(first posted 7/21/2017) While on the way to Detroit last December, I stopped in the suburbs to visit my aunt, who lives not far from the former Chrysler World Headquarters. It’s a lovely area dating from the mid-1970s, complete with ponds, parks, trails, tennis courts, and pretty enclaves featuring single family homes, condos, and duplexes. It was here that I spotted our subject car the next morning before heading into Detroit for a fantastic mini-vacation downtown. Needless to say, this car stood out in the suburbs – in the best way, possible.
If I had to pick a favorite year among the Tri-Fives, it would probably be the ’57, which I remember still being featured semi-regularly in popular media even by the late 1980s, when I was an adolescent. It is that iconic. My second choice would be the first-year ’55, with its Ferrari-inspired, wide-mouth, egg-crate grille and overall freshness of its then-new design. The ’56 is my third-favorite only by process of elimination, which is still a very attractive and cool-looking design to a guy who was born about twenty years after it first sat in Chevy showrooms. There are plenty of visual details to love about the ’56, including the low, rectangular, horizontal expanse of its chrome grille flanked by turn signals. I can imagine its looks were very modern at the time, before Chrysler Corporation slayed with its ’57s.
This past May, our own Jason Shafer wrote a piece about a ’57 Chevy 210 in similar condition, that referenced the desirability, availability and pricing of the body styles of these cars that don’t have two doors (or a hardtop roofline). With a pillared, four-door sedan that doesn’t have low miles, isn’t pristine or restored, or doesn’t have sentimental value, the question is what, if anything, to do with it to make it one’s own. The answer here was flat, rattle-can black paint and custom, gloss-finish stripes in red, lined with white, in a pattern that, to me, resembles a tribal tattoo more than a little bit.
Recall, if you will, the turn of the Millennium, when tribal tattoos started to become more widely seen in the mainstream. I’d like to state right away that I am not anti-tattoo, nor is this a “bad ink” rant. When I was a kid, my mom and dad (usually Mom) used to read “The Sneetches” by Dr. Seuss at bedtime to my brother and me, among other stories. The idea of being “marked” or “unmarked” (or just different) having no correlation with one’s worth has stayed with me as one of my core values. Many of my friends sport ink, as does my other half.
Back in my late twenties, I had experimented with fake tattoos for a while to see how I might feel about getting a real one. As lame as that may sound to some of you, these larger-scale, mail-order decals actually looked pretty decent from a distance – not too black, shiny or faded. They fooled my late father who, I might add, didn’t judge me upon noticing, but calmly asked, “When did you get that?” (I miss that man and his calm, cool demeanor.)
Anyway, though I have occasionally thought about getting some permanent art on my body, nothing I’ve considered (so far) has ever seemed like something I’d want to advertise or live with forever, even for the sake of the memory of someone or something. I’m somewhat introverted, but I’m also kind of a chameleon by nature – which can come with the territory of being multi-ethnic and growing up feeling like you fit in (almost) everywhere and nowhere at the same time. I always stay as true to myself as possible, but the way I see it, my ability to periodically self-reinvent (or correct course) as I’ve seen fit over the years might be compromised by getting some permanent pigmentation in my skin’s dermal layer. Unlike with this ’56 210, getting a tattoo lasered off that was either bad or no longer relevant wouldn’t be quite as easy as getting this car a respray at the local MAACO.
Tattoos look great on many people, though, and I respect it when I see the kind of good taste, bravery, and commitment to a visual identity that’s evident in many people’s “bodies” of work, so to speak. The painted-stripe “tats” on this 210 really work for me, on the bodystyle and trim level that was the most popular Chevrolet of 1956, with close to 283,000 sold. (The sales runner-up was the Bel Air four-door, pillared sedan, with 270,000 sold). On my last trip to visit my aunt during the weekend of the annual CC meetup this past June, I didn’t see this car around, and wondered if its owner had moved along, as this car had out-of-state plates.
Going back to my question of whether I would have left this car bone-stock or personalized it, that would all depend on its condition prior to my ownership. With that said, I really like this 210, and I salute the owner of this car for their choices that make it an automotive statement that I think is big, bold and very Detroit. After all, he or she is a member of the Tri-Five Tribe – which, I can imagine, provides license for things that many others of us probably just couldn’t get away with no matter how cool we may think we are, ink or no ink.
(Detroit suburb) Troy, Michigan.
Thursday, December 1, 2016.
Here’s another interpretation that I was eventually going to make a CC Outtake – but it seems appropriate to use here instead. Not my cuppa, but kudos to whoever put the effort in (look closely and you’ll see evidence of bondo work, etc.).
Another shot. Kinda reminds me of a Hot Wheels version of the car.
I can’t tell if it’s trying to be a donk or a gasser
If it were a station wagon it would be a CUV.
Only at CC can we work a discussion of the merits of tattoos with a 56 Chevrolet! Kudos, Mr. Dennis.
I am not personally a tat kind of guy, and this paint treatment doesn’t do that much for me. But hey, if it belongs on anything . . .
As to the relative merits of the tri-5s, my first real up close and personal to one of these was the 56 that belonged to a friend of my mother, a nursing school classmate. She was a single lady who kept that copper and ivory 56 Bel Air sedan until replacing it with a 65 F-85. I remember being about 6 years old and walking around that 56 Chevy over and over, taking in the many cool details that were absent from newer cars.
I always liked these. My dad had a ’56 for a company car. It was a low line green 2dr station wagon. I wasn’t old enough yet for the specific model to register. I do remember it had a stick shift and no radio. I assume it was also a 6.
My brother, sisters and I loved taking family trips in the company car instead of our own car which wasn’t a wagon at the time. With the rear seats folded down, the back of the car was a huge play space.
To our eternal dismay, the Chevy was eventually replaced with a brand new low line white ’58 Plymouth wagon. The Plymouth was a 4dr wagon and had a radio.
What should have been a step up proved to be the opposite. My parents used the radio to find never ending sources of polkas wherever we went. We kids hated the music. The rear doors that at 1st had seemed so neat made my Mom nervous.
When riding in the Chevy, everything behind the front seat was pretty much totally a kid domain. We tested and learned the limits of parental tolerance. On trips, a kind informal truce existed between kids and parents. So long as we didn’t get too loud or crazy, our parents pretty much ignored us. Even my little brother cooperated. On trips, he didn’t follow his usual pattern of ratting his older siblings whenever he felt tormented.
In the Plymouth, Mom began watching those back doors like a hawk. My siblings and I suddenly found our area subject to unwelcome parental attention. The secret conversations and kid world we loved in the Chevy were now subject to adult monitoring in the Plymouth.
The other big downer was the rear glass. In the Chevy, my dad would let us ride with the rear transom cracked open. The Plymouth had a crank down rear window which my dad refused to crack open. Evidently the Plymouth owners manual had some warning about exhaust gas coming into the car when driving with the rear window open – or so we were told.
The danger was probably no different from the Chevy, but all we kids knew as that on hot summer days, the breeze we had enjoyed in the Chevy was denied us in the Plymouth.
As adults, we often judge cars by styling, handling, value, performance or any such similar measure. I have no idea how an adult would compare a ’56 Chevy wagon with a ’58 Plymouth wagon. I don’t recall may dad ever mentioning preferring one over the other either. He regarded them as a tool he was issued as part of his job.
When tripping down memory lane with this old iron, many of my personal memories are strictly kid memories. Kind of funny looking back now on the features that forever formed my opinion of one model versus another. I bet my kids would judge the company Dodge Caravan I had when they were of a similar age by a very different standard than I used.
I wonder if their opinion would change had I “flamed” the Caravan paint job in an effort to add some “cool” to a vehicle that seems to have become terminally uncool despite its many virtues.
Wow, memories! Loved riding in the wayback of our 57 Ford Ranch Wagon, equipped with….a heater. Period. Dad would open the rear window hatch and I would check out anyone riding behind us. I was an only child, so had to amuse myself. Next up was a 58 Plymouth Savoy, or whatever the low line was, but a 4 door sedan. This baby had not only a heater, but whitewalls! But no more wayback.
I loved reading this, Rob – thanks! You brought up several things I connect with… I remember thinking, as a kid, that riding in a station wagon (regardless of back seat, or way-back) usually seemed almost as fun as a hayride. Also, I remember reading in previous comments on CC how four-door cars were perceived back then as less safe, with parents’ fears of kids opening doors and falling out. When I was growing up with five of us in the car (Mom, Dad, two other brothers), we mostly had two-door cars until I was about 10.
In your case, going from a Chevy to a Plymouth back then (both part of the low-priced-three) would seem to be to be less of a comedown than say, by the late 70’s, when Plymouth seemed at least a rung or two down from a comparable Chevy. What would have bothered me more, and to your point, was the loss of breeze in the Chevy!
Sadly, unlike you, Rob, I was too young to remember my Dad’s ’56 Two-Ten, but it was just like this one… ok, maybe not with the hot pink tattooed livery. His was two-tone Sherwood Green & India Ivory. All I know is I got at least one ride in it that I know of… a ride home from the hospital when I was born in 1960. So I can say that I’ve ridden in one of the 283,000 featured cars at one point.
But much like Joseph says above, parents back then we’re freaked out about four door sedans and safety for their kids. My Dad was no exception. Very shortly after I was born, he traded the ’56 Chevy in on a ’60 Dodge, and yes… it was a two door. Truth be told, my Dad liked coupes better anyway (much like his son), and continued with two doors until he inherited my great uncle’s ’84 Buick Lesabre. Since then he’s had a few four door cars.
My Dad’s (and my) order of preference for the tri-fives… ’57, ’56, and then ’55. But BOTH of us have warmed up to the ’58 Impala after seeing American Graffiti. ?
Thanks Dennis for this. In a sort of CC Effect, I was just over my Dad’s house today visiting, and looking at his diecast models of a ’57 Bel Air Hartop (the car he wanted when he ‘settled for the 210’ as an affordable first car), and a ’56 Bel Air Convertible. Hey, the man has good taste (even though he DID just trade his 2014 Mustang in on a 2017 Accord! Really, Dad!! ?)
I can’t decide if I like it or not. While I’d never put flat paint on anything I owned, I do kinda like the look of it. And while the red is unusual, it’s not ugly by any means.
I like it. I kind of surprised myself on this but it took me a minute to even realize that it was a four door. As for tattoos, I have one but I’ve come to compare them to Jeeps. They were both once a tough guy thing. Now they’re a chick thing. You don’t go to the circus anymore to see the tattood lady, you go to Walmart.
I saw that, too. It really distracts from it being a 4 door. Very well done and proportioned. I would daily this car. Incidentally, I have faded bicep (?) tats, so I get this. Very striking from the second I saw it. Two thumbs up.
I appreciate it the way it is, but if it were mine…I’d repaint it. Then LS it.
Not exactly what I’d do, but kudos for keeping it on the street and not mutilating it.
This car doesn’t look too bad, just unfinished without better wheels.
I do have 2 tattoos, 1 on each arm, high enough up my arms that they are covered when I wear a short sleeve shirt. I got the 1st one about half way through my 21 years in the Navy. The design was inspired by the name of a song that I liked at the time. Unfortunately, the design is similar to that used by a country now known for it’s miserable civil rights record. The 2nd tattoo is/was a “tribute” to THE greatest love of my life. And it’s somewhat appropriate that the design has quickly faded, and even having it re-inked didn’t help all that much to rejuvenate it.
Actually, I’ve been considering a variation of this car’s design for my Crown Vic as it has a few patches of bare metal, I’m assuming they happened when the police decals were removed.
And a great part of the design on the car pictured: you don’t notice it’s a humble 4 door.
I think the paint job does a very effective job at camouflaging the fact that it’s a 4 door, and it’s period correct, so I can’t find any fault in it.
Similarly if you have scars, burns, and blemishes tattoos a great way to hide those ugly reminders. That however is the only scenario I can envision myself getting any, you’d literally have to drag me across the asphalt in front of the tattoo parlor before I’d voluntarily enter it.
I think this ’56 looks O.K. .
I’m a ’55 lover because of the cleaner, less cluttered and more conservative lines but this is a nice car too no matter how you dress it up .
I have an aging tat too, I could remove it but prefer to leave it to remind me I was once young, foolish and a hard ass .
Now I’m just old, still foolish though .
-Nate
Certainly different than the other 56 on here that was optioned up the wazoo!
I actually kind of like this paint job, though it does need a different set of wheels, as noted above. I also like the tattoo analogy – this is a no-nonsense cruiser proud of its long rough-and-tumble life. While this old Chevy also challenges my preconception that tats only look good on the young and fit, I’ll never have one, as I still fear that they won’t flatter an aging body. Thanks, Joe, for bringing a different perspective and opening a few minds.
I really like this car. Very tastefully done. But, is that a skull on the parcel shelf?… one step too far. I hope the inside has a southwestern motif blanket thrown over it like Paul’s recently admired Hudson does.
And, the wheels are perfect. It’s generational, to be sure, but the only black wheels I really like are the bare, stamped, ’50s to ’70s versions, with dirty blackwall tires. The current vogue for stealth in everything strikes me as a bit silly, as if we all want to be getting away with something, so the red tribal swatches drawing the eye back in are just right.
They sort of have to be where they are, but they make the chrome saddle at the hip a bit too much of a focal point…guilding the guilding. How about removing the side spear altogether, and leaving it to memory and imagination on what to do with the vacated space?
I like the car. The bodywork and trim are all stock with just the flat paint and tats. This treatment goes back to the scallop painting that was popular in the late Fifties and early Sixties. A late model car was dechromed and scallops were painted over the filled areas, preserving the new or nearly new paint. This just has the tribal spin on it. The plain black wheels look right and fit the low buck vibe. The skull, well that just seems silly to me, now, but I get it.
For years I used to daily drive a slammed, flat white and rust,’66 Riviera with wide whitewalls and Moon discs. It was right before the Rat Rod thing took off. For once I was ahead of the curve.
As for tattoos, got one of those too. A pair of Harley wings on my right forearm, pretty much always visible. I figured if I didn’t want everyone to see it, then why bother? I was either proud of my HD heritage or not. Now so many of my younger co workers, male and female have numerous tattoos, I assume that they mean something to them more that fashion, but I wonder who needs to immortalize that much stuff.
When I was a kid, my mom had a friend with a turquoise ’56 Chevy 4-door, a 150 series with a powerglide and (I think) a stovebolt six. She was a foul-mouthed divorcée, fond of saying that her ex-husband “got the good car.” After all these years, I can’t recall what the suppposedly good car was, but rides in the back seat of that ’56 are firmly etched in my memory. On one occasion, she drove on the wrong side of the road for a mile or so, because the pavement on that side was smoother, and she wanted to go easy on her retreaded tires. I wonder what’s under the hood of this customized ’56! An original stovebolt would be pretty cool.
The stuff above the side trim just doesn’t work in my opinion but the rest of it isn’t too bad.
…Interesting…stripe treatment.
Yeh. Interesting. Let’s go with THAT.
I almost had a very low milage 1956 210 two door. My Grandfather bought it new; 6 banger, powerglide, am radio, two tone blue and white, and full wheel overs. He had to notch the 2 by 4’s in the front of the garage, so that the doors would close
My birthday is in September. In 1964, he stated that he was going to quit driving and would give me the Chevy for my birthday. In late July or August, we drove to his house and the Chevy was across the alley at his neighbor’s. It had been hit so hard in the right side that the left door would not close. The neighbor had borrowed the Chevy and pulled in front of a garbage truck.
2 years later I had a 1957 Chevy convertible. I paid $70 for it with nice quarters and good top and interior. It came with 22 used condoms, which helped to lower the price. I’ll still clean up a lot a filth for a good deal.
Not usually into this kind of thing, but I like it. Works very well on this car.
I know the flat black thing is a more recent fad, but I’m kind of wondering if this was actually done a while ago? Kind of has a late 80’s, early 90’s feel to it.
The “V” on the hood shows at one point it had a 265 (unless the trim was added), so no stovebolt six. 3 speed, added 4 speed or powerglide-it’s anybody’s guess.
Not my kind of thing, but to each his own…this does bring back some memories….my parents had a ’56 210, two-tone blue and white, powerglide, whitewalls, six cylinder engine and no radio. I think I may a picture or two of it somewhere in the family scrap book.
I like the paint, I’d have gone with a glossier black and painted the steelies hot pink/red with a white pinstripe around the rim to match the accents.
Thank you for this Joseph. Nice car. Living in the EU I am not biased against four doors – here we had four door cars road racing on the tracks week in, week out, so the stigma does not exist.
Our Chevy growing up in Israel was a 53 and my father would have hit the roof if had any tattoos done – well, until I came of age and left home. By then, it would not have made any difference. Not that he had anything to worry about…
We only had four door models and they are prized nowdays, I like this one the wheels are fine.
I approve of this owner keeping another 4 door on the road. It keeps more cheap classics around so people can enjoy just driving an old car as opposed to keeping a “more popular” model stored in a garage.
Nicely done…. I’d love to hear a small block burble in that.
I’ve come to appreciate the more common, lower-line models from the post-war years – except for Packards, where the Patricians are class…and I STILL can’t bring myself to like a Studie, except maybe the 1966 models and the Avantis. The Ford Custom 300s, Chevy 150s and 210s, Plymouth Savoys and Plazas, you get the idea. I still love me a nice 4DR hardtop, but not very common in the lower series except for the 1965-69 Corvairs. That’s OK. The 4DR sedans and any of the wagons are great to see on the road. They also tend not to be over-restored to the point where they’re better-than-factory new. I don’t feel guilty getting behind the wheel in oil-stained jeans, in one of these. 🙂
Thanks for the nice words and an interesting take on my Chevy! I’ve had the car for years and i’m slowly fixing it up while driving it as much as possible. The paint is inspired by early 60’s south California mild customs but with an east coast attitude. It’s too bad I missed you, I would have liked to meet you! Also, in regards to some of the comments about the wheels; I’ve since given them a coat of paint and found a set of correct hubcaps, I think it cleans up the looks a bit!
Ralph, I’m so sorry I missed this and for the delayed reaction. It’s always really cool when the owner of one of my chosen essay subjects happens to see something I’ve written here and chimes in. I hope you are well and that your 210 is still humming away!
I’m not at all fond of tattoos and the scallop paint job reminds me of the hot rods in the late 50’s when the scallops and flames were the rage. Today they just look dated, personally I feel the car would look much better just in basic black.
Such an apropos comparison. It does work on this staid 4 door somehow, but wouldn’t on me. I like to blend with the woodwork not stick out and have said many times I’ll go out like I came in, with nothing added. I don’t even wear jewelry, watches, rings, not even a wedding ring (tho’ I am married). Nothing goes on my body. More power to those that like their adornments, it’s just not my thing. This car is another story, it makes a frumpy body look cool!
As for ’56 Chevys, Dad had a 210 4 dr in gray and white (boring, given the great available colors that year), and I’ve maintained for decades that the ’55 to ’57s were the perfect size for a car: great proportions, ergonomics and seating height. If the US makers had stuck with that practical size “big” cars might still be popular.
Oddly the ’56 is my favourite of the tri-five years.
This one reminds me of my old high school principal’s car. He had a ’56 210 4 door in a faded maroon and white. Famously we kids advertized it for sale in the paper as an end-of-year prank and the school office phone was tied up with people wanting to buy the Chevy!
The whole flat-black-and-scallops thing, while viewed as a fifties period thing, isn’t to my taste. I’d go for something more like this.
And I thought my work table looked messy! As a car modeler,I`ll say your Chevy looks beautiful. Nice work.
Thanks Phil!
That’s actually tidied up for the photo. Normally it’s more like this. 🙂
The Chevy’s an Aussie hardware store house brand enamel, with some Tamiya Pearl Clear on top.
This dynamic design paint Job is very well balanced and likely took considerable time to create. Unlike cheesey flames this design creates a dynamic of speed even when stationary. The flat back disappears so the eyes focus on the red. Chrome on the sides follows the contours in its own way. To me it resembles three dimensional topographic roads from above.
Watson must be spinning in his grave…..and as the former 20 year owner of a ’56 Chev 150 2 dr sedan with gloss paint, uhhh……..DFO
The gloss flake on your 56 is like a tractor beam, I can’t take my eyes off it. Most CC readers seem to be stockers but not me. Always great to see next level work like your 56. Crazy Cool!
The 56 is the best of that Chevy triffecta it was the first one offered here with a V8 and it has less tinsel than the ornate 57 which did not sell well new, I also like that paint job