(first posted 6/26/2014) Poor Chrysler. Poor, stupid, unlucky Chrysler. Was there another brand of what we used to call the “Big Three” that was so consistently star-crossed?
From the end of World War II until the mid 1950s, they had no style. During the rest of the 1950s, they had plenty of style but levels of quality that went from bad to awful. In the early 1960s, they were hampered with oddball styling. In 1965 and again in 1969, Chrysler brought out new full-sized C body cars that were reminiscent of GM’s styling of three years earlier. The 1969 fuselage cars were particularly unlucky in that their introduction coincided with a bad economy and that their styling quickly went past its sell-by date. But everything would be different with the new 1974 models, right? Wrong again. But it would not be for lack of trying.
The structure of the car would be all new, although mechanical components would largely carry over. For the first time since the late ’50s, it seemed that Chrysler had finally been able to tap into current styling trends, and the Newport was attractive, though certainly not groundbreaking. The cars would be long and sleek, particularly in this four door hardtop body style, which was significantly more stylish than the slightly dumpy four door sedan. These Newports may not look it, but they are five inches shorter than their 1973 predecessors, while still on the same 124 inch wheelbase.
Speaking of that four door hardtop, was this the very last newly designed car to be offered in this body style? Ever three years behind the competition, Chrysler would soon be the lone purveyor of pillerless four door cars. The “last convertible” danced offstage to a cheering crowd in 1976, but the last four door hardtop would disappear two years later to zero fanfare, never to return.
As with many Chryslers, the styling of this car is shrouded in mystery. We have examined the transition from Virgil Exner’s styling era to that of Elwood Engel in 1963 (here) and this car marks a similar handoff of the styling baton from Engel to his successor, Richard MacAdam. Engel retired in 1973, so the car was likely done mostly under Engel’s watch. This hardtop body style is actually quite interesting in how much its roofline differs from the companion four door sedan (a much bigger seller).
It has been reported by Sandy Block in the WPC News (reprinted here by the Imperial Club) that this sketch was the first concept of the 1974 Imperial. Although the sketch shows a center pillar, the overall shape of the 1974 C body four door hardtop is quite evident. It is not hard to imagine that the Imperial and New Yorker were the reason for this sleek four door, but unlike at other companies, the lowliest Chrysler would share a body with the high-end imperial, so the Newport buyer was the unintended beneficiary of the Imperial’s stylish shape.
Photo source Allpar.com
So, who designed these? To my eye, the more conservative sedan seems more in keeping with MacAdam’s sensibilities, while the sleeker pillarless car seems more in tune with Engel’s body of work. But perhaps those of you in the commentariat have more to share here.
Another Chrysler bigwig who closed out his career with these cars was Lynn Townsend who, particularly during the 1970s, was a fascinating figure. He was a pennywise accountant who, strangely, seemed to have in place no significant controls over costs. How else to explain the lavish use of chrome-plated diecastings slathered all over the front of lowly base model Newport, while at the same time, giving every single car a black instrument panel and steering wheel. Unlike Chevrolet, which had tried the same cost-cutting trick on lower trim levels in 1971-72, even the guy who shelled out for a top-of-the-line New Yorker Brougham would be denied a color-keyed steering wheel. And was this the same seat-vinyl and loop-pile carpet used in the lowly Valiant? I have no idea, but a fellow could be forgiven for reaching that conclusion.
That same pound-foolishness was writ large in the decision to stretch the fuselage body out through a fifth model year in 1973. Chrysler would pay dearly for that decision, and in two ways. The first effect was in 1973, when Chrysler would offer big car buyers a stale product during the hottest car sales year in industry history. Then, Chrysler would pay even more in 1974, when the brand new C body would hit the market in the worst economy since 1958 and the highest fuel prices in memory.
How bad was it? Chrysler brand sales dropped from 234,000 cars in 1973 to 117,000 in 1974. Of those, roughly 68,000 were Newports, with the base Newport outselling the Custom nearly two to one. Before someone goes to look it up, Chrysler suffered the worst year to year drop in the entire industry that year, despite being the only genuinely new offering in its class. Just for comparison’s sake, the 1975 Cordoba would, all by itself, outsell the entire ’74 Chrysler line, and by nearly 35,000 units. Chrysler kept one tradition going strong, though, in that its four door sedans outsold hardtops by whopping margins. My research indicates that only about 9,000 Newport four door hardtops rolled out of the plants that year, a figure about 1,500 short of the number of four door ’74 Imperials.
You might also think that the extra year’s time allowed for development of the new 1974 C body cars might have at least resulted in decent quality at launch time. Had this situation occurred anywhere but at Chrysler in the 1970s, this might be a reasonable conclusion. But alas, build quality did not seem to be on the agenda during the final year or two of Townsend’s time as chairman. The ’74 C body would set the tone for a series of new car launch disasters that would take the company all the way through the 1970s (and in some cases, beyond).
A few years after these cars were new, I had a conversation with the son of a Fort Wayne funeral director who had bought a ’74 New Yorker, his first Chrysler in years. I was told that the car was a complete mess during its entire (short) life with the business. Everyone who worked there came to despise that car, and one guy even remembered that the car had been built so badly that it came with a black steering column and wheel in a burgundy interior. That, I had to tell him, was actually intentional. Not surprisingly, this information lowered his opinion of the car even more.
So, with all of the problems that these cars exhibited from the start, why does this Sahara Beige example excite me so much? Particularly after I excoriated a very similar beige Buick sedan as perhaps the most boring car in the world (here)? A good psychological referral might get you an answer. I described the ’73 LeSabre as a safe bet–an unexciting car, but a very good one. This Chrysler, on the other hand, was the 50:1 longshot bet. Sure, it was reasonably attractive, but it would likely get its owner on a first-name basis with the service writers at the local Chry-Ply dealer (and later a salesman at an Olds or Buick store). Maybe I liked it because this was the Bad Boy of big sedans–the car that my sensible parents, and most of America, as it turned out, would never touch with a double-sanitized fork.
I can’t put my finger on it, but there is something classic and elegant about this car that harkened back to an era before that of the Brougham, which was advancing steadily in 1974. Perhaps this was a large part of this car’s lack of popular appeal–it was a Richard Nixon car in a Gerald Ford world. Chrysler would learn at least some of its quality lessons and would eventually sell a lot of these big hardtops, but only after a lot of effort and improvement (and a fair amount of Broughamification). Perhaps the other pull this car exerts on me is that this would be the last new big Chrysler that would even remotely come in a full complement of bodystyles.
I have often compared the new-car purchase of a 1970s Chrysler product with playing the lottery. There were some winners, who got a well-built car that contained a lot of deep-down goodness. Most, however, were not so lucky. And in 1974 with this car, it was not only the customers but Chrysler itself that was left holding a losing ticket.
Thanks for another great read JP.An attractive car despite it’s frog’s belly paint.
This is a beautiful car, but Chrysler has always been the red-headed child for the last 60 years.
I do give Chrysler credit for being the last U.S. OEM offering a pillarless hardtop.
As for misfortunes, I believe Chrysler was the very first OEM to offer rebates with their first tent sales in 1974. Many “firsts” for the company, but too often worked against them, and as for rebates, well, that infected the entire industry and will not go away.
We still loved our K-Cars and their derivatives for many years!
Yes, far more damaging than the “Malaise era,” Chrysler’s “Garagiola era” of 1974-75 was the opening salvo in Detroit’s battle of the rebates!
But sometimes, you’ve just got to move the metal. The “sales bank,” parked over at the Michigan State Fairgrounds, could only hold so many cars…
http://youtu.be/xILkNX3_QOA
“BUY A CAR, GET A CHECK!” – I was 6 years old and remember it like it was yesterday.
How much did Chrysler pay the jingle writers to come up with the little ditty at the end of this one? Also, note the Dodge LCF truck pulling the car carrier, No doubt a Cassens Transport rig, then as now based just up the road from here in Edwardsville, IL and still Ma Mopar’s favorite trucking company….
Great find. Always loved the 74’s. My College roommates parents had a Maroon Newport Custom 4dr Hardtop with a tan Vinyl Roof and tan interior with the 440 under the hood. and loaded with options. I guess a New Yorker would have been to much for his Dads Minnesota Lutheran heritage. I can remember riding back with him from getting the car serviced at the Dealer and him punching it up to 100 or so. The sound of that 440 was definitely music to my ears. Would love to have that car now, it was definitely one of the best looking ones I have ever seen. They ended up trading it for a 77 Newport Sedan which was to me somewhat of a come down.
The interiors of these cars are awful. I rode in one when it was new and it seemed so cheap when compared to the competition at Ford and GM. The instrument panel just looks cobbled together from the parts bin to me with poorly aligned plastic bits. I want to love these cars but I cannot.
Our local CP dealership had $2,000 rebates on these cars when they were new. Quite a bit of money in those days.
The interior looks like a Valiant’s on steroids.
I see more Dodge Sportsman. It’s those vents.
Mid grade Aussie Valiant period.
Yeah, and they were a sparkling sales success too,Bryce!
You’re pretty much summed-up why the newest Mopars that my parents owned were model years 1967 and 1972… it all went downhill from there. My parents went so far as to have their daily drivers (in the rust belt!) restored, then continued to drive them into the ground again before finally replacing them in the mid 80’s.
> That same pound-foolishness was writ large in the decision to stretch the fuselage body out through a fifth model year in 1973.
Luckily for Mopar C-body fans today, they redesigned the front disc brakes on C-bodies and made them standard equipment for 1973. That resulted in a one-year-only disc brake system which uses the same rotors as Dodge pickups, and is coveted by people that want to convert their older C-bodies to front discs.
Kind of like the offspring of a ’67 Chrysler and ’71 Oldsmobile, but yet it’s extremely appealing from the exterior. It might be the last of the mid-sixties design ethos. I never knew about the quality problems then, I was in high school and thought that there should be more of these on the road than there were. A good management team could have made Chrysler into something unique in the world today, maybe a Mercedes a middle class person could aspire to.
Except for the Royal Monaco, by 1974, the Chrysler division made some of the ugliest cars I’ve ever seen. The Newport, for example, has the *ugliest* grille of anything put on a Chrysler. For me, it’s the grille of the car that makes the rest of the car attractive or ugly. And the grille for the 1974 model year is one of the ugliest I’ve ever seen.
The New Yorker grille took awhile for me to get used to. It re-introduced that center dip in the bumper that had appeared in 1960, and that I wasn’t so sure about. The Newport grille was more subdued, and I always found it quite attractive, in a 1974 kind of way.
I still recall my 14-year-old reaction when these came out – “finally, the first Chrysler since 1968 that doesn’t look totally stupid.” Turned out that either I was in the minority, or that looks aren’t everything.
I agree. I’m not a fan of Chrysler cars of the 70s. They’re not bad looking cars overall, it’s just the front grille makes the rest of the car handsome looking, or just plain tacky. Perhaps the best looking Chryslers I’ve seen were the 1969 through 71 Newport and New Yorker, including the Town and Country wagon.
Definitely one of the most attractive full-size offerings during the mid-1970s. The 50:1 longshot bet is basically how I’ve felt about many of the Chryslers from the mid to late 1990s. Very attractive, but a risky choice.
I always thought these were attractive looking cars on the outside. The instrument panel is hideous. The overall look of the interior could have been very inviting with nicer materials. I really like that hard top body style on this car.
+1.
Great article on a car that is hardly seen anymore, even at car shows. One of my friends at our church drove her parents’ 1974 or 1975 Newport sedan. It was dark metallic green with a white vinyl top. Her family kept it until the early 1980s, at which point it was traded for a rear-wheel-drive Cadillac Sedan DeVille.
Given the engine troubles that plagued early 1980s Cadillacs, that may have been a case of jumping from the frying pan into the fire. I don’t remember her family having any particular complaints about the Newport.
I always thought that the 1974-78 full-size Chryslers were handsome cars. Unlike the contemporary Dodges and Plymouths, they didn’t seem like plagiarized 1972 Buick LeSabres. And Chrysler did a good job of integrating the 5-mph bumpers into the basic design – far better than Ford and GM did with their full-size cars during these years.
While quality wasn’t Job One during the launch of this car, I believe that Chrysler also botched the launch of the 1969 C-Bodies. There were numerous complaints of terrible build quality on the first year of the fuselage cars, and Chrysler’s attempt to implement a new ordering system resulted in some cars being equipped in ways that couldn’t be sold. The most notorious example was a batch of 1969 New Yorkers equipped with MANUAL steering and brakes that the corporation foisted off on zone representatives, according to one article I read.
It is interesting that, unlike the full-size Plymouths and Dodges, sales of the full-size Chryslers did recover somewhat for 1976, and continued relatively strong throughout this generation’s run. It was as though all of the Chrysler loyalists who wanted a full-size car during these years bought a Chrysler instead of a Dodge or a Plymouth. The Chrysler brand set sales records in the late 1970s, and while the Cordoba and LeBaron were the main drivers of the division’s sales in those years, the full-size cars did record decent sales. These weren’t total flops. The problem was that the post-1973 full-size Dodges and Plymouths were, and sales of the Newport and New Yorker weren’t enough to make up the difference even after 1975.
Yes, by the mid-70s, buyers were starting to shun cheaper big cars in favor of nicer-trimmed mid-sized ones,and that effect was most extreme at Chrysler. If money was an issue, there were so many better alternatives among the smaller cars. A low-end big car by then really reeked of either a fleet car, or of a cheapskate Grampa-mobile.
It always seemed that most people thought of the full-size Dodges and Plymouths from the 1970s as police cars and taxicabs. The people who did buy the “civilian” versions were diehard Mopar loyalists, and they rarely bought the top-of-the-line versions, which hardly helped the cars’ image.
Even a Plymouth Gran Fury had nowhere near the image or “prestige” (if one can use that term for a mass-market family car) of a Chevrolet Caprice or Ford LTD.
My experience with these had been a 77 Newport Custom 4 door hardtop that my car-mentor Howard owned. It was an excellent car, much more nicely trimmed both inside and out than this one. I also owned a 77 NY Brougham that was not as good.
The boost to these cars came with the 76 models when the old Imperial became the New Yorker, the old NY became the Newport Custom (without the gaudy stainless side cladding). Everything from the base Newport on up was trimmed much, much better than these 74s, and quality seemed to be up to decent standards (for Chrysler of that era, anyway) by then. Of course, the economy was pretty strong in 76-77, too.
In the late 80s, I test drove a 74 Newport sedan. I was shocked at the lack of rigidity in the body structure, as the 4 door hardtops of my experience were extremely rigid. That sedan was the floppiest sedan I had driven in eons – how Chrysler managed to make a unibody shudder like that one was beyond baffling. For all of Chrysler’s faults, its unibodies had always at least been quite stiff. Until 1974.
Couldn’t disagree more regarding the body structure of ’74-77 C body Mopars.
Between 1980 and 1996 with 3 kids and wanting size and safety, gas mileage be damned, we owned 4 ’71-’73 Fuselage C bodies (2 wagons, 2 sedans), ’76 & ’77 Gran Fury Broughams, and a ’77 Newport Custom. With the exception of a ’71 Fury III which had high mileage (but was still lasted for 5 years with an 80 mile daily commute before rusting away), all the rest were bought with low miles and were driven daily for between 5 to 10 years.
We pulled horse trailers and a 19′ boat with them regularly.
The Newport was a 4 dr hardtop, the rest were pillar sedans or wagons, our preferred configuration. None of them exhibited a noticeable lack of body rigidity, and the later C body ’76 and ’77s were undoubtedly the most rigid. All these cars were driven for between 80 and 140,000 miles, so we’ve had rather extensive experience with them. We had a couple B and C-body GM full frame Buicks and Olds during that time also. The Mopar C-Unibody was a superbly engineered structure for one so large, and superior in rigidity to any other large car of the era, the GMs in particular (never had a big Ford, they were way too loose and floppy in all respects, Dad had an awful ’72 LTD.). I’d love to own another ’76/77 C body if any good ones are left after their extensive depredation by the demo knuckledraggers.
Thanks for your input. I have never driven a 74+ wagon so I cannot comment there. And somehow I have only driven one 74+ sedan, but was disappointed in its lack of rigidity compared with the multiple 74+ 4 door hardtops I have driven (a Newport, a New Yorker and an Imperial). Could I have gotten one with some structural damage? Perhaps, though it was a pretty clean and well kept car.
Remember the old Chrysler saying about how some of the cars/wagons were really good while others had myriad problems right after you drove them off the lot.
These big Mopars of that era were cherished by people who had to use their cars for lots and lots of driving. They were simply made for people who had to put in a lot of windshield time. The drivetrains were superior to anything else available. Nothing beat a 727 torqueflite for durability. These cars were tanks and near the end of their lives they were prized above all others for demolition derbies. They didnt win any beauty contests but that was not important to their fans.
I’m seeing a lot of herd mentality in these comments here.
>And Chrysler did a good job of integrating the 5-mph bumpers into the basic design – far better than Ford and GM did with their full-size cars during these years.
Never really thought about that one, but I do believe you’re right. Something to be proud of in a seventies context!
Any idea what a 1974 Newport 4 door is worth?
I love the last of the C-bodies. As someone pointed out in another post, when Chrysler created the R-Body line to replace these, they actually based it on the older B-body chassis. These C-bodies were a more modern design.
Being a wagon-lover, I’d love to find a clean Town & Country of this vintage, silver or white with the woodgrain.
These cars fly under my visual radar most days, but this well-preserved 1990/91 Grand Marquis caught my eye in a suburban mall yesterday (more pics @ Cohort). Basically the same car as the Chrysler – 17 years later.
rodbadr, Those FoMoCos had a shorter wheelbase, a smaller engine, and better fuel economy than the classy, robust big RWD mid-70s Mopars.. sadly.
How far back does that “crystal” hood ornament go? I know they were big on the K-cars and the Fifth Avenue, but didn’t realize they had them in the early 70’s too.
I don’t believe that the crystal hood ornament is correct for this year. If I remember correctly, Chrysler’s hood ornament in the mid-1970s was a chrome outline of the Chrysler “castle” featured on the grille of this car.
That crystal hood ornament is a retrofit (as are, of course, those wheels). The Newport had no hood ornament in 74. I believe that the crystal one first appeared on the 82 Imperial and was common on the fwd LeBarons (IIRC). Personally, I would prefer the car without the hood ornament, and especially with either factory wheelcovers or the optional Road Wheels, but given that this is the only one of these I had seen in years, I overlooked the mods and allowed myself to get sucked into its orbit. I really like this car, despite its flaws.
“The boost to these cars came with the 76 models when the old Imperial became the New Yorker, the old NY became the Newport Custom ..”
This helped, temorarily. But, as with the Volares, they had poor build quality, and many former die hard Mopar big car buuyers went to Ford/GM afterwards. My uncle went to a Marquis in 1980, for example, after 1965, 69, and 76 Plymouths.
But, as stated, I’d like to know the story behind the designs. The ’62 models are well written up here and other car sites. But who decided to simply copy GM?
Amazing this is Mopar is on life support and gets ‘reborn’ many times. But I think this Fiat merger is its “9th Life”.
When Lynn Townsend was put in control of Chrysler Corp after the short-lived presidency of William Newberg, sales were in a free-fall due (at least in large part) to the company’s attempt to lead in styling but going down some roads where there were no buyers. Some really strange stuff came out of the studios in the last years under Virgil Exner’s running of styling. Townsend was an outside CPA who became president. It was he who set the policy that Chrysler would no longer attempt to be a leader in styling, but would let others set the trends. This was a safe course, but also had Chrysler forever 2 or 3 years behind the rest of the industry on styling.
Yep, and Townsend’s misbegotten European adventures tied up cash that could have gone to shorter body cycles; hence the ’73s. Although, I’m not sure that wasn’t planned all along, as the fuselage bodies got significant sheet metal updates in ’72. As bad as they were, you almost wonder if Chrysler wouldn’t have been better off launching these as ’75s, or even ’76s, putting a priority on reskinning the B-body sedans and wagons, whose aggressive haunches dated even faster than the big cars.should Especially given that GM and Ford’s full-size bodies carried on for most of the decade.
These Newports had some truly wacky interior options. I remember seeing a white over red Newport Custom years ago with a red brocade interior.
And as noted above, the best 5-mph bumper integration of any car in the era – and for several years thereafter.
Chrysler’s European excursion did have one upside: the Horizon, which was a pretty competent C-segment hatch for the late ’70s and probably could have remained so had its development not trailed off. Admittedly, that came at a high price, but they did get SOMETHING out of it.
To some extent, that policy was a return to the previous status quo for Chrysler, which had taken a similar tack after the Airflow debacle. The only reason that changed at all was that Exner convinced K.T. Keller and Tex Colbert that the designs for the ’55s were dead ducks. (The original rationale for hiring Exner had been to come up with some “idea cars” that would reassure stockholders nervous that Chrysler was out of touch without actually committing to building anything risky.)
Chrysler did a good job not making the bumpers look like the battering rams most other car’s had at the time. It looks good as a four door. Removing the ugly seat belt assembly as this owner did really improves the pillarless look. Too bad the quality was poor.
I agree. The 1970s were definitely not the best decade for cars built in North America, what with all the unrealistic regulations and BS. It’s no wonder American car companies have taken a nosedive they have yet to recover from to this day.
Someone speculated that the only way Chrysler managed to survive for many years was that they kept getting the leftover sales as independent brands died off. In the end, Chrysler just ran out of independents to cannibalize sales. That, and Chrysler’s lucrative government contracts just weren’t enough to overcome some really dismal management decisions and a poor economy. It would take the likes of a dynamo like Iacocca to drastically overhaul what had become a chaotic, dysfunctional organization at Chrysler.
The 1974 Newport is an embodiment of where Chrysler was headed. It’s not a particularly bad car (for a Chrysler); it’s just nowhere near as good as the competition (which wasn’t all that hot, either, but it was the seventies…).
But even the 1974 full-size Chryslers weren’t as bad as what was yet to come: the 1979 Dodge St. Regis and its derivatives. The coffin shape styling of those cars was prophetic.
You’ve done a good job of presenting the 74-78 C body as appealing. I always associate them with the pillared Dodge and Plymouth sedans, which are frankly unattractive to me. I don’t think the interiors are especially bad, except for the vents which went in everything from the Sportsman to the original Caravan and the puffy faux-stitched panel in front of the passenger. Then again, I got upset when Honda moved away from black steering wheels; I always felt they helped focus one’s attention on outside objects.
Obviously everyone knows I’m partial to the Fuselage cars. I understand they were generally austere and cheaply made, and that they weren’t what full-size car buyers wanted. But they were at least cool and different in a way these cars, which were almost apologetically styled, were not.
+1. There’s something “I wanna be a Ford LTD AND an Olds Delta Eighty Eight Royale” about these that ironically make them more “me too” than either iteration of Full Sized Mopar before (to my eyes).
I wouldn’t say the Fuselages were particularly following GM trend either. Other than visible bulk, the GM B/C’s of 65/65 were still really tailored in a way that the Fuselage cars are pretty organic. From my point of view this push and pull between organic and tailored shapes is actually one of the most woeful design details of the 67-70 GM B/C cars. I’m probably in the minority with Perry, but the Fuselages were pretty unique in my eyes, for better or worse.
Yeah, in the timeframe after 1962 up to the Iacocca era, the last, tepid, toe-in-the-water, let’s-try-something-different thing that Chrysler tried were the fuselage cars. They really didn’t much look like anything from the previous couple years from either GM or Ford, but they weren’t completely out-of-the-box, radical departures, either. It’s a shame Chrysler’s quality was sinking (again) during that time. Maybe more of a fuselage car success could have taken Chrysler on a different path.
OTOH, probably not. Even when Chrysler had decent successes, they always seemed to manage to shoot themselves in the foot, anyway.
The taillamps are very Oldsmobile!
I always thought that the 1969 Plymouth Fury looked like a “fuselage” version of the 1966 Chevrolet Impala.
The funny thing is, these C-bodies are like the offspring of the marriage of Engel’s ’67-’68 C-bodies and the ’72-73 C-bodies – especially when you look at the sedan. It has some of the roundness of the fuselage mixed with the tauter (than the ’65-’66s) angularity of the ’67-’68s. Never thought of it that way until this post, mainly, I guess, because the sedans were always relatively rare in civilian trim, even when I was growing up.
I know that grille looks cheap, but it looks a heck of a lot richer than the grille on the 2014 S-class I saw in my parking garage today – check one out and you’ll see what I mean.
Lastly, one thing I’ve always liked about these last of the C-bodies is that the exposed headlight models kept their round headlights to the end. The surrounds on the Newport/New Yorker are particularly well resolved, and they really were the only cars to escape the dreaded rectangular light retrofit.
What? 27 comments in and no reference to the fabled Shitmobile from Trailer Park Boys?
Must be a Canadian thing.
This car is not one of Chryslers shining moments but I know Ricky, Julian and Bubbles would approve.
http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Am0I57_lHfU
Warning, probably NSFW lots of naughty language.
But..but…get in, close that big door (more solid for ’74) and put it in gear. Whhhoooosh. The engine makes no sound. All you hear is a little TorqueFlite music.
Now, I get all the reasons that these didn’t sell well, but Dad worked at a C-P dealer in these years and so every car I knew (except Mom’s VW) was a Mopar. I loved them dearly.
I know from experience that a ’75 Gran Fury hardtop with a 360 was a solid car, inside and out, though I guess the black interior masked the lack of color-matching. And yes, it was my grandfather’s.
My family was a MOPAR household, we owned a 68, 70 & 72 Sport Suburbans, while they may have not been as well appointed as a Ford or Chevrolet, they offered VERY reliable transportation. The 68 & 70 with the peg board headliners were different. The 72 with a cloth headliner & the 360 with a torqueflite offered 150,000 miles of relatively trouble free driving hauling a 26 ft. Airstream around the eastern U.S. in the 6 years we owned it. Something to note the electronic ignition offered in 72 was something unavailable from anyone else. Something else to note was MOPARs had as standard a full complement of dash gauges as standard. Our MOPARs always beat an LTD Country squire in the MPG department.
We also owned a ’78 Newport 2 Dr. Hardtop with the 400 lean burn that ran like a champ & that big padded dash on the passenger side offered a 17 year old a place to put his knees as he rode along & slouched on that big front seat.
Star crossed is a great description for these cars. So close, on so many counts, but almost invariably off somehow. Add in hit or miss build quality, and it was really hard to sell to anyone beyond Mopar loyalists. One of those returning customers was my Great Aunt Roberta, who got a new Chrysler New Yorker every two years. Her husband was a big fan of Chrysler products, and she continued the tradition even after his death. I remember all her cars from the 1970s, and while none of them would have been at the top of my list, I could see their charms.
Group 1: The fuselages. She had a brown 1971 New Yorker Brougham. To my eyes at the time, the fuselage looked fat and the loop bumpers seemed old. Today, I actually admire those details, but as noted in the article, they really are late 1960s flourishes and seemed out of date by the 1970s. A 1973 New Yorker Brougham came next, in gold. I preferred the front of this one, since it was more “square” and therefore looked more contemporary to me. But I thought the back really didn’t match the front. I never remember her complaining about the quality of either car, though they led pampered lives in a benign climate and were traded when still pretty new with low miles.
Group 2: The 1970 designs that were several years too late. My Great Aunt’s 1975 New Yorker Brougham was dark green with a white top, and I had love/hate feelings about that one. Aspects of the design were very sleek, and the Chryslers looked much less like GM products than did the Dodge and Plymouth big cars. But the huge chrome grill and chrome side trim seemed too much (even for the 1970s, and yes I think the featured Newport’s front and side detailing is preferable). Inside, I thought the central mounted glove box was smart, but if I remember right it was really hard (either metal or super rigid plastic), even though it was in such a prominent location. Some details worked… others were really bad. Her next one, the dark brown 1977 New Yorker Brougham with the Imperial styling was my absolute favorite of the bunch. The waterfall grill did wonders for the front, and the overall effect was just so sleek and smooth. The pillow tufted leather interior felt really lush. If that had been a 1973 instead of a 1977, it would have knocked the cover off the ball. But in 1977 my heart was with the downsized GM big cars, and the Chrysler seemed so dated, even though it was very nice. I remember her grumbling about issues with these cars, and the 1975 did cause her a number of problems, though the 1977 was better. But neither were great. Trouble brewing.
The end: My Great Aunt’s last Chrysler was a 1979 New Yorker with the 5th Avenue package–it was very cream colored, even with “driftwood” fake wood trim inside! It really did look a bit like a rolling coffin (inside and out), and to my mind there was no comparison between that car and my mother’s 1979 Oldsmobile Ninety Eight LS. Though her particular 1979 was actually very trouble free, My Great Aunt was so concerned over the Chrysler bankruptcy and the company’s badly tainted reputation that this Chrysler became her last. It was replaced two years later with a Buick Electra Park Avenue, which she adored.
Too late, too inconsistent, but often so close. Another make where it is so easy to play the “what if they’d gotten it totally right?” game and imagine what their business would be today without the missteps these cars represent.
Right here. This is where Chrysler starts to loose it. These big Chryslers were very sound mechanically, but suffered from indifferent assembly, poor quality trim, and a tendency to rust. The previous year saw the slow selling Barracuda and Challenger dropped, 1975 saw a retreat from most commercial truck lines and the introduction of the abysmal Aspen/Volare, which replaced the legendary and still well-selling Dart/Valiant/Duster. In Chrysler’s defense, the market was changing faster than Chrysler could effectively react to it. However, poor quality and the ‘keep the assembly lines going no matter what’ sales bank contributed immensely to Chrysler’s problems in the late 70’s.
I agree. I’ve never understood why Chrysler was allowed to build their cars the way they did. It’s just unforgivable.
Chrysler/Dodge/Plymouth are my favorite full-size cars of the late 60s/early 70s. I’ve gotten over my teenage lust for big block muscle cars but the full size boats are the perfect home for one. 440 + torqueflight + road wheels = lust for me. I wish the owner had put some better wheels on this one but I’m digging this Newport.
>> In 1965 and again in 1969, Chrysler brought out new full-sized C body cars that were reminiscent of GM’s styling of three years earlier. <<
Not really. The 1965's were influenced by Engel's own 1961 Lincoln. And it was GM that aped Chrysler's fuselage styling in it's 1971 full sizers.
For 1971 the top-of-the-line Caprice was completely redesigned on a longer 121.5-inch (3,090 mm) wheelbase and featured bold, Chrysler-like fuselage styling.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chevrolet_Caprice
My first thought was how similar the front end looks to the same year’s Gran Torino.
Why do I kind of like this car? WHY? Its a big pillowy soft brohammy 4-door and its beige. That pretty much nails everything I cant stand in a car. A Mopar fanboy I might be on some level, but while Ill take a few swigs of the Kool Aid, guzzling it isn’t my style.
I think this particular example is just very well dialed in. The color suits the lines very well. The wheels are custom, add a bit of stance but still very classy. 4 doors are a bit easier to swallow if theyre a pillarless hardtop and this car is meant for that look. The 2-door hardtops in the ads just look fat and dumpy but this looks like a styling bro-trip to Vegas kind of sled.
This car definitely has some of Engel’s stank rubbed on it and that’s a VERY good thing. Criticize those designs for lagging by about 3-5 years all you want. In their day they might have seemed dated but now that clean slabsided look is truly timeless. A ’66 Fury 2 door h/t will be immensely more popular/valuable than a ’72. This particular Newport might not ever bring in the big $$ as a collectors item, but as a secret weapon in the garage for a guys or gals outing I cant imagine a better freeway bomber.
Having read this fifteen hours ago, I’m still pondering my thoughts on this lovely Chrysler. These have definitely aged quite well, much more so than the contemporary GM biggies.
How far off is it to say Chrysler’s and their quality of this time was like a venus fly-trap? It’s pretty, you are lured into it, and it may be followed by a big whammo – or not.
Oh, I’ll take my chances with this one. It’s a Newport and there hasn’t been an unattractive one yet. The only big car from ’74 that speaks louder to me is a Grand Marquis.
The last C-bodies were barely on my radar prior to finding CC. I’m pretty sure at one point I thought they were all Dodge/Plymouth cop cars or taxis, and even though most of the articles and comments on them here have leaned towards the negative side, I always find them interesting and usually attractive, too.
Both are in full effect for this Newport, which is one of the best looking examples of the species I’ve seen yet! I know they did not come off this way at all in 1974, but 40 years onward it looks so refreshing, simple and clean compared to the products of the Broughamocaust that were sweeping the nation that year. I’d say being several years behind current styling trends could definitely be seen as a positive in the mid-70s; what a shame that no one realized it at the time.
The basic shape of the body really isn’t that dated for 1974, though. It’s just the details, like those 1970-ish Oldsmobile taillights (which are excellent) and the overall “vibe” of the car that harkens back to an earlier time. Maybe this is what the 70s would have looked like if the LTD and Caprice never happened, or if auto styling kept going back to the period after fins/before ’65 Chevies for inspiration rather than following the path it took. The hardtop body and light colors also mask a lot of heft, and although the dash padding does look incredibly shitty, I like this instrument layout, the black plastic and most of the other interior details.
I don’t love the generic 70s landyacht grille, but Chrysler’s take on it is easier to stomach than most. I also wonder if it’d look even better without the (thankfully non-padded) vinyl top. That doesn’t really mesh too well with the creased quarter panels on the 4-door (looks really awkward in the ad for the brown car), but that’s only a minor criticism – and really all I can come up with for negatives. Oh, well… aside from all the horrific build quality problems and whatnot, but obviously this car was one of the “good ones” if it’s survived in this condition.
My great aunt traded in her high mileage, one owner 65 Newport for this exact car in 74, only in dark green (I think the vinyl top was black). Its history supports the comments about hit or miss quality for Chrysler in the 70’s. The 74 was a very poor quallty car that gave her no end of trouble over the next two years (the 65 was excellent in every way). Overall, I like the styling.
Having owned Chrysler products since the 1940’s, the aunt traded the 74 in 76 for a new Cordoba, her last car. It was an excellent car that gave her no serious trouble over many years. OTOH, my cousin bought a new Cordoba the next year that was so bad that she bought European (Audi) for the next two cars.
BTW, JCP, all three of these Chryslers were purchased at Poinsette Chrysler-Plymouth in Fort Wayne (though the 65 spent most of its life here in SoCal so looked like new upon trade-in).
I drove a six-hour round trip once to look at a ’65 Newport that ended up being a real pile, but the guy was also selling a ’75 New Yorker that was in FAR better shape for only a grand more. Not my thing though… As much as I love old cars, the fuselage is the last big Chrysler I consider even remotely appealing, and in reality, I only like the fuselage Dodge/Plymouth.
If you really examine it, this is way better than Ford’s full-sizers from that era, but I still prefer GM’s ’70s whales, especially Chevrolets.
I may be one of the few who had first hand experience with both the fusey and these. My best friend’s father (who became my car mentor Howard) Owned both. First was a black 2 door 72 Newport Royal which he had bought new. He traded the 72 on a dark brown 77 Newport Custom 4 door hardtop with fender skirts and parchment interior. Neither car had a vinyl roof, and both were powered by the 400 V8. And both also came from Poinsatte ChryPly in Fort Wayne where CA Guy’s aunt bought her Chryslers. Both of these cars were in the better areas of the Bell Curve.
Both had their strong points. The 72 drove perfectly but late in its life suffered from periodic overheating. The 77 seemed more luxurious and better trimmed. The body felt more solid and had better sound absorption, but the car had a slight vibration on the highway that was never resolved. The 77 felt more “mainstream” than did the 72. I guess this why I could go either way between the two generations, depending on the individual car. I like both, but for different reasons (but still prefer the pre-69 versions to either).
“…but still prefer the pre-69 versions to either.”
Oh, I think that goes without saying! 🙂
My parents had a ’74 Monaco hardtop in a fabulous combo: White/White/White. The front seats were buckets with a cloth inserts that looked like was designed in WWI battleship camouflage. I do remember that the carpet was black along with the steering wheel — kinda thought that was coordinated (sounds like it was unintentionally that way). It had the 400 engine, power windows and door locks. It was a real looker.
I don’t remember any complaints about service on the car. Maybe I was just too young to remember.
The story I do recall is that my mom would get frustrated with other motorists… They’d confuse her with the local cops and slow down! I think I inherited her lead foot.
A handsome car that missed on too many details. I believe that the 4 door Newport went hardtop only in ’78, and perhaps as early as ’76 or ’77 to simplify the line and align it with the New Yorker. As JPC mentioned, the final top 4 door hardtop Newport interior was quite luxurious, and yet quite different from the New Yorker.
Good write up.
If it’s good enough for The Trailer Park Boys, it’s good enough for me.
I actually saw a Chrysler Newport of this period although the taillights were horizontal (looked like something you’d see from a Buick or a Mercury) rather than vertical (what you see here), I can’t remember if it was pillared or a hardtop but did recognize it being a Chrysler Newport, I thought these cars looked better than GM’s full sized cars of that time period (before their ’77 downsizing).
That is a nice-looking car and apparently one of the better-built ones given what I’ve read in the story and the previous comments.
I did not know of Chrysler’s 1974 notions of having a black steering wheel, black steering column and black instrument panel on all their cars . . . until now! Utterly bizarre-looking with the tan and white interior. Gotta chuckle at that, though. What on earth were Townsend and the higher-ups at Chrysler ~thinking~? It’s hard for my poxy brain to believe that was intentional and yet it was. (Wish I knew of a emoticon that would depict ‘Wacko’!).
I think these cars do have a certain appealing style, though this particular example is a bit ’70s beige-y for my taste.
Interesting fact about those black steering wheels: there was a recent precedent for this. 1972 Thunderbirds, and ’68-’70 Cadillacs were also equipped with any steering wheel, as long as it was a black one. Even then, though, if Chrysler were copying GM, there were 4 years behind.
Forget the black color; what was Chrysler doing still using horn rings until 1976?
I had completely forgotten – if I ever knew in the first place – that this generation of Newport was offered in the four door hardtop body style. I did remember that the New Yorker was offered as a post sedan, and always thought it looked like a considerably cheaper car when it wasn’t a hardtop. I do really like the styling of all the ’74-78 Chrysler hardtop sedans, which seem to channel the excellent (even if slightly dated) 1965-66 design. These two cars neatly bookend the Engel era at Chrysler.
Chrysler would again have terribly unlucky timing with this car’s successor, the 1979 R-body which arrived just before the 1979 fuel crisis and 1980-81 recession. Those cars, Chrysler’s last truly big sedans, would be dropped partway through 1981… just in time to miss out on a resurgence in big sedan sales.
I’ll add a bit to my comments of a couple years ago. ’71 to ’77 C-body Mopars were our main go-to cars while our 3 kids were growing up. We insisted on big safe & powerful cars that also handled decently, with the bonus of having some of the best engines and transmissions available. We had 3 fuselage Plyms: a ’71 F3 sedan a ’71 wagon and a ’73 wagons, and a 72 Chrysler T&C. These were succeeded by 3 “formals”, a ’76 and ’77 Gran Fury and a ’77 Newport Custom, all 3 sedans. I couldn’t stand the ’69 and ’72 full size Fords my Dad had, with their mushy suspensions and horrible handling, We did have a few full size ’73 to ’76 Olds and Buick sedans that handled decently and had good drivetrains also, but at heart I preferred the Mopars. Over about 20 years we put probably 500,000 miles on them. When one rusted out I’d start the search for another clean low mile example. By the late ’90s it was almost impossible so we stitched to 2 R-bodies, both good cars for us but not the same, and then ’77 to ’79 B & C body Buicks and Olds, much easier to find, even better handling, and still with their excellent divisionally-made engines and superb THM transmissions. After ’79 I lost interest, to me they were flimsy shadows of themselves
Yes ’70s Mopar interior quality suffered with cheesy looking dashes and in the mid ’70s in particular horrible hard plastic that deteriorated from sunlight. I never had a problem with body assembly quality, panel gaps and paint were not the stuff I worried about, and the basics were sound. In the end I came to prefer the 360 engine above all, it was one of the greats. However the 318 in my ’71 F3 was superb over 100K miles I put on it (from 90 to 190 k) and that car, along with our 10 year owned ’77 Gran Fury Brougham, were 2 of the 3 best cars I’ve ever owned. The ’67 Volvo 122S that my wife commuted in 50 mi each way into Baltimore from out in the country for 10 years and was felled only by a guardrail in a snowstorm at 240,000 miles was the other one (and it’s B-18 heart lived on in a friend’s P1800!) However the last 2 generations of true full size Mopars will always command a grateful place in my heart for serving our family so well for so many years. I’ve love another one.
Base series Chrysler buyers, just as with Buick, always preferred the four door sedan over the four door hardtop, not only because of price, but four door hardtops had a reputation for air and water leaks, wind noise, a less solid feel than the full-door sedan. There was also the outlook that eschewed the more stylish, less practical four door hardtop as frivolous.
I had not realized these were downsized from the 1973 models. They were nice looking cars, but their pedigrees were tainted as you described. Their looks were cribbed mostly from GM cars of a few years earlier.
It’s no surprise the Cordoba outsold these and the whole Chrysler lineup. Here was a trim good looking design, with long hood, short deck appeal.
In the vignette MarkP posted in 2014, the pitchman, Joe Gariagiola, when he steps outside, refers to $200 rebates on Plymouth Voyagers. Was that a pickup truck line that year? I couldn’t find a reference to it anywhere.
Excellent piece.
It was a rebadged Dodge B-series van. Curbside Classic had posted an article about it. It wasn’t sold in Canada.
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/blog/ebay-find-1977-plymouth-voyager-the-ultimate-shaggin-wagon/
Voyagers at that time were full-size vans, twins of the Dodges.
Unfortunately, I remember these cars well and had to drive one as a kid just learning to drive. These cars are completely uninspired. They only look good in hindsight because they no longer need to compete with better competition from 1974.
By 1974, the action was in intermediate cars, and Chrysler didn’t have a decent one that looked like it was designed after 1969. Coke-bottle rear fenders, after-thought rear doors, Chrysler’s intermediate line was designed for coupes, not sedans – where the action was. So, these intermediates went to fleets. For some odd reason, Chrysler and AMC didn’t think that the squaring-up of the full sized car look, would trickle down to the intermediate market. But intermediates were the new preferred sedans. No one really had their act together in this market styling-wise. Torinos were bloated looking sedans, GM Colonnade sedans were OK, but Chrysler and AMC’s offerings weren’t even trying.
So, 1974 was the year of the big old car, but it was the year of the big old formal looking car. Ford rocked that look silly, GM was on the mark, and Chrysler’s big cars looked like they never heard of broughamification. It took Chrysler a few more years to catch on.
Chrysler also lacked a real small car. The Duster sat six, and was bigger than the Hornet, Nova and the Maverick. Also, the Duster was old, it was the same car as it was in 1967. Chrysler had no sub-compact.
Chrysler looked doomed. It smelled of failure. Those fuselage cars we drool over now, were never popular enough to get the market to consider Chrysler products. Their whole line seemed completely uninspired, old and sub-par.
Growing up in a MOPAR/Ford family, I’ve driven enough to of those cars to know that they only look good from the year 2020.
The looks were indeed meh, but I didn’t care, I liked their excellent engines (especially the no Lean-Burn 360 that was available in ’77), the superb transmission, the torsion-bar front suspension, and the solid uni-body structure which was far more tight and rattle-free (frequently pulling heavy trailers really amplified that characteristic) than Ford and GM’s. Over a half-million miles of driving them they were most satisfactory. Function prevailed over form.
I just bought my first chrysler newport 1974 thanks for the info i love old cars
I bought one of these from a 70-s something gentleman (the original owner) in Manchester, CT in October 1985 for the princely sum of $850.
I was twenty-six years old.
His Newport Custom was wine red metallic, sporting a beige fabric and vinyl interior, and a beige vinyl roof..According to memory, it had around 80,000 miles on the odometer.
The interior had 50/50 front seats, a reclining passenger’s seat, a rear seat center armrest, PS, PB and an AM/FM, but not much else other than AC. It was in excellent condition, and very roomy and comfortable.
Not unexpectedly, the inner part of the rear quarter panels were well-rotted, with a good amount of undercar rust, too, but the rest of the body and pant were in very good condition.
Under the hood, the 440-2 bbl V-8 ran quite well, although it did burn some oil, nothing extreme. The auto Torqueflite never gave me a problem during my 21-month stint with the car, which also included a trek from Hartford, CT to Los Angeles and back in late 1985. I towed a small U-Haul trailer out to California, and the torque of the 400 was more than ample to provide above-average performance and gas mileage, around 12-13 mpg overall.
My only regret is that I hadn’t been old enough to own (much less drive) a new car like the 1974 Newport Custom – or even it’s more expensive counterpart, the New Yorker Brogham. Several of my passenger, including my brother, commented on how smooth and ‘luxurious’ the car was, and the body color never failed to receive applause (as long as they didn’t look too close at the rear quarter rocker panels, that is!)
The 1974 Sedan de Ville I bought a couple of years later was also a sweet ride (platinum body, off-white vinyl roof, and a striking red leather interior – it was like a bordello inside, not that I’ve ever frequented one -but its gargantuan 472-V8 actually made less power than the Newport’s 400, and the Newport was noticeably quicker and better handling, too.
Both cars had about the same aount of passenger and trunk space.
Both had the underside rot and rust issue, but apart from the Caddy’s interior, I’d actually have to say that the Newport was a more fun car to drive, and to ride in.
For all practical purposes my Newport was just as comfy as the Caddy was.
Also, for the article writer, the ’69 fuselage models were not take-offs of GM products from a few years earlier.
They were actually one of the few examples of Ma Mopar actually creating a new, innovative styling theme.
In reality, GM partially copied Chrisler when they brought out their more fuselage-sytled ’71 models, although they did have lower fender lines and beltlines, than the big C-bodies, to be sure.
Regardless none of the ’71-76 GM full-sizers looked as classy as the ’72-’73 New Yorker Brougham; a series that was essentially 95% of the Imperial, but at only 80% of the price tag.
Great article, thanks for rekindling some lovely memories!
Which came first, the –
chicken– 1974 Newport or the –egg– 1973 Cutlass?Motor Trend had their 1974 New Car issues sent out to subscribers [me] in Sept ’73, a month before the Oil Crisis started. They raved about the new Imperial with 4 wheel disk brakes. MT also predicted “record sales for 74”, who knew about OPEC?
Plymouth and Dodge C bodies flopped badly and were fleet queens, see ‘Blues Bros’ crash scenes. Big Chryslers did way better in 76 when Imperial styling went to NY’er, “Caddy luxury at a Chrysler price”. Newport got NY’er old style, with horizontal taillights.