chrysler President William Newburg overheard Chevrolet General Manager Ed Cole say that they were downsizing their lineup for 1962. Intel in hand and not to be outdone, Newburg ordered that 1962 Dodge and Plymouth full-size models, direct competitors to Chevrolet, be downsized. Immediately.
Engineers and designers worked around the clock and in record time whipped up smaller designs (above) that were more or less "upsized" versions of their, being kind, progressively styled 1960 compact models. And...they went over with a thud. In the blink of an eye, sales of Dodge and Plymouth's "big cars" dropped some 25-percent year over model year. And 1961 was not a banner year for Dodge and Plymouth sales either.
My blog, my opinion, that drop in sales had more to do with what was perceived as bizarre styling rather than how big the cars were. Case in point, although domestic cars were, in general, elephantine at the time, sales of far smaller imports were making inroads, American Motors' line of far smaller vehicles were selling well and Ford's compact Falcon, introduced in 1960, was, ahem, flying out of showrooms. America was ready, it seemed, for smaller cars. For the record, the smaller 1962 Plymouth and Dodge models (last two photos, above) were some seven-inches shorter than their 1961 counterparts. Some 500-pounds less heavy too. Taste being like armpits, I think they're fabulous looking. Especially, naturally, the two-door versions.
Akin to throwing a speeding car into reverse and then back into drive, to fill the, again, perceived void in Dodge's lineup, halfway through the 1962 model year, Chrysler repurposed a Chrysler Newport as the Dodge "Custom 880". Just like that, Dodge was back in the "big" car business. Oddly enough, Plymouth soldiered on with their smaller "full-size" cars through 1964. Then again, Plymouth was never really it's own, quasi-independent division like Dodge was.
The Dodge Custom 880 was somewhat different from a Chrysler Newport in that it had an updated front end from the 1961 Dodge Polara although it did have the newly "de-finned" rear from the '62 Newport. Look, ma! No tail fins! Sales were unimpressive as well for these cars with Dodge moving all of 18,000 of them for the second half of '62, approximately 28,000 for 1963 making our subject here quasi-rare.
For 1963, Dodge redesigned the front end and as the Big Three did back then in the era of "planned obsolescence", with almost annual substantive model updates, Dodge did a total redesign of the 880's body for 1964 with yet another significant reboot for 1965. Dodge dropped the "880" moniker for 1966 replacing it with "Monaco" which was built on Chrysler's updated-for-1965, traditionally full-sized or "standard sized" C-body platform.
Turned out, though, the intel that Newburg got regarding GM's downsizing was either wrong or mis-interpreted. GM wasn't downsizing their full-size line but was to introduce a new line of intermediate sized cars for 1964. What's more, for 1962, GM's full-size models were actually larger than they were in 1961. Whoops.
Newburg quickly left the company - although it was for improprieties and unethical business practices rather than being held accountable for ordering the haphazard redesigns. Haphazard redeigns that, again, my blog, my opine, were some of the best-looking cars Chrysler pushed out in the '60's. Your opinion may vary, see dealer for details.
Our Facebook Marketplace find here is for sale down in Ansted, West Virginia with a $4,750 asking price. And that's reduced from an initial ask of some $5,500. Poster claims it's been "in the family" for the better part of thirty years and we'd be hard pressed to find a better example of a car from this time period in the shape it's in for the money. I concur but only to a point. If this was a two-door, I'd whole heartedly agree. As this is, it's just some big, old car; albeit one with a fairly unique origin story. An origin story, mind you, I wouldn't pay a premium for. This is a $1,500-$2,500 car if you ask me.
No comments:
Post a Comment