Oldsmobile's Rocket of the Past

Oldsmobile Rocket 88 Advertisement: Life Magazine, January 19, 1953

Although NASA was still five years away from the public's collective conscience, rockets were already streaking across the cultural stratosphere in 1953.  Buck Rogers and his 25th Century exploits had been around for twenty-five years.  More than fifty years had already come and gone since Georges Méliès had taken that first Trip to the Moon.  And the grim, technological warfare that engulfed the world ten years before had been filled with the shriek of the German Army's nebelwerfer, the flash of the American Bazooka rocket launcher, and the terror inducing scream of the V-1 rocket and its supersonic cousin the V-2.  So it is not surprising that rockets, which have been around far longer than you might imagine, carried a great portion of Oldsmobile's advertising payload in the 1950's.

How long have rockets been around?
Just ask Alexander the Great,
as depicted by Conrad Kyser in
his "Bellifortis".  (circa 1405 AD)

Oldsmobile introduced the Rocket V8, the first mass-produced overhead valve V8 engine, in 1949.  (Plans were made to call it "Kettering Power", in honor of the project's chief engineer Charles Kettering, but the plans never made it off the launchpad, so to speak.)  The Rocket V8 would continue to be produced in some form until 1990.

But we're rocketing too far into the future.  Let's get back to to 1953.

If you were thinking of buying a new car that year, Oldsmobile wanted to get your attention.  And what better way to do it than a three-page spread in a January printing of Life Magazine?  Christmas has come and gone.  The kids are back in school.  It's cold outside and you're stuck indoors with the latest magazine, one of the few windows on the world at large available to you.  You turn the page, and there it is, streaking across the page: a golden rocket on a black and white background.  How could it fail to grab you by your imagination?

Can you believe it?  The Rocket you've been hearing your pals talk about, that wonder of the driving world, the Rocket V8, now has higher-power, higher compression and higher-voltage?  A full-on 165 horsepower?  (And that jerk co-worker was bragging about his '49 Rocket with a measly 135 HP!)  Maybe driving dad's '42 Ford Rattletrap for the last few years was worth it.  After all, the war's been over for eight years now, and money's not as tight as it was...and that is a really cool, sleek rocket...

You want a rocket.  Guys want rockets.  We all want a rocket!

And why wouldn't you?  Look what it says: the new "Ruling Power of the Road"...latest and greatest version of the most famous engine in automobile history.  Hey, it also says "see next page".

So turn the page already!

Oh yeah, you gotta buy this car.  And look what it says: it's the car you've been waiting for...most beautiful, most powerful ever built!  And it has the new Pedal-Ease Power Brakes (for quicker, surer stopping power!).  New Power-Ride Chassis?  New Power Styling?  That is crazy, as the kids are saying nowadays.

And boy does that hood look better than dad's Ford?  No contest.

Now, if only the wife won't complain too much when you use all your savings to get this baby.  But I'm sure she'd be happy if you bought one.  Just look at how happy that couple is:

The only real question is which model to buy?  The featured model in the ad is a "88 Holiday Coupe".  If its $2,673 price is a little high, you could grab the base model, which was re-christened for '53 as the "DeLuxe 88" for only $2,262.  But why settle for the base model when you could spend just a bit more, $2,395 for the "Super 88"?    Doesn't that sound...super?  Hey, just a wee bit more, $2,853, gets you in that convertible coupe.  Of course, there's always the step-up to the classic 98 series...but that's gonna cost you closer to three thousand dollars.

What the ad doesn't tell you is what Oldsmobile couldn't know at this time.  Due to a fire at GM's Livonia, Michigan Hydra-Matic transmission plant later in the year, thousands of the '53 Oldsmobile 88s would be built with the Buick two-speed Dyna-Flow transmissions.  Which one was a better transmission?  I'll let you readers debate that below.

All I know is I want a rocket.  A Rocket 88.  Don't you?

(Sales prices and production numbers found at HowStuffWorks.)

The Cars of Life--April 29, 1963

Life Magazine, April 29, 1963

Last week I highlighted the television war that raged in the pages of a 1957 edition of Life.  You can always be sure to find vibrant, full-page ads in that journal.  You can also get an idea of what the general public was buying at that time.  The more cynical observers out there might suggest that you can see what Madison Avenue wanted the public to buy.  In either case, flipping through an April '63 issue I could not help but notice its emphasis on cars.

In 1961, Ford and Chevrolet were neck in neck in the car production race.  Both of them produced 1.3 million vehicles, with Ford edging out its main rival by only a little more than 20,000 cars and trucks.  But in 1962 Chevrolet seemed ready to lap its rival Ford with a massive jump in sales.  That year saw Chevy streak ahead to 2 million vehicles produced, while Ford only reached 1.47 million.  The last time that had happened, in 1955 (Chevy increased from 1.1 to 1.7 and Ford from 1.1 to 1.4) production numbers fell off the next year.  This cycle is fairly steady in the history of car production.  However, in 1963, after the jump in production, the numbers increased yet again.

I suspect this is largely due to the fact that this was exactly 18 years after the end of World War II.  Baby Boomers were just turning eighteen, getting out of school, or at least getting jobs and beginning to buy cars.  The race had jumped into a different gear.  The car companies knew that even though it wasn't time yet to display next year's models, it was still worth it to push their present cars to the buying public.  And so the top car producers ordered up these full-page ads in the same issue of Life.

Oddly enough, the most luxurious car to enter the race in this issue was the only monochromatic car ad: Imperial's Lebaron four-door.  Since 1955 Chrysler had given its Imperial marque its own line, devoid of the Chrysler name.  And while designer Virgil Exner had made a name for himself with his "forward look", 1963 would be the last year he helmed Imperial's design.  It was the only year that the sloped trim actually wrapped all the way around the back of the body.  And although Imperial was known for its gunsight taillights you can see that the Lebaron did not use them.  It does, however, have the distinctive "Flitesweep Deck Lid", a fake tire bulge (imitating a Continental look) which had been an option from 1957 to 1961, and was brought back for 1963 by popular demand.

But the body styling was not the emphasis in this ad.  The ad-men, instead, pushed the comfort angle along with the "unaccustomed luxuries as standard equipment".  More legroom (due in part to the squared-off steering wheel), inside remote control of the side mirror, front door hidden storage compartments, automatic parking brake release, and a host of other power controls.  This one isn't being marketed for the young kids.  And Imperial only produced a little more than 14,000 cars that year.  This number would peak the very next year at 23,295.  Eventually, in 1976, Imperial was folded back into Chrysler.  Wunderkind Lee Iacocca revived the Imperial name for a short run in the 1980s, but it was never to have its own identity again.

Mercury was launched in 1938 by none other than Edsel Ford.  It was to be an entry-level line of luxury cars, a bridge between Ford and Lincoln.  But Mercury was in danger of being streamlined off the road in the 1960's due to the failure of--yeah, you might have guessed it--the Edsel.  Ford was in a little trouble, and Mercury faced some changes because of it.  Then billed as "Mercury, the man's car", the S-55 Monterey emphasized power.  This two-door sports a Marauder 390 V-8.  I'm not sure kids of today would see this car as a possible vehicle for mountaineering, but the boys at Ford declared that awesome "4-on-the-floor" stick-shift brought "oneness between you and your car...Effortless cornering, passing, and mountaineering."

Mercury was only rolling about 300,000 cars off the production line at this time.  It would peak in 1978 and 1979 above 600,000.  This is significant only to me, since my first car was a 1978 Mercury Monarch, a car I bought in 1988 for $1300.  I don't recall doing any mountaineering in it, but it was powerful and fun to drive.  Mercury's sales fizzled out after the new millennium and it finally died in 2011.

(Disclaimer: I drive a Pontiac, and my anger at GM for shuttering this brand is still at a high-level.)

In 1962, Pontiac overtook its rivals, Plymouth and Rambler, for the number three spot in the race.  It held this spot, just behind the big boys, for the rest of the decade, finally losing out to Plymouth, where Pontiac settled into fourth place for the entirety of the 1970s.  But in 1963 it was feeling pretty good.  Not only were they approaching their fortieth anniversary (in 1966) but they had recently seen the entire line of Pontiac models named as Car of the Year by Motor Trend magazine (1959).  Despite this success, however, and the spectacularly ornate designs which included such dazzling features as the twin v-shaped tailfins of the late fifties models, the early sixties models lost some of that glamour.  With more squared roofing and body designs, Pontiac, nevertheless, moved firmly into third place.

This ad, proudly displaying the front-end of a 1963 Catalina "Wide-Track" Station Wagon gives us a view of the split grille, which was first introduced in 1959.  It was dropped for 1960, only to be brought right back the next year.  A variation of this has been on the majority of models for Pontiac, up to and including my own 2005 Grand Am.  It was also in 1959 that the arrowhead emblem with the star in its center became what was ultimately Pontiac's final symbol.  This station wagon is lauded for "all those people-coddling things that wagons should have as standard equipment but often don't."  Pure poetry.

By the 1980s, the Pontiac line was in decline, dropping to fifth and sixth place early in that decade.  However, in 1987 it surged back to third place and held that spot for more than ten years.  In what can only be described as yet another dirty, back-stabbing attack on the Indians, Pontiac's life was snuffed out by GM in an attempt to save their own hide due to terrible management of the entire GM family of cars at the start of the new millennium, finally ending production of this noble fleet of cars in 2009.

I find it interesting that Ford, fighting to get back to number one, ran a truck ad in Life instead of its Galaxie, the high-volume rival to Chevy's Impala and Pontiac's Catalina.  I would expect this truck ad to be in Progressive Farmer or maybe The Saturday Evening Post.  But here we see an F-100, one of Ford's models in their fourth generation of trucks.  This design, restyled in 1961 to be lower and longer than previous generations, only lasted for five years.  The emphasis here is on its durability, despite its smart looks and smooth ride.  Ford copy-writers did want readers to notice that this truck had a "Comfort-Conditioned Custom Cab" with a full five inches of cushion under the driver and 23 pounds of insulation around him.  That's right, I said him.  Don't try to tell me that there were many women driving pickups in 1963.  Maybe Ellie May Clampett did now and then, if Jethro didn't throw a fit.  But not many more than that.

I don't think Ford's decision to push the pickup truck in Life was the right way to chase down Chevy.  They wouldn't overtake Chevy for the lead in the race until 1966, and that was only because they produced a mere 5,776 more vehicles that year.  They wouldn't hold the top spot for two years in a row until 1970-71.

 In 1960, Chevy took a beating from Ford in the small car category.  Chevy was depending on its rear engine Chevrolet Corvair to wow young families, but it was the Ford Falcon that stole the show.  In an unprecedented hurry, Chevy designed and produced the Chevy II in eighteen months.  According to Chevy, it combined "maximum functionalism with thrift."  Sounds to me like wearing socks with sandals.  Maximum ventilation with warmth.  But in this ad, Chevy wants us to ponder another combination: thrift with sport.  Here they are taking this basic, stripped down compact and trying to get the attention of all those young baby-boomers just getting out of school, I suppose.  Let's give their copy-writers a chance to win us young (at-heart) people over to the Chevy II:

"Under the hood you've got a peppery 6-cylinder engine.  Smooth, dependable, eager to do about everything but run through a gallon of gas.  (From the way it nurses the stuff, in fact, you're likely to suspect that it goes around making its own.)...The package comes on either convertible or hardtop.  Either way gives you plenty of ginger--without a lot of needless gingerbread."

Wow.  This car nearly makes its own gasoline.  I'll fall for that.  And then there's all that ginger.  I haven't a clue what ginger is on a car, but I can see this one's got ginger in spades.  Fan-tastic!

The Chevy II, a Nova that eventually dropped the "Chevy II" in its name in 1969, came with a 4-cylinder engine, which could be upgraded to that peppery straight-6.  A third option made this a popular choice for drag-racers: a dealer-installed V-8.  It wasn't until the next year, 1964, in trying to fend off stiff competition from the brand-new Chevelle, that a factory V-8 became available.  That Super Sport option offered in the ad cost $161.40.  But don't forget all that ginger your $161.40 bought.  I don't know what that works out to per pound of ginger, but it can't be too bad.

Nova lived on until 1979 when it was replaced by the underwhelming Chevy Citation.  It could not sustain a short revival in the late eighties, and is now just a memory.

So these were your choices as you read your Life magazine in April of '63.  Which car would you have chosen as a winner?

And since every car needs oil, I'm tossing in the below oil advertisement that was also in this issue.  I'll let the ad speak for itself.

US Automobile Production Figures can be found here.

A Richer Life: The Image of the American Dream in 1950

General Motors and the American Dream

At the center of a small town people pass each other on the street, stopping to chat, kids show off their new toys to their friends, packages tucked under their arms, boxes wrapped in brown paper.  At the supermarket the special is Rib Roast.  Across the intersection at the appliance shop you can see a great white Frigidaire refrigerator displayed in the window.  It is not a hot day; jackets are worn by all save a few ladies and children who grabbed a sweater that morning.  But the sun is shining on the green hills outside of town.

It is a perfect day.

I forgot to mention the traffic.  There are cars scattered around the intersection.  A big dark Buick Eight has the right of way as it passes the post office.  There are a few GMC pickups parked at the grocery store.  A Pontiac or two, a few Chevys and Oldsmobiles.  A Cadillac.  What you won't see is a Ford or a Mercury.  No Hudson, no Studebaker.  Not in this town.  Not a chance.

You see, this town was designed and created by General Motors.  The town isn't real.  It's just an image that is printed in brilliant color for magazine readers to enjoy.  To look over.  To imagine that their lives could be a little better, a little richer, a lot more like the American Dream.

Because when you buy a car from the General Motors family, you're getting a "key to a richer life".  After all, their motto is "More and Better Things for More People".  You can't argue with that.

Let's let the GM PR department give us their own take on the small town life.:

This is Main Street, U.S.A.  It is unlike any other Main Street anywhere else in the world.

It is rich in contentment and well-being.  It bustles with hearty and wholesome activity.  And as you see and know firsthand, it revolves very largely around the family car.

Along every Main Street in America, General Motors cars are a familiar and trusted part of the rich, full life Americans know.  And this is so, very largely, because General Motors men have never ceased trying to improve on their best, have never flagged in their zeal to build better cars each year than they built the year before.

Because of their practiced skill in Research, Engineering and Production, the key to a General Motors car is recognized today as the key to greater value.  It is perhaps not too much to say that it is likewise the key to a rich and satisfying life.

It is, perhaps, too much to say.  But they said it anyway.

I love these old illustrations.  I can't find the name of the artist who did this great scene.  If anyone out there knows it let me know.  I'm also intrigued by the very small print which says "Hear Henry J. Taylor on the air every Monday evening over the ABC Network, coast to coast."  I could Google his name, but I wanted to see if any of you readers know who he was.

So enjoy the rest of the day here in General Motors land.  As you can see, it's just the right sort of day to take your toy airplane along on a trip downtown.  After all, your dad bought a GM car, and that means your life will be better and even a little richer.

Well, at least that's what they said back in 1950.

Four Reasons Our Roads Will Never Be Beautiful Again

  It is very frustrating for me to look back through old advertisements and realize how far removed we have become from a time when cars were works of art.  At the present time, most of our cars look like Toyota Camrys.  They are mostly little shoe boxes with their edges rounded off.  The grills are unforgettable.  The colors standard.  The look is pedestrian.  No wonder Pontiac went out of business.  How can a car company stay in business when all of the cars look the same?  I might set out to buy a Honda, but I could just as easily buy a Toyota or a Chevy and feel like I've bought the car I was looking for.  Who can tell them apart?  And who wants to?  They all look like the cheap knock-off die-cast cars that were not designed from any real automotive lines.  You know the ones I mean, the ones you could buy from the little toy section in the grocery store or the ones at the Five and Dime.  (That's a Dollar store for you kids today.  My favorite Five and Dime was the Ben Franklin, which was a wonder to wander through as a seven-year-old.)

  This is the 1958 Pontiac Bonneville.  Billed as Motoring's Action-packed Aristocrat!  That distinctive rear panel slot makes me think it is designed to be grabbed by a futuristic robotic arm for advanced parking.  This baby was the Pace car for the 1958 Indianapolis 500.  Sweet.

   Virgil Exner hit a home run with the 1956 DeSoto.  His new look, billed as the Forward Look, which included this super-awesome triple tail-light catapulted DeSoto's sales to record highs.  The DeSoto Fireflite convertible was the Pace car for Indy in 1956.  Incredibly, Chrysler discontinued the DeSoto brand just four years later.  Well, Chrysler was never known for their great decision making.  (Google the K car if you don't believe me.)

    Not to be outdone by Chrysler's Forward Look, Buick decided that if the public wanted chrome, they would get chrome.  In spades!  Actually, in squares: 160 chrome squares, to be exact.  The 1958 Buick Fashion-Aire Dynastar grille was meant to reflect light like nothing before.  This beautiful girl rolled down the road shining like a trophy wife's diamond necklace.  Too much?  Nah, I don't think so.

   Of course, if you know me, I'm going to get the '57 Chevy Bel Air into this discussion.  Is there any better classic look?  I was surprised to learn that the '57 Ford actually outsold Chevy that year, though it is suggested that Chevy's switch to the tubeless tire scared away sales.  Ford's Fairlane certainly had attractive features, and I'll let the motor-heads argue over who had the better engine, but I just don't think the Ford matches up against the Chevy look.  But either way, the Chevy or the Ford are clearly far better designs from the artistic standpoint that a new Ford Focus or a Chevy Volt.

  Seriously, folks, what happened?  I wasn't there, during that transition time from 1960 to the 1980's, but I've heard there was a great deal of drugs being spread throughout the collective culture.  Perhaps that's the reason these gorgeous vehicles aren't made any more.  You can blame it all on the oil crisis in the '70s, but that is no excuse for the loss of aesthetics.
  I have trouble understanding how any car maker cannot see the potential for reviving these kinds of designs.  Even the underpowered Chrysler PT Cruiser and Chevy's HHR grabbed a bit of the spotlight due to their slightly retro looks.  I've been saying this for years to my family members, who must now be tired of hearing it, that if Chevy put out a retro Bel Air that brought back the look with modern conveniences, it would sell like hotcakes.  Anyone out there listening?


  As an end note to this post, I have now run Room With No View for a full year.  Thanks to everyone who peeks in from time to time to find out what's been on my mind or in the cross hairs of my camera.  I hope you always enjoy my posts, and keep checking back for another year.  If you haven't already, click the follow button, as this makes me feel like someone out there likes me, and would follow me like everyone followed Gene Hackman in The Poseidon Adventure.  I know, half of those people died, but I think I could do better than that.  And always share the posts you like with your friends.  The more readers, the more the world will eventually be converted to my way of thinking.  And that's not bad!