General Motors, Decline and Fall,

1980 – 2009

William Sundwick

Founded in Flint, Michigan in 1908, the corporation that ushered in the automobile age in America and came to dominate the nation’s industrial economy by the 1970s, declared Chapter 11 bankruptcy just after celebrating its centennial.

What happened?

In 1980, journalist/folklorist Ed Cray published his history of that corporation, Chrome Colossus: General Motors and Its Times. GM then held a 46 per cent share of the domestic U.S. auto market. Cray notes it had been over 50 per cent in the early to mid-1960s, inviting threats of anti-trust action from Congress, amplifying anger at GM manufacturing decisions concerning safety and lethargic pursuit of emissions reduction. The Boards of Directors in those days were confident they could ride over these assaults. They were right -- so long as sales and employment were strong and stock valuation high. I certainly felt no insecurity growing up as a teenager in a Flint GM family!

But there was an unseen threat building, starting in the 1970s, which should have foretold a deepening challenge to GM’s place in the automotive market.

It came from Japan, with its much younger automobile industry looking toward export markets, not just in the U.S., but around the world. The first Toyotas and Datsuns appeared on the West Coast in the late 1950s. A curiosity at first with little penetration even in California. But that penetration grew and went nationwide by the mid-70s. GM management did recognize that there was something peculiarly competitive about Japanese manufacturing. They sought to learn more about it via partnership with Toyota. NUMMI (New United Motors Manufacturing, Inc.) was formed in the early ‘80s at a closed GM plant in Fremont, California (since sold to Tesla). It produced both Chevrolets and Toyotas side-by-side on the same assembly line.

But NUMMI failed to change “The General.” What General Motors couldn’t understand was that the secret of Japanese manufacturing, and growing preference of U.S. consumers, had nothing to do with efficiency of the machinery in the plant. It was not the “culture” of employees (the old GM workers were rehired in Fremont). Instead, it was mainly the culture of management. The Fremont plant was run differently from other GM assembly plants, following the Japanese model. But apparently, corporate management failed to notice a fundamentally different job design. Workers in Fremont rotated among many different jobs, rather than simply tightening the same bolt every day for an eight-hour shift on thousands of cars.

GM had advance warning of this problem from the wildcat strike at Lordstown, Ohio in the early ‘70s – where sabotage led to slowdowns and generally low production quality of the new “import killer” small car launched there, the Chevrolet Vega. Production rates were punishing, workers took it out on the product. Yet corporate management took no notice. After the “experiment” at NUMMI, Japanese style “relational management” never spread to other plants. The Vega’s design was considered flawed, too, not merely its manufacturing quality. General Motors could not see its employees as anything more than cost centers, whether hourly and salaried engineers. The public could see the effects.

“Corporate culture” has become a popular trope over the last thirty years. It probably had its origin in the sad story of General Motors’ decline. The corporation had its beginning in the early days of the automobile, in an environment analogous to how we thought of Silicon Valley in the 1980s. It was where entrepreneurial ventures based on engineering advances were the foundation of economic growth. Billy Durant, the founder of the corporation, was the embodiment of that entrepreneurial, risk-all, American myth that surrounded figures like Steve Jobs in later times. Durant’s genius (some would call it recklessness) was his willingness to take a chance on a bevy of garage tinkerers he met in Michigan. The first of them was Flint mechanic David Buick, struggling with his own version of a horseless carriage. His Buick automobile was the brand that started General Motors. Durant, however, did not build the GM corporate culture. The myth of that industrial spirit was, instead, created by Alfred P. Sloan. Sloan led an ever more centralizing corporate Board through the 1920s and 1930s. The stable of brands assembled by Durant and his early associates had all been managed independently at the engineering and production level. They always had shared technology and parts, but Sloan made them mere “divisions,” subservient to the General Motors Board of Directors, directed jointly from Detroit and Wall Street. Sloan was the archetype modern corporatist.

Sloan organized the corporation around profit centers and marketing concepts. Any original ideas for products or engineering had to clear rigorous financial hoops – the “bean counters.” The overwhelming strength of the industrial engine this strategy created caused General Motors to be perceived as a key factor for allied victory when World War II came. Its then-president, William S. Knudsen, became FDR’s head of the War Production Board.

But, after the war, that old, inherently conservative, midwestern corporate culture returned -- unable to focus its marketing on anything but the ego-enhancing product differentiation that Sloan had pioneered starting in the 1920s. The five automotive brands that GM successfully hawked during the postwar years (Chevrolet, Pontiac, Buick, Oldsmobile, and Cadillac) were distinguished mostly by size and flash – what would today be called “bling.” All were built on a similar platform with more engineering in common than unique. Chevrolets and Cadillacs were built during the period to be fundamentally the same, different enough only to make a convincing argument that the higher-priced brand was somehow “better.” This was, of course, illusion – manufacturing standards and quality control were identical at all GM plants.

GM corporate culture could not grasp the reason for the increasing success of Japanese imports through the 1970s and ‘80s. It was not their cars’ designs, but a combination of several factors. There was the above-mentioned relational style of management in plants (and with suppliers); the uncomfortable fact that legacy costs were low at the much younger Japanese firms (not as many retirees collecting pensions and benefits); and, yes, a less risk-averse product-planning style, greater willingness to take chances on new designs without the relentless bottom-line calculations, the Wall Street side, that dominated GM decision-making. It was the old company, Toyota the young company!

When the UAW chose to strike General Motors in 2007, the walkout lasted three days. But three days lost production was not enough to change GM’s ways. Market share in the U.S. by then was down to only 20 per cent, a far cry from thirty years earlier. The public had caught on, even if management had not. GM was a global enterprise, but European market share was declining as well, and China was just getting started. South American (primarily Brazilian) operations were significant, but not on the scale of North American or European. When Wall Street was hit by the 2008 crash, the General finally took off his stars and filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in 2009, the corporation’s 101^st anniversary. Only a massive U.S. government bailout saved GM from liquidation.

Arising from the ashes, the “new” General Motors, General Motors Company, LLC, promised to be leaner and better – not necessarily meaner. But global market share, even after selling off subsidiaries, and shuttering brands (Hummer, Opel, Pontiac, Saab, Saturn, others), has not revived over the ensuing decade. By 2019, U.S. market share had eroded even further, to about 17 per cent. Had the General learned anything?

CEO Mary Barra has flirted with new products, especially electric vehicles, and claims the company will transition completely to EVs (well, 70 per cent by 2040), but we’ll see. The plug-in hybrid Chevy Volt was discontinued in 2019, with no replacement named. Lordstown, site of the painful wildcat strike decades earlier, was not reconfigured, but closed – then sold to a start-up who will manufacture all-electric pickup trucks there soon. Will the GM Cruise Division, formed to manufacture autonomous vehicles at its Hamtramck plant, ever see the light of day?

If I were a prudent investor, I would not buy GM stock.

Arrival and Insertion, 1953-62

The Flint Series, Chapter 3

William Sundwick

Flint grew rapidly in the early fifties. The 1950 Census pegged its population at about 163-thousand, but by 1960 it was 197-thousand. We all noticed it.

New neighborhoods, like our Ballenger Highway neighborhood, were adding single family houses, in ours mostly “ranch-style” (often called “ramblers” on the East Coast), at such a rate that services couldn’t keep up.

Schools needed to be expanded quickly. Since the nearest elementary school to us was over a mile away (no buses), four hastily erected prefab “primary units” for grades K-3 served as a stopgap.  These one room units, identical except for paint color, were in use until we moved out in 1965, when the new Anderson Elementary School finally opened in the neighborhood.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow Elementary/Junior High School had been built on Chevrolet Avenue in 1928, only a few blocks north of the old “Chevy in the Hole” complex. This was the original dedicated Chevrolet and Buick assembly location, built in the teens. From 4^th grade on, I was deemed capable of walking safely the short mile from my house to the school.

It was a pleasant enough walk, except in winter when Flint became frozen tundra for four months.  I seldom had to walk alone, always accompanied by chums in my grade. It was a friendly neighborhood, with many kids my age.

We strolled down Winona Street four blocks to Mackin Road, then east on Mackin another five blocks. It was a big school compared to those one-room prefab primary units. There was a spacious playground, a gym, and a library.

My friends included Abe, who lived on Mackin Road – I stopped at his house each morning to pick him up, and we walked together. He was the elder son of Holocaust survivors who had somehow found themselves in Flint, moving from New York (Brooklyn?) a couple years earlier.

There was also Charles. He walked from his house on Begole Street a block away, and we would proceed from there. Some tensions arose later with Charles, as our world views took on shades of plant management. His dad was my father’s subordinate at Ternstedt.

My cousin John Sundwick, the youngest of my Uncle Bob’s three kids, was a year behind me in school, and lived only about four blocks away on Lavender Street; but, alas, our Elementary School paths never crossed, since school districts in Flint placed the boundary between Civic Park Elementary and Longfellow between us. Ballenger Highway was an insurmountable barrier to walking without crossing guards or lights, for kids our age. In Junior High, defined as grades 7-9, the “other Flint Sundwicks” lived in Florida, returning later to the Flint area.

In those frigid winter months, or on any rainy days, I remember rides proffered only by my own mother. Other moms didn’t seem to step up. Did they not have access to a car? In Flint? That’s possible, since there might not have been many two-car families in our predominantly working-class neighborhoods. Mom’s 1953 Chevy did yeoman’s service for seven years.

Michael Moore, in his memoir about growing up in Flint, “Here Comes Trouble” (2011), declared mid-century industrial Flint a relatively classless society. He wrote of living on the same block with doctors and lawyers, even though his own father was an hourly-rate assembly line worker at AC Spark Plug .  The same was true in my Ballenger Highway neighborhood – indeed, except for my own closest friends, I had no idea what people’s dads (and moms) did for a living. It was never a topic of conversation. And, even somebody as class-conscious as my mother, who put much effort into “social climbing” (allegedly for my dad’s career), would never say an unkind word about any of our neighbors, their income, education, or social status.

I learned later, in high school, that the Ternstedt people, except my friend Charles’ family, were ensconced in wealthier neighborhoods in town.

As the sixties arrived, our neighborhood was completed. The newest houses were somewhat larger and fancier than the originals like ours. Split levels appeared in the late fifties. And we learned that some people moving into them were part of a “professional” class, self-employed (especially doctors, tax accountants, funeral directors) – not necessarily reliant on General Motors for employment.

This change may have separated our neighborhood from the adjoining old Civic Park neighborhood, which was expressly built by GM for its workers in the teens and twenties. Despite the abandoned houses, vacant lots, and ghostly shell of an empty Haskell Community Center, a historical marker at Bassett Park, its former centerpiece, still stands to recognize this. Civic Park epitomizes the “old” Flint better than any other neighborhoods on the west side of town. It may symbolize the death of the city as well.

 I always noticed what kind of cars were in my neighbors’ driveways. Back then, people changed cars frequently, typically every two years. They all had a sense of loyalty to Mother GM, apparently reasoning they could secure their own paychecks by buying its cars. Almost always Buicks and Chevrolets, the specific model, equipment, etc. waxed large in my observation. But we were the only folks in the neighborhood with a new Cadillac every year, from 1954-1958, until Dad’s career flatlined after his first coronary. We immediately switched to Chevy.

We did have two cars still, and a garage for them. Did the neighbors talk, when my dad courageously switched to the lowest-priced “stripped down” Chevy in 1958? My mom was embarrassed, and she told us as much! I had grown fond of the Cadillacs, too, but looking back I now understand my dad’s rather powerful social statement. Why did we care, really, about the Caddies? Did it matter what the neighbors thought?

My world changed when I entered Flint Central High School for the 1962-63 school year. It was the Harvard of Flint public high schools, the oldest (1923), situated near the Flint College and Cultural Center. And, all I had to do to get there was live in its district, which included a narrow swath on the west side of town (perhaps drawn for racial gerrymandering or integration?). It also included the “East Village” neighborhood – home to Flint’s old money, and intellectual elite.

It was a new world, indeed. Eventually, it led to a strong desire to escape! 

Selling an Old Name to a New Demographic

Cadillac’s “Break Through” Campaign and the GM Malady

William Sundwick

Picture, if you can, the typical Cadillac of the 1990s. It was probably a De Ville or Fleetwood Brougham. Big, posh, a veritable land yacht. There was the elegant little Allante sports car and, by 1999, the Escalade truck, but nobody at Cadillac had discovered how to market these aberrations to the Florida retirement community consumer, the demographic best understood at the time.

Cadillac needed to discover younger buyers – boomers in their fifties, not the retirees of the “greatest generation” purchasing what might be their last car. The target customers were buying BMWs, Volvos, Mercedes, then Audis. Why? There were many reasons, but marketing was a big one.

General Motors was, indeed, beset by some deep structural problems in the nineties. Fixed costs (both labor and capital equipment) were eating into profits. And, a series of strategic decisions beginning in the sixties had the effect of hollowing out the engineering pool needed for product innovation. Reorganizations, especially the BOC-CPC structure of 1984 (Buick-Olds-Cadillac/Chevrolet-Pontiac-Canada), exacerbated the decline of both quality and engineering creativity.

But, it was the gradual disappearance of its traditional customer base that was the Cadillac brand’s specific problem – it was an actuarial issue. Cadillac buyers may have been drawn to the brand going far back into their collective memories. But, frankly, they were dying off. The affluent younger greneration in their fifties and early sixties, whom Cadillac needed, was underwhelmed by Cadillac’s “standard of the world” slogan, dating from the 1910s. The Cadillacs they saw now belonged to their parents’ cohort.

Boomers were getting press in the nineties and aughts because they seemed to have a very different ethos than the generation before them. They were cast as a “Peter Pan Generation” –  refusing to grow old even in middle age. They were attracted to the edgy, the independent, the counter-cultural. Their classic rock music had stuck, their fitness fetishes caused gyms to sprout on every corner, and women were now as likely as men to be in the appropriate economic strata. These led to clear preferences for smaller, more agile, cars. Many boomers were now reaching the level of personal financial resources that Cadillac marketing was pursuing.

Enter the “Break Through” campaign – its first TV spot was at the 2002 Super Bowl. Rumors had been circulating in the advertising world of an undisclosed princely sum that Cadillac had paid for the rights to a 31-year-old Led Zeppelin song, “Rock and Roll.” It became the centerpiece for an advertising campaign that would last five years before it was finally pulled. There were several TV commercials featuring the song, which became indelibly associated with Cadillac, even among those aficionados who knew the song previously.

The new, naughtier, image that Cadillac was trying to create was not all smoke and mirrors. GM revamped the product line in serious ways – with the small CTS sedan, an entirely new platform for the larger STS, and in 2003, a Cadillac “Corvette,” the XLR.

Both Robert Plant and Jimmy Page thought the licensing terms fair. It was the first song they had ever licensed for a TV commercial. It may have been the first time ANY song from the “classic rock” period was licensed for a TV commercial.

There were other fronts in the campaign besides the music and TV commercials. The automotive press was regaled with track competition for Cadillac models (last seen when Cadillacs competed at Le Mans in the early fifties). The CTS-V, with its supercharged Corvette V8, was dubbed “world’s fastest production sedan” after besting all competitors around the Nurburgring Grand Prix circuit. Indeed, it set a record for lap time at that German course in 2008.

More of the edginess theme could be found in the well-publicized preference among professional athletes for a Cadillac truck – the Escalade. Escalades became synonymous with African-American “bling.” All these things -- the music, the racing, the urban flash – helped boost Cadillac 2003 sales figures by 16 percent.

Cadillac was beginning to reacquire some of the panache those of us old enough to remember the fifties had formerly associated with the make. Too bad for GM that the rest of their lineup didn’t receive equally successful marketing campaigns. Oldsmobile, for instance, died with a whimper at about the same time – its “not your father’s Oldsmobile” campaign had fizzled a few years earlier.

Was it the cars, or was it just that music, that brought Cadillac success? Let’s look at the cars. Compared to Cadillac’s competitors at the time, BMW clearly had the greatest following, and prestige.  Lexus was a little stodgy, Audi was yet to hit its stride, and Mercedes was sharing BMW’s strength with a slightly older demographic. Lincoln was already a non-entity as a competitor. The BMW customer was the “Break Through” campaign’s target. Cadillac’s CTS sedan was intended as a 3-series killer, the STS was squarely aimed at the 5-series, and the DTS would continue to aim at the geriatric crowd (and some Mercedes models). Escalades were aimed at an American high-end urban demographic, not averse to trucks – a market never penetrated by the Germans or Swedes. Volvo still made most of its sales in its lower end models (more Buick than Cadillac?). Lexus saw itself straddling that demographic, too. For the first time in recent memory, Cadillac’s lineup seemed competitive.

Teutonic engineering and style was what Cadillac tried to copy. The precision, the authority, the innovation, styling that was solid, yet sleek, and a sterling reputation for quality. These were BMW’s claims to leadership in the luxury segment. Unfortunately, the paucity of engineering talent at GM forced Cadillac to settle for marketing an image of engineering innovation, and revamped styling,. The reality was still lacking – speed, as in the staged Nurburgring event, would have to substitute for solid engineering.

 The initial boost from the campaign began to wane after the first year. There was a second Super Bowl commercial in 2003. The scene was a New York subway train with advertising posters for Cadillacs from the fifties as the train moved through time to today, and through the windows we could see the current Cadillac line. It may have been too urban-oriented for the Zeppelin sound track. Nevertheless, Cadillac stuck with the campaign, and the music, until 2006. It was succeeded by the “Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit” campaign, with more of a country flair. But, that campaign was less successful, perhaps due to a lack of affluent buyers in the target demographic.

The urban orientation seen in the 2003 spot was a signal that future Cadillac marketing would become much more focused on the upper-middle-class professionals who live in large metro areas. It was probably inspired by the continued success of the Escalade and the growing concentration of wealth in cities.

So far, however, this new focus has not paid off. Cadillac sales are again in the doldrums. Perhaps moving Cadillac brand HQs to New York’s soho neighborhood will inspire new strategic thinking. Except that nobody in New York buys cars!

Is the corporation the problem? Could it be that General Motors just can’t decide where Cadillac belongs? GM market share has been increasing over the last couple years, but no thanks to Cadillac – it’s seems mainly driven by Chevrolet now, and newer crossovers from GMC and Buick.

GM’s 2009 bankruptcy forced another realignment. The “new GM” would be much leaner, freed from onerous UAW contracts, and could raise up some bright young engineering talent within its ranks. The new focus would be on technology – both manufacturing and car design. It’s noteworthy that plug-in hybrids and all-electrics are now being developed by GM faster than anybody else in the U.S. market except Tesla. Cadillac, for its part, is seeking to unveil a more extensive semi-autonomous driving package than any other domestic make. Coming soon.

The new marketing target for Cadillac is Generation-X. They are as different from their boomer parents as the boomers were from their parents. Gen-Xers still value independence and edginess, but are less concerned with social status than their elders, more pragmatic. They are less easily intimidated by group pressure. And, they are financially less secure than their elders – worrying about how to pay for their kids’ college!

All this may lead them to make more conservative choices in cars. A new marketing campaign for GM’s luxury brand could be a serious challenge for that old Cadillac crest. We’ll see if the current urban focus is the correct one.

 What We Drove, and Why

One Family’s Car Culture, GM Style – 1950-1970

(Sundwick Automotive Photo Library, Part IV)

William Sundwick

We were not a typical family, even for Dearborn or Flint. Dad was a committed General Motors “lifer” – a salaried engineer, destined by the end of his career to be at the top rungs of “plant-level” management. We were required to own GM products; it was a moral responsibility.

And, we had to change them frequently – advertising, of sorts. The family corporate discount on new cars probably didn’t exceed 20%. So, my dad took a bath when he traded every year. Surely, his salary wouldn’t compensate for that. He felt he had the civic obligation to visibly promote the General’s products.

My earliest car memory dates from the summer I turned three. I have a distinct image imprinted in

my deepest consciousness, unsupported by a family photograph, but reinforced by my father when I described the scene as an adult. It’s an image of a sunny day, me walking out the kitchen door to see a new shiny green 1950 Chevrolet in the driveway. I remember the detail of the chrome grille and bumpers, I remember that it was a trunk-back “Styleline” two-door sedan (as opposed to the “Fleetline” fastback body style). Yes!” exclaimed my dad, “that was our ’50 Chevy!” Why do I remember it? Mysteries of early cognitive development, I guess.

Perhaps the reason it was not recorded in the family photo album is because it was not a particularly remarkable event. It was just another new car – even then, when Dad was a relatively junior engineer at the Detroit Ternstedt plant (GM’s “hardware” division), he traded cars every year. Each was indelibly recorded in my mind’s eye, even as they were just routine for my parents.

I remember our upgrade from Chevrolet to Oldsmobile in 1952. The rationale was that we were planning an ambitious road trip to the Rocky Mountains that summer. Dad felt he needed V8 power to climb the mountains in Wyoming, where we had plans to stay at a “dude ranch” there (a popular tourist destination in those days). That ’52 Olds 88 was the least expensive V8 in the GM line, a two-door sedan like the previous Chevys (no sporty “hardtops,” or even white sidewalls, for my father’s spartan taste).

Moving from Dearborn to Flint in the Summer of 1953, shortly after the F5 Beecher tornado laid waste to a big swath of the latter, I found myself in alien territory. It felt like the “frontier.” Our new construction house was in a development on the edge of town, lacking sidewalks or even paved streets at first. We packed our belongings into another spartan two-door, a 1953 Chevy “210” series. It was two-tone brown, and would be my mother’s car for an unprecedented seven years. In Flint, we needed two cars for the first time. My mom needed to get out into our new community. We had relatives there – but, Mom had bigger plans. She was going to college! The local junior college (now called Mott College) expanded to become the Flint branch of the University of Michigan.  She would be in its first graduating class, 1960. As a part-time student she needed a car. That ’53 Chevy was it for the duration, nearly six years.

Dad meanwhile was assuming increased responsibility at the new Ternstedt plant on Coldwater Road. It would join many other GM manufacturing centers around the city. There were Buick “city” on the North side, and old “Chevrolet No. 1” on Chevrolet Avenue (dating back to the very first Chevys, in the teens). Fisher Body No. 1, almost as old, and scene of the famous 1936-37 sit-down strikes which gave birth to the UAW, and the halcyon days of the American labor movement. There was AC Spark Plug on the eastern edge of town, where my uncle worked in sales (also the workplace of Flintoid Michael Moore’s father).

 But, GM was engaged in massive expansion in fifties Flint – in addition to Ternstedt, there was the Van Slyke Chevrolet complex, which doubled or tripled Chevrolet capacity over old No. 1. It included the legendary “V8 engine plant” – hallowed ground for American car buffs.

Flint was rapidly becoming a “real city” – at first, the explosive population growth seemed to have no limits, but eventually dark clouds began to gather. By high school my entire cohort vowed never to return to Flint after college. We thought it a city without a soul.

Climbing the GM corporate ladder – even at the plant level – required symbols of authority, so my

father bought a succession of five Cadillacs in the mid-fifties. Their main purpose was to park in his reserved space in the plant’s lot – “Mr. Sundwick, Process Engng.”  But, they were also comfortable fun for our annual summer road trips. We traveled to Wisconsin (Mom’s family), New England, the Upper Peninsula (more Sundwick relatives); and ultimately, California in 1958, the last Cadillac.

To emphasize the utilitarian nature of these otherwise ostentatious rides, Dad selected entry level “62 Coupes” – they had whitewall tires by this time, but little else. There were roll-up windows, no A/C, no automatic headlight dimmers on the dash. The one exception was a 1956 Sedan de Ville, a four-door “hardtop” with power windows and power seat. Still no air (it was Michigan, after all).

At age 49, Dad suffered a serious heart attack, in the fall of 1956. His career path was truncated, since he was now a health risk for the corporation. He accepted the lowered aspirations by figuratively raising his middle finger – no more Cadillacs after 1958 (though he claimed reliability problems with that ’58 disenchanted him). Indeed, we sold that last Caddy, and replaced it before the end of the model year with the very lowest priced, “stripped down” Chevy one could buy – a back-to-basics 1958 Delray two-door. He drove it to work and parked in that same reserved space. What did people think? My mother registered embarrassment at neighbors’ inquiries. I was mortified, too. In 6^th grade, however, few classmates knew much of our family.

When we visited Washington, D.C. for our next summer road trip, we had already upgraded to a new ’59 Impala 4-door hardtop (called a “Sport Sedan”). And, it did have whitewalls! 

Frugality was becoming a theme in our family. College savings may have begun to weigh on my parents, despite Mom’s new job as a high school English teacher in Flint’s “suburbs.” We kept the ’59 Impala for another year, and a trip to New York. Finally, now that my mom was supplementing our income, we replaced her old ’53 Chevy -- with a funky little black Corvair sedan. This was a truly curious car. 1960 was the first year for Corvair, it had an air-cooled “pancake” rear engine like a VW! It did have white sidewalls. That low bar seems to have finally been crossed.

As I approached driver’s license age, both Mom and I wanted to recover some neighborhood social status. The result: my dad reluctantly agreed that our next car would be an Impala convertible – our only convertible ever! With my learner’s permit in the glovebox, it bothered me only slightly that it was my mom in the passenger seat when I tooled around the neighborhood with top down. The bright yellow ’61 had a white top, camel interior, and

not only whitewalls, but full wheel covers, rear antenna, and bumper guards! Yes, my dad was weakening. I even convinced him that power windows were a practical necessity with convertibles.

My dad drove the Corvair to work.

As the sixties progressed, we gradually moved up the GM product line again, but no more Cadillacs until my parents retired and moved to Florida following Dad’s second coronary. In 1962, it was another Olds, ten years after the previous example, then a Buick LeSabre, and a 1964 Pontiac Star Chief (our first car with air conditioning, despite summer road trip that year planned for Toronto and the New York World’s Fair). 

In 1965, we bought a truly sporty bright red Corvair Monza coupe with white vinyl interior (we were a two Corvair family for one year – Mom’s 1963 beige Monza was my high school choice for dates).

By the time I graduated from Flint Central High School in 1965, I had acquired a used 1956 Pontiac Chieftan 4-door hardtop, justified by my job as managing editor of “The Arrowhead,” the high school newspaper. I needed to zip around town during the day collecting advertising copy from local businesses. Mom needed her car for school in the “burbs.”

It was off to college in Kalamazoo the following fall. No car (not allowed for freshmen). My parents bought a pair of 1966 Buicks to celebrate my leaving. One for my dad (a stately Electra 225 sedan) and one for my mom (a midsize Skylark coupe). I enjoyed the Skylark when home on break – its

diminutive 300 cu. In. 2-bbl. V8 seemed surprisingly peppy (worth one speeding ticket).

That would be my final Flint fling, except I came back to visit Flint once as a college senior, with my girlfriend, in the graduation present from my parents -- a ’69 Opel Rallye Kadett (yellow with black bumblebee stripes and interior, flat black hood panels, husky 4-speed manual transmission, tachometer, and fairly potent 1.9- liter overhead cam four).

During their Florida retirement, the parents had drifted back to Cadillac. Coming full circle with a gold 1968 Coupe de Ville. It was huge. I drove it once or twice on errands. Giant 472 cu. In. V8, but I could hardly see the end of the hood in front of me when driving. I wondered if you could land aircraft on its deck!

For me, my parents’ life in Florida was increasingly remote. I moved to the Washington area in 1971 for grad school at College Park. I stayed here; they stayed there. Until I brought my mom up here, to a nursing home, when she was in the terminal stages of Parkinsons. She died here in 2007.

I have no recollection of driving any of their succession of Cadillacs and Buicks (there were several) after 1970. And, my choices in transportation were governed more by practicality than advertising or social status.

Exploring the Sundwick Automotive Photo Library: Part II -- Customs

William Sundwick

What is a “custom car?”  This library will use the following definition:

Custom: any car or light truck that has been altered in appearance significantly from a model available in the manufacturer’s original catalog for that model year. The alterations may be done professionally, or by the amateur vehicle owner. They can include custom paint jobs, sheet metal work, replacement of exterior visual components by non-standard components, or any combination of these things. Custom wheels are not enough, by themselves, to constitute a “custom car.”

Note: this definition is limited to physical appearance of the vehicle. It must be noticeable from the photo.

The obvious question that arises about custom cars is one that still mystifies me – why? Why would anybody want to spend their time, and often a great deal of money, to create a vehicle which most likely will fetch less in resale than a similar vehicle that was restored to “mint” historic condition?

It is not financial reward that motivates the custom designer, although there certainly are custom car shows that the vehicle could enter, with prize money of sorts; but, it will never match what the amateur owner would have spent producing his work of art. On the other hand, buying a custom that somebody else has created, can be much easier than buying a restored “classic.”

Is it the desire to create something? A true artist’s craving? I maintain this comes closest to describing the motivation of custom car builders. And, what’s more, the people who may be bitten by this craving are a very select group – probably rural, non-college educated, with few other opportunities for individual creativity (presumably with some body shop, and sheet metal, skills).

This peculiar (one might even call it “deviant”) fetish about cars has been impressively captured, in the American mid-west and southwest, by the CarNut.com web site. Most of the entries for custom cars in the Sundwick Library come from that site -- specifically: carpicsindex.com.

Let’s look at some representative examples, with commentary on each.

Early Rods – the “Classic” era of the ‘20s and ‘30s 

Chevy, Ford, Plymouth --   many professional custom car builders, like RODriguez, below (photo credit: Frank Filipponio), have used platforms from early Fords for their creations. Likewise, there are fiberglass or aluminum replica customs from several shops based on early Fords from the thirties, like this ’37 “convertible hardtop” … 

  

 

 “Hi-boys” and “Lo-boys” refer to fenderless hot rods from the era, which may be chopped (lowered roof) or channeled (lowered body on frame), or both – these two early Fords are good examples, one for show, one possibly a competition dragster.   

Although never as popular with the hot rod and custom demographic as early Fords, the other sales leaders of the thirties, Chevrolet and Plymouth, also have received some attention over the years. Here’s a great example of a “chopped” custom sedan, a ’34 Plymouth, and a Chevrolet sedan delivery from 1935.

Sedan deliveries became popular models for California customizers in the forties and fifties, as “surf wagons.” 

 

Finally, the category of “street rod” has been popular for conveying the sense of a car which can be driven on the street, attracting much attention, especially with suitably tuned exhaust note, but the best examples, like the ’39 Plymouth here, are strictly for shows.

Other makes -- The basic styles of customs and hot rods were also applied to other makes besides the three main market leaders of the thirties. This excellent channeled ’31 Essex sedan is an example (Essex was a popular-priced brand of Hudson).

Or, these two radical customs – an airflow Desoto and a wild chopped Hudson: 

Often, the special characteristics of a certain model might be just what the custom builder is seeking – e.g., the unique radiator/grille shapes on a ’34 Olds, or ’37 Chrysler (below) …

The replica business has not totally ignored other makes, either. The same fiberglass custom replica bodies made for Fords can sometimes be found on other cars, like this Lincoln Zephyr coupe by DeConides:

One final category in this period which bears inclusion in my definition of “custom.” These are the customs built for wealthy customers who could specify a bespoke body designed just for them, and placed on whatever Packard, Cadillac, Rolls Royce, or other expensive chassis, they select. Here is one of these, a very exotic French Delage town car (body by Fernandez, not well known in U.S.):

 “Lead Sleds” and “California Customs” – the ‘40s and ‘50s

Perhaps it was the “New Look” that postwar cars began to take in the forties -- elimination of running boards and pontoon fenders, body entirely enclosing wheel wells, more streamlined models – but, for whatever reason, the new look in customs reflected those changes. The primary objective was to make the car as low to the ground as possible, often weighing down the body with lead (hence the slang term “lead sled”). Then, typically, heavy chrome was added, especially from other contemporary makes.

The wilder variations became known as “California” customs, since the Golden State seemed to foster the most creativity in this area. As with many things that originate in California, it soon spread across the country.

Predominant in the period were the “shoebox” Fords and Mercurys (1949-51), but the Chrysler “Forward Look” (1955-59) featuring monstrous tail fins captured some imaginations, as did the similarly befinned ’59 GM bodies. The more discerning types liked the elegant, yet sporty, Raymond Loewy Studebakers of 1953-55. “Step Down” Hudsons (1948-54) and Nash models (1949-54) were, likewise, worthy of note to some customizers.

Here, then, are some examples from this wild and crazy post-war period in car design …

Shoebox Fords (including Mercurys and Lincolns) –  Somehow, the early focal points of custom projects were the “shoebox” generation of Fords and Mercurys (sorry, no explanation found for where the nickname originated). These were not necessarily more streamlined than the competing designs from GM, Hudson, Nash, or Studebaker (they were sleeker than Chrysler products in those years, however). Possibly because of the hot rod legacy of the Ford flathead V-8, they came to dominate the custom field. While the Ford body designs evolved in the fifties (and the flathead engines were consigned to history), the custom builders’ loyalties to Ford remained.

Typical “Merc” customs, the most popular by far, were chopped, and had a grille from some different car of the fifties (DeSoto was common), or something with heavy chrome teeth made by a custom shop, often chrome trim from a different car (Pontiac in one example here) was added … and, of course, the mandatory custom paint job. Note the “canted” quad headlights on the ‘50 Ford shown above, maybe from ‘58-’59 Lincoln?

 GM, and Harley Earl – The forties belonged to General Motors. It’s chief designer, Harley Earl, created a classic look eventually shared by all GM bodies – pontoon fenders which, after ’41, included part of the front door (on ’42-’48 Buicks, front fenders presented a continuous ridge all the way to the rear skirted pontoons). The fastback, or “torpedo,” body style in either 2-door or 4-door versions was all the rage. Their elegant lines have been a favorite among classic collectors, as well as customizers – as seen in these examples.

  The Loewy Studebakers, Step Down Hudsons, and Nash– Raymond Loewy was the designer responsible for the very first “new look” postwar car: the 1947 Studebaker. No front fenders were visible on lower body, which entirely enclosed frontal area – and, only vestigial traces of a rear fender line (see the 1950 Stude pictured here).

Hudson introduced its similar “step down” body in 1948, and Nash in 1949. By this time, the fully enclosed lower body was universal in Detroit.

Loewy, however, despite dire financial straits at Studebaker, continued with a truly exotic new design for 1953. It was inspired by Italian body styles on expensive sports cars, both elegant and sporty. Yet, it was made for a popular-priced car in the U.S. Studebakers were intended to be competitive with Chevy, Ford, and Plymouth! The ’53-’55 Loewy designs have long been prized both by collectors and customizers. 

Forward Look Chrysler Corporation –  Suffering from loss of market share in late forties and early fifties, Chrysler Corporation embarked on a rebranding project for its 1955 line – it was called “Forward Look,” new bodies throughout the line, inventing the fashionable “tail fins” in 1956, and carrying it to extremes with a second new body shell introduced for 1957 models. Perhaps the finest example of the Chrysler tail fin is seen on the 1959 Plymouth shown below. DeSotos, Chryslers, and Imperials were nearly as magnificent, though.

An interesting side note: the 1956 Plymouth wagon on the left is an example of a small sub-genre of custom – the passenger car body placed on a 4x4 truck (or Jeep) chassis. Strange, but true, for a few imaginative custom car builders!

General Motors, 1959 – Tail fins, unashamed! Buicks, Cadillacs, and gullwing Chevys – all with soaring fins. 

This Buick convertible also shows another fashion statement of the era: a “continental” spare kit (named after the iconic original Lincoln Continental of the forties).

Many consider the ’59 Cadillac as the most outrageous statement of the age of chrome and tail fins ever dreamed up. That makes them a good source for customs – since little needs to be done to alter the original, save a special paint job, wheels, maybe some de-chroming.

Low-end Chevy models (like this Biscayne) were faves among the street rod set, going back to the classic ’55 –’57 model years. This ’59 maintains a simple minimalist approach to customization, despite the natural gullwing fins.

For the strip –  organized drag racing, under the auspices of the National Hot Rod Association (NHRA) began during this period. Originally, as the name of the governing body implies, the sport consisted mostly of modified (“built”) early Fords, what we usually call “hot rods.” But, soon there was a proliferation of cars running the quarter mile in various classes, with certain models from the forties becoming early favorites in the free-for-all “gas” classes (only restriction: they run on regular pump gasoline, with normal octane ratings, as opposed to nitrous oxide, or some exotic blended fuel). Among the early favorites on the strip were English Ford Anglias from the late forties, and Willys Americar models from the thirties and early forties (Willys abandoned passenger cars for the Jeep during World War II). 

Later, the popularity of a variety of custom “street rods” forced the NHRA to add other classes to accommodate these customs – they were known as pro-street, pro-comp, or pro-mod. As with the earlier “gassers,” there were no restrictions on engine or drive train modifications. Pro-street machines were allegedly “street-legal,” but, otherwise, anything was allowed.

The early fifties produced further classic dragstrip contenders, like the Henry J (a small car added to the Kaiser line, for a production run of three years, 1951-53), the iconic ’55-’57 Chevrolets (everybody’s favorite street machine), and all the popular makes, given appropriate modifications to stock engines. But, there were limits to body modifications depending on where you intended to compete – pro-mod allowed fiberglass or aluminum body parts as replacement for stock steel. Early gassers did not allow substitute body parts, only removal of bumpers and chrome, cut out wheel wells, and the like. 

 

Muscle cars and “tuners” – the ‘60s and beyond

Custom cars continued to be built, both by amateurs and professionals, through the sixties, seventies, eighties, nineties, and aughts. Only recently have manufacturers begun to compete directly with the performance “tuners” who had been building limited run high-performance versions of popular (or exotic) cars.

Perhaps the amateur customization market has faded out due to costs, but also fewer old car platforms survive – people keep their cars and trucks much longer now than previously, replacing them simply costs too much. In case you haven’t noticed, the demographic most active in the custom car market is not getting richer!

Detroit iron –  while the amateur customizing styles started in the fifties continued through the end of the century, the popularity of trucks and SUVs started a new style of tough-looking off-road vehicles, including “monster trucks” in the eighties. And, “muscle cars,” light-weight mid-sized sedans with large displacement V-8s, then the “pony cars” (Mustang, Camaro, Firebird, Barracuda and Challenger … and AMC Javelin) also contributed their bodies to customization.

Here are some examples:

This Corvette follows the show/strip custom style started in the fifties …

But, the advent of the big-block V-8 muscle cars in the sixties supplied a wide range of cars for customization not seen in the previous decade. 

And, some purely artistic renderings continued to be built, like the ’70 Camaro below. 

On the professional side of the customization world, there were entrepreneurs who specialized in conversion of coupes into convertibles, since Detroit decided to stop building most convertibles as production body styles, in the early seventies. The ’86 Capri drop-top here is an example of this.

First, pickup trucks, then SUVs became very popular in the period. Custom builders wasted no time finding ways to modify the stock appearance of these popular vehicles. Often, the look desired was a tough, off-road appearance, like this early Jeep Wagoneer, but the more familiar custom sheet metal and outrageous paint jobs also continued to draw some practitioners …

The “roadster pickup,” like this GMC, is a throwback to Model T and Model A Fords. It is something which is perpetuated by the Jeep Wrangler in production, but hasn’t been offered by too many Detroit truck makers.

Another institution that made its appearance in the sixties was the “stretch limousine.” These were always custom bodies, often produced in limited numbers by “coachbuilders” … much like those of the ‘20s and ‘30s. Some are really bespoke, others are from catalogs.    

      

This Stutz is a truly bespoke vehicle built for the President of Gabon, in Central Africa. 

Finally, there appeared in this period some elegantly designed luxury coupes … Thunderbird led the way, followed by the Buick Riviera, Olds Toronado, and Lincoln or Cadillac versions of same. Buick and Olds versions, especially, have lent themselves to some visually appealing reworks:

This T-bird was cleverly designed to look like a “shoebox” Ford of about 1950! Apparently, built by a real retro fan.

Japanese “rice burners” – Not yet apparent in the sixties (or even seventies), but by the early eighties, we had an entirely new source for custom cars – Japan.

Because many models were popularly priced, affordable by the many, builders soon popped up specializing in these “rice burners,” to use their early colloquial nickname. Parts, both for alteration of physical appearance and getting increased performance from the little 4-cylinder engines, became available from domestic specialty shops. Customizing of the imports followed the same pattern as they had in the previous generation for Detroit iron. 

As the East Asian imports became popular, the globalized U.S. automakers acquired some of the Japanese manufacturers, or at least had cooperative marketing agreements with them, so they could sell the Japanese cars here, branded as Chevrolets or Dodges … and, of course, custom builders would get hold of them, and modify them. Look at the Chevy Aveo (Korean Daewoo) and Dodge Colt here (Chrysler had controlling interest in Mitsubishi for a time, later sold it). 

Mitsubishi found that some of its models, in the nineties, were popular in the U.S. market under their own moniker … like the Eclipse sports coupes and cabrios. 

But, the Japanese market leaders were also the leaders in amateur and “tuner” modifications. Honda and Toyota dominated, with Nissan (formerly marketing its products under the “Datsun” brand) not far behind. Then came Mazda (Hyundai, too, after it entered U.S. market in the nineties).

           

                     

The design study of a Datsun “Z-car”(above) is what an earlier generation would call a “radical” custom. And, the popularity of small trucks from Japan beckoned the custom builders just as did their bigger Detroit cousins.

Other imports – of course, European imports continued to be popular after the arrival of the Japanese on our shores. Volkswagen had a long history of customization, going back to early days of the “beetle” in the fifties. Dune buggies were especially popular in the sixties and seventies, based on beetle chassis, but other creations could be found as well – like this “hi-boy” sedan from 1969.

In the sixties, there were also British sports cars, in the eighties and nineties, Volvos and BMWs … all had their adherents among the custom builders. If a car was popular, somebody would build a 

custom from it.

The bespoke world for the ultra-wealthy did not ignore German or Italian exotics, either. This Ferrari 456 “shooting brake” for the Sultan of Brunei is a good example … 

Or, the odd case of a car with a clearly foreign provenance, but an American branding as a custom, like this Pontiac “sport truck” (really an Australian Holden, like the Pontiac G8, itself) …

Then, there is the case of the popular-priced American car (Pontiac Fiero) styled to look like exotic Italians (Lamborghini/Pantera mix) …

All these cars were crafted by enthusiastic and skilled hands, all involved considerable expenditure of resources … both temporal and financial.

One might ask: to what end? The only thing they all have in common, over multiple generations now, is that their owners considered them to be works of art.

Tastes may differ, but to the artist, the only tastes that matter are his own!