The 1950-1951 Studebaker Starlight Coupe has always been a favorite of mine, thanks to its eccentric styling. We did a styling analysis if it a few years back, but seeing this one posted at the Cohort by Johnh875 is irresistible. I even rather like the Mopar Rally wheels. My eyes naturally gravitate to the crazy wrap-around rear window, and then along its long, tapering tail. Only then did I catch the bumper sticker…
Oh well; a bit late for that.
That rear glass is so nuts… it looks like an airplane cockpit grafted on to the back of the car.
It would be a cool customization to reverse the roof from the beltline up. There’s a Buck Rogers vibe to these old Studebakers.
These always puzzle me. It looks like only the back of the car was styled, and the front, other than the bullet nosecone, looks like something left over from before WWll.
About the curved back glass panes: The Budd Company wants their Vista-Dome windows back!
The only thing more bizarre then the rear styling was the bullet-cone front, all of it looks like it was built from left over WWII parts
Maybe the ol’ Stude isn’t exactly water tight anymore and the bumper sticker is just “truth in advertising?” 😉
Check out the cab damage on the Apache truck in the background! It reminds me of the truck that just sold for $142,000 at the Lambrecht auction. I’m sure there’s an interesting (and sad) story behind that dented roof.
And I’ll have to agree that the Mopar wheels really suit that Stude.
Over the weekend, I was ambling through Craigslist and found someone in southern Indiana with a ’49 Commander Starlight Coupe – the longer wheelbase one with the bigger flathead six. I had just forgotten it today, and now this.
I personally prefer the 47-49 versions (pre-bullet-nose) but would take one of these under the right circumstances.
And of course, there is no need for a bailout because a successor of the company remains in business (and is paying the State of Indiana a whole lotta money to clean up the old contaminated industrial site in South Bend).
The bumper sticker refers to the Studebaker National Museum in South Bend — part of a fund-raising campaign. (I followed a guy into a hobby store just to ask about the sticker.)
Personally, I’m hoping for some European Community aid for the Rootes Group 😉
I assume they are still owned by PSA (Peugeot-Citroen) so they might be needing some aid if things don’t improve…
The rear window reminds me of the Buckminster Fuller Dymaxion windshield, although I’m not sure that’s a compliment.
When the C6 Corvette restyle was released, the car magazine interviews with the car’s designer, Tom Peters reported that the Raptor fighter plane’s cockpit was a chief inspiration for the greenhouse on the new Vette.
I wonder if the Studebaker’s designer, Bob Bourke, had those WW2 fighter air planes or the early commercial air liners in mind when he designed that unforgettable back window? What a great catch! In the Studebaker design analysis story a agree with the premise that the bumpers were an afterthought on this car. That street rod Stude looks stunning without the front bumpers. I love this car.
These hold a special place in my heart as my dad owned one when he and my mom got married 60 years ago this week. There is/was a picture from their wedding day showing them in the back seat looking out the rear window. It was traded off before I came along. so I never got to experience it.
This looks to be a ’51 model as it was the first year for the V8, and I see some emblems in the photos
A good find. Thanks for the memories.
The bumper sticker is a hoot. I have one for my ’56 President.
The super-wraparound rear window is eye catching, but pity the poor folks who sat in the back seat on a hot, sunny day.
Interestingly, when Studebaker-Packard was on the ropes in 1956, there was talk of the company getting some kind of federal help. Some of S-P’s senior execs knew Eisenhower and made the pitch that Studebaker-Packard going under would be bad for the economy. Eisenhower discussed the idea — less in a direct bailout sense than in a “Hey, can’t we do something for these guys” one — but nothing much came of it.
IIRC, Studebaker-Packard’s defense work was one of the reason that Curtiss-Wright’s was brought in, sort of a way of safeguarding the government’s interest. I also recall reading that S-P was later not awarded some significant defense work, that would certainly have provided some earnings that would have been of great help about that time. I believe that the government did not have a good feeling about S-P’s prospects, but by shutting off the flow of defense contracts, made things worse.
Sort of, but the order was a little different. Studebaker and S-P ended up not getting defense contracts after Charlie Wilson became secretary of defense in 1953-54; Eisenhower’s discussion was in the spring of ’56, which was several years after that. S-P did have some defense business, but not as much as they would have liked.
I don’t think the Eisenhower administration had much to do with Curtiss-Wright’s involvement, but one of C-W major motivators in getting involved was Studebaker-Packard’s military business. I believe Curtiss-Wright ended up with all of those contracts, among other things.
I heard that the ’47 stude was conceived as rear engined, and the long tail was retained after that idea was shelved.
My uncle got a bullet nose for a second car around 1955, and we were appalled. I was already car crazy at 8, but thought all studes trailed blue smoke and were ugly, like the elephantine 48-51 Packard. I preferred Mercury, Chrysler Imperial and Cadillac. Now I like everything pre 1974.