(first posted 11/3/2015) What’s the most significant car of 1959? The giant finned Cadillac? It’s pure excess embodied in steel,glass and chrome, the apogee (or nadir) of a trend that had been building for decades, spurred on by Harley Earl’s mantra: longer, lower, wider. But there were contravening voices too—weight is the enemy—and the Studebaker Lark is their ultimate expression. It’s the anti-’59 Cadillac, a mere 175 inches short and 2600 lbs light, yet it has all the classic American car requisites of the time: a V8 engine, automatic transmission, body-on-frame construction, and room for six, in a pinch. But what’s really notable is what’s missing: huge front and rear overhangs, fins, and acres of chrome.
The Lark is the alter-reality mobile of 1959, an American car with a European sensibility. And there were just enough folks who bought into that fairly radical idea in 1959 to make the Lark the biggest hit for Studebaker in way too long, as well as their last one ever.
It’s not the first time that a smaller car saved Studebaker; the first was the 1939 Champion, the car that brought Studebaker back from the precipice of the Depression and bankruptcy. It was the first serious attempt by one of the major manufacturers to counter the trend towards ever greater size, weight and power that had taken hold in the early-mid thirties. Giving up little or nothing in terms of passenger space and comfort, careful design and engineering created a car that was shorter, and most of all lighter, weighing some 2,200 lbs, about the same as the Ford Model A. That allowed it to perform well with its new and smaller 164 CID six, a sweet-running and relatively high-revving (4,000 rpm) 78 hp engine that gave the Champion big car performance, along with better handling and economy.
Rather than calling it the first modern “compact”, one could say that the Champion was “European sized”, inasmuch as it espoused the ideal of maximum comfort in a package as small and light as possible, with the attendant benefits of handling and economy. And it was about the size of a “large” European sedan.
That was no coincidence, as the Champion was designed by French-born Raymond Loewy, who had catapulted into the leading edge of the new field of industrial design. Loewy put his stamp on everything from locomotives, ships, appliances, office machines, cigarette packages, consumer goods and anything else that wanted to look up to date during this decade of revolutionary design transformation. And Loewy was a true automobile enthusiast, keeping up with the latest European trends during his many visits to the continent.
Loewy not only influenced Studebaker design for twenty years starting with the Champion, but its whole approach to car building. He constantly pushed Studebaker to build trimmer cars, and during the development of the 1947 models, he had these signs WEIGHT IS THE ENEMY posted everywhere. Although his design contract ended in 1955, Loewy’s long relationship with Studebaker would leave his influence and legacy right to the very end, including consulting and designing the last-gasp Avanti. Although the Lark was not designed under his direct supervision, it embodies all the key Loewy qualities.
The all-new 1947s reflected Loewy’s mantra, as had the 1939 Champion. This ’47 Champion coupe was listed at 2,670 lbs, over 300 lbs less than a comparable Chevy coupe. The 1948 – 1951 period saw the best sales years and profits ever for Studebaker, taking advantage of the post war market with fresh, new products. But that wouldn’t last.
The brilliant new 1953 Loewy coupes were a bold attempt to rekindle interest, and were of course lower and longer. But they were still light; a Champion coupe weighed in at a mere 2,595 lbs. But the coupes were a failure and a dead end; their sad story is here.
In some ways, the 1953 Studebaker sedans are an even sadder story, and not just in their looks, which was the result of an unfortunate last-minute effort in having it share the coupe’s styling. But the coupe’s styling didn’t really lend itself to a sedan, and the sedan was stuck with the tall and ungainly proportions of the previous generation sedans. They were a poorly-conceived afterthought, and the results were crippling.
Studebaker assumed that sedans would still make up the majority of ’53 sales, as was typical in the industry. They lacked confidence (and preparation) in their superb new coupes. And it turned out to be the opposite; demand for the coupes was stronger than expected, but serious production snags limited coupe output. And buyers shunned the ungainly sedans; a disastrous double whammy. Meanwhile, Ford and Chevrolet were discounting their cars like mad in a battle for market share; that alone was the most damaging event for all of the independents. The post war seller’s boom was truly over, and GM and Ford had their guns blazing. And Studebaker was stuck with a sleek coupe whose reputation was dinged and a sedan whose proportions were off-putting.
We’re not going to cover those difficult years for Studebaker of the mid-fifties in detail here; the “merger” with Packard, and the management contract with Curtiss-Wright, and all of the attendant bad decisions and resulting disappointments. Loewy’s design contract with Studebaker ended in 1955, and the last job handled by his team, headed by Bob Bourke, was the 1956 Hawk, a low-cost effort to inject a bit more life in the ’53 coupe body. It worked, more or less, and the Hawk would soldier on for a number of years.
Packard’s James Nance was not a big Loewy fan, and was determined to get away from the sloping low hoods and tails that Studebaker’s own sales manager, William Keller, referred to as “the droopy penis look”. Nance wanted GM-esque style, with big, bold front ends, and tall tails to match. Vince Gardner was hired to re-do the sedans for 1956, and he did just that. The result is certainly more mainstream, and gave them more gravitas; not that it did much for sales. Studebaker’s losses were mounting, and the millions needed for a completely new body to be shared with a new Packard Clipper just weren’t to be found.
That resulted in another last-minute refresh for 1957, now by Duncan McRae, who also designed the proposed new cars that were stillborn. New Studebaker President Harold Churchill faced a daunting task. And he nearly succeeded, based on a new strategy: stop trying to compete with the Big Three and find niches big enough to exploit profitably. Labor and other costs had finally been brought down, lowering Studebaker’s break-even point to some 100,000 units, possibly even as low as 80,000. Now the task was to find enough niches to exceed that number.
The Hawk fit into that strategy, the only personal performance luxo-coupe of its kind at the time, and sold in modest but fairly steady numbers. In May of 1957, the flintskin niche was identified, and duly addressed by the Scotsman, the ultimate stripper, lacking even chrome on the hub caps.
Contrary to what might be presumed, Studebakers had been consistently more expensive than their Big Three competitors. They were sold on certain qualities that folks were willing to pay more for, whether that was advanced styling, trimmer size, better efficiency, or just because they were loyal to the brand. And Studebaker did have some features the competition didn’t, including an automatic in 1950, a rather advanced but expensive unit, and the first ohv V8 in the low-priced field (1951).
But with the Scotsman, Studebaker was able to undercut Ford and Chevrolet by some $100. Only a few thousand were envisioned, but its sales exceeded expectations, and the Scotsman’s success directly led to the Lark. A growing number of Americans wanted cheap and basic transportation, and the booming import market and Rambler’s rapid growth were very real proof of that trend. And Harold Churchill wanted a chunk of it.
In the meantime, 1958 needed to be muddled through, somehow. Meaning that poor Duncan McRae had make the ’58s look somehow more relevant, or just different. Everyone was going to quad headlights, but Studebaker couldn’t afford new front fenders, so pods were grafted on, as well as fins on the back. The roof panel was new, though, flatter and a bit lower. Headroom was not compromised, as there was a new lower one-piece drive shaft.
Even more embarrassing were the “Packardbakers”, a line of ’58 Packards that as forced on Churchill because S-P Chairman Roy Hurley hadn’t yet totally given up on finding the money for a new Packard line. It was a sad end to what had once been America’s leading luxury car brand.
In mid-1957, Harold Churchill made his big gamble: he would kill all of these increasingly absurd (and useless) efforts to compete with the ever bigger and finnier cars from the Big Three, and bet the South Bend farm on a compact car. After relentless pressure from his sales executives, the Hawk was given a stay of execution, so that Studebaker dealers would still be able to cater to those looking for something more upscale. But the mainstay, and Studebaker’s only hope of salvation, was to be…the Lark. Realistically, it was really the only option left, as any further attempts to make the hopelessly outdated 1953 sedan body any more competitive with the Big Three was simply foreclosed. So the opposite (and more obvious) route was taken: turn the old sedan body into a competitive “compact”. Rambler was on a roll, and Studebaker wanted in.
Once again. Duncan McRae was given the lead on this very challenging job, assisted by Bob Dohler, Ted Pietsch, Virgil Exner, Jr., Bert Holmes, Bob Mcneary, Bill Bonner and Ray Everts. The timeline was brutally short: nine months from clay approval to introduction; a timeline unheard of back then. But then the Lark was hardly an all-new car; essentially, it was the middle section of the venerable 1953 sedan, with its ends drastically shortened. The comparison with the 1958 above makes the changes (and what wasn’t changed) quite obvious. Several hundred pounds of dead weight were left on the cutting room floor.
The wheelbase was shortened by eight inches, from 116.5″ to 108.5″, almost exactly the same as the Rambler’s 108 inches. But the radically shortened Lark made the Rambler (above) look gaudy and profligate in comparison, what with its fins and 190″ length. In fact, it looked a lot more like the 1958 Studebaker than the 1959 Lark. What had McRae wrought? And had Studebaker gone too far in its radical appendagesectomy?
This graphic (and in-scale) comparison with the 1959 Cadillac really brings the Lark’s proportions and shortness into perspective. The Lark is 175″ long; the Cadillac 225″. Yet the Lark probably gives up very little in the way of useful interior passenger space, with more headroom but a bit less width. These two represent the black and white polar opposites of the American car in 1959.
The Lark previewed the radical downsizing that the Big Three themselves would have to undertake in the late 70s and 80s, which resulted in a 1985 Cadillac Coupe DeVille that was closer to the Lark in length (and proportions) than its 1959 predecessor. Like the Lark, it was big on the inside and small on the outside. And not surprisingly, it was scorned by its traditional base of buyers. It’s still America.
How was the Lark actually created? Studebaker Chief Engineer Gene Hardig took a ’58 sedan body, cut off the ends, shortened the wheelbase by tucking the rear wheel in closer to the rear seat, and gave it to the designers to come up with a suitable front and rear end. And as one small concession, they were given the budget for a flatter roof panel, to make it look a bit more modern. But the inside dimensions were the same as the “standard size” cars Studebaker had been peddling for years. Not surprisingly, the Lark was quickly put to use in taxi service, where its space efficiency and economy were welcome.
Somewhat surprisingly, Studebaker had the funds to give the Lark a fairly complete line-up, including a two door station wagon that sat on a longer 113″ wheelbase, since it had to basically re-use the whole rear section of the existing wagon.
And then there was the two-door hardtop, seemingly an extravagance, one that neither Rambler nor the Big Three’s 1960 compacts would have. And in 1960, a convertible joined the lineup, another compact exclusive. I found this very nice ’59 coupe at The Home Depot, where an employee parked it there daily for some time, and we’ll use it for a closer look at its styling, chassis, drive train and interior.
Continued on Page 2: The Larks styling, technical details, all-round performance
The Lark and Nash Metropolitan should be accredited for being pioneers of the subcompact/compact car movement, just when every other American manufacturer was enthralled with huge tailfins, glitz and chrome.
I wonder what the gas mileage figures were for the Metropolitan and Lark in their base and smallest engine displacement offerings.
The Japanese car, I think resembles and could’ve had some Lark styling influences is the 1963 Toyota Tiara… There’s a car I wouldn’t mind owning.
THat Toyota is an Anglia clone:
http://i.telegraph.co.uk/multimedia/archive/01794/ford-anglia_1794392a.jpg
THat Toyota is an Anglia clone:
http://i.telegraph.co.uk/multimedia/archive/01794/ford-anglia_1794392a.jpg
Having grown up around both, I would never have thought there was any similarity. I don’t see it.
Good eye, davis…
The similarity is so close, it’s uncanny. 🙂
I wonder what the gas mileage figures were for the Metropolitan and Lark in their base and smallest engine displacement offerings.
My dad had a 59 Lark, an unhappy car that blew a head gasket when only a few months old, and a 60 that was a lot happier. Both were bottom trim 2 door sedans with the six and three on the tree.
I asked him once what sort of mileage the Lark gave and he said “about 20”.
The downsized 1985 FWD C-body Cadillacs were very well received in the market. The RWD sedan continued in production and looked dowdy and dated by comparison. (The smaller 1986 Seville and Eldorado were flops.)
Lotsa people ridiculed the 1985 FWD “C’ Bodies (including me!) at the time, but it’s often forgot that they were far from flops in the market (85 DeVille outselling the 84) Retaining the RWD Brougham was a hedge and wise since it generated pure profit. The 86 Eldos,Rivs and Toros were sales disasters not the “C/H”s.
I should have clarified that. The ’85 Sedan DeVille sold well, but the Coupe DeVille dropped significantly from ’84. The ratio of coupes to sedans changed dramatically in 1985. The downsizing worked better much better on the four door than on the coupe, which looked particularly ungainly. Cadillac would never sell a healthy percentage of Coupe DeVilles again.
I wonder whether this was in some way responsible for the dying on Americans’ love affair with big two-door cars? When the car Americans aspire to was restyled and looked gawky was there a corresponding flow-on, a loss of interest in that body style as a whole? A question to keep sociologists awake at night. 🙂
Several factors come into play in the big coupes demise. These Coupe deVilles were more 2 door sedan than Coupe. Seat belt use was increasing in the 80’s and they made it harder to climb in back. Child carseat use was also rising during these years, making a coupe more unattractive. At one time, coupes were the choice for young families because the kids would just pile in and with no back doors, they couldn’t fall out. Just as the Coupe fell from the scene, the SUV craze took over and it appears to be here to stay. Death by 1000 cuts.
Yep. I’d like to see coupe sales charted against the institution of mandatory child restraint laws and then the installation of air bags, which eliminated any possibility of mounting the child seat up front. When my daughter was born in 1984, I had an ’80 Firebird. The impracticality of that became quickly apparent.
Interesting observation about the German expat connection. It didn’t seem to work that way at K-State in the same years … the German profs I knew had VWs. Maybe the pressure to seem All-American was stronger in Iowa?
The Cadillac became an icon & the Lark became the future, but if its 1959, I think I’d choose the middle of the road Ford.
I do rather like the ’63-’66 Studebakers, and it seems that they look a better match for the competition but clearly it was too late by then.
Way too little too late. Look at the ’63 Rambler Classic that competed for the same market and the Lark was dead.
Beautiful writeup. Just perfect.
+1.
+2. Represents what I stop by for almost daily. A great read.
+3 Agreed. Very comprehensive!
+4 Loved this article; I’m bookmarking it for future reference!
+5 it’s not just an article, it is a reference piece! Paul at his best.
Always a delight to wake up to a Studebaker. Especially when someone else writes it, 🙂
I have a warm spot for the early Lark, as I spent a lot of time around the 60 Lark VIII 2 door sedan owned by the mother of my childhood best friend. That black and red interior brings back memories. I agree that it felt somehow from an earlier generation than other cars of that era, with everything feeling thick and substantial. The one odd touch was that the dash indicator for the turn signals was a single light and not the two arrows that I was used to.
The 1961 facelift never looked quite right to me, as the details on the 59-60 were just about perfect. So put me in the Harold Churchill camp on this one. Had the car sat 4 or 6 inches lower with a modern frame, it would have been a real looker instead of being so thick and stubby. Anyhow, an excellent read to start the day.
Thinking about this some more, it is really hard to discuss just one postwar Studebaker without getting into all of the others, as they are all so closely connected (physically and in their evolution story).
It has occurred to me only recently how handicapped the standard Studebaker must have been in 1956-57 by the lack of a hardtop bodystyle. I have recently become enamored of the 1956-58 models. It must have been such a horrible deflation to see that freshly restyled 56 model flop so badly. Hard to believe that a 2 door hardtop would not have helped by quite a bit, particularly in the higher trim levels. Of course, by the time they finally got one in 1958, the rest of the car had become so pathetically outgunned that failure was almost guaranteed.
It has occurred to me only recently how handicapped the standard Studebaker must have been in 1956-57 by the lack of a hardtop bodystyle. I have recently become enamored of the 1956-58 models.
We know that Studebakers were uncompetitively narrow by the mid 50s, for a full sized car. A top of the line 55 President had less hip room than any other US built model, including the Rambler.
Not only would a new, wider, platform have cost millions that Studebaker didn’t have, but the configuration of the lines in the body plant would not allow a wider body. When Packard closed in Detroit, management considered moving the Packard tooling to South Bend and continuing production, but the reconfiguration in building 84 to allow the 8″ wider body would cost millions…iirc the exact number is in “Champion of the Lark, Harold Chruchill”
Church did the only thing he could do with the budget and time available. As the existing interior size was only competitive with the Rambler, hack the rest of the car down to Rambler size. The short schedule and budget probably worked in his favor by now allowing development of embellishments, resulting in the delightfully clean, for it’s era, styling.
BTW, it got too late last night to add links to other Studebaker posts at CC, including several of yours. But that’s been done now. The ’59 Lark was just about the only major hole in our coverage.
What’s the most significant car of 1959?
The Mini?
Since the US and Canada make up 76% of our readers and the UK 3%, I didn’t think I needed to add the prefix “American” to that question. 🙂
The coupe’s proportions are terrific and its two-tone interior is spot on.
Thanks Paul for another great informative write up on a car I know little about.
One question (I may have missed this) is what was the width of the Lark? You suggest it was European in proportion but was it a fat wide European?
I’ll take this one. Width 71.4 inches, with a front/rear track of 57.4/56.6.
Width is right about even with the 49 Ford, but using Ford as an example, the 1955 was 75.9 and the 1959 was 76.8. By 1960 the Ford hit 81.5, over ten inches wider than the Stude.
Thanks JPC. That shows a car about 7 inches longer than a Hillman Hunter and 8 inches wider.
Or 8 inches shorter than a Volvo 144 but 3 inches wider. So the Lark was still wide to European standards.
The wheelbase was a lot longer though – the Hunter was 98 inches and the Volvo 103, and it shows in the car of course.
Interesting to see it lined up to the Loewy Sunbeam Rapier. You can Rootes shape sin some of the other shots as well, especially that 1953 saloon.
You can (see) Rootes shapes in some of the other shots as well, especially that 1953 saloon.
Let me fix that for you:
You can see 1953 Studebaker shapes in all of the Audax Rootes cars since Loewy recycled the ’53 Studebaker design on them.
Yep another reason I like the Studes I have a 3/4 scale one in the carport
Very true!
Great commentary, Paul. As usual, you bring up some points not previously considered, and draw the thread out in provocative directions.
It might be surprising to some that when I was looking for a new collector car for a very short garage I rent (175″ deep/ 14′ 7″/ 4.45 m), I checked out comparative lengths (I ended up going in a completely different direction, buying a FIAT 850 spider). Not only is the Lark shorter than the standard Rambler, it’s ALSO shorter than the concurrent, first generation American… by over 3 inches!
Naturally, I have a pavlovian response to the photochop gauntlet you throw down, and have started making a “unit body adjusted” design. It’s turning out to be a more delicate construction than one might think.
Here’s the image I will start with. I took the side view of the “Home Depot Lark” and corrected a bit for lens distortion and focal length (which also exaggerates the size of the Lark’s wheels in the comparison with the Cadillac), reduced the shadow below so the car’s silhouette would stand out, and tried to draw it toward a more isometric view without losing too much naturalness. From there, we will try to make the car look like it has unit construction….
Barko:
Semi-OT, but the touchup before and after
there describes exactly what the control
labeled “brightness” on a TV does. It
controls the DARK portions of the picture.
Spice up the chrome? Turn up the “contrast”
Fine tune the front grille? Sharpness.
I calibrate TVs as a sideline.
Thanks for the input, YSM. I’ll see what I can do within the limitations of a 72 dpi jpeg, a black car, my skill level and the time I’m willing to spend on the technical over artistic aspects of “imagineering” a unit body Lark.
Several areas were isolated and adjusted separately, and I admit to falling in love with showing the weathered paint and rusty rockers. I do plan to make it car look “newer” before changing its proportions. but I’m eager to get to that last part and see how it turns out!
Some photoshopped sketches I dashed off have indicated that chopping, channeling and sectioning yield some odder looking results than expected. More to come.
Eagerly awaited!
The ’62 and later rear fenders have never looked right to me. There’s something about that wheel arch shape that just isn’t aesthetically pleasing. It’s only while rerading this that I’ve thought of a possible solution. What if the new rear fenders had been done with a lower wheel opening and that character line from the top of the wheel arch realigned to touch down just above the rear bumper? Couple that with lowering the rear fender tops to be level with the trunk lid. I reckon that would’ve made the car look much sleeker.
One thing I can say about mid-gen(early 1950s)
Studebakers is they were the very antithesis of
modern automotive steep downward forward
slope(high tail, low nose). What was the purpose
of sloping the roofline, beltline, and rear deck
down so steeply, even on Stude’s sedans?
Turning around to face the rear window when
backing up in a Stude, I’d bet you’d be looking
at a small child’s shoes! The safest cars ever
to back up in.
Turning around to face the rear window when
backing up in a Stude, I’d bet you’d be looking
at a small child’s shoes! The safest cars ever
to back up in.
While not as bad as in the coupe’s the 53-55 sedan’s trunk came in for a lot of criticism for it’s short depth and low lid, limiting cargo space. One of the vast improvements in the 56 was a longer rear, with higher, more square lid. Road tests of the 56s praised the improved trunk space. When the Hawk was developed for 56, it also was given a higher, more square, trunk lid.
The 56-58 wagons used the same roof as the 54-55 version, so it’s easy to see how much longer the rear of the post 55 cars were as the tailgate is several inches short of meeting the rear bumper.
That shelf behind the bumper on the station wagons just made the fact that the body was outdated even more obvious. Studebaker was running on fumes for a long time before it folded. You just couldn’t run a modern corporation that way by that time.
The 1954 wagon parts worked great on the 59 Lark though. The 59 was the most cohesive design Studebaker had produced in years, in spite of lifting the entire passenger compartment from earlier models.
You just couldn’t run a modern corporation that way by that time.
Nope, but Studebaker’s board was more interested in diversification. They were putting money into a stack of other business, while the auto division ran down.
Nice to get another well crafted PN writeup this morning, well done. There are still a few Larks around in my hometown of Hamilton, there was an article in the paper this year about some old guy with one under a tarp in his back yard, looked too far gone to save.
The piecemeal replacement of front/back, greenhouse, then front/back again kind of reminds me of the gradual transition of the TR3 thru TR6 that Triumph did, with probably a similar budget and undercurrent of desparation.
The piecemeal replacement of front/back, greenhouse, then front/back again kind of reminds me of the gradual transition of the TR3 thru TR6 that Triumph did, with probably a similar budget and undercurrent of desparation.
Same thing with the Spitfire: the Mk 3 having a new front, with the Mk 2 rear, while the Mk 4 carried on the Mk 3 front, with a new rear.
I believe the 1959-61 Lark was Studebaker’s last best looking car until the 1964-66 model years. Unless you count the station wagon and Wagonaire, I found the 1962-63 Lark to be the most hideous looking cars Studebaker produced.
I hated Grandpa’s ’62 Lark.
My biggest problem with all the Lark sedans and wagons was the 1953 side windows and thick B pillar that went with them.
Sadly, Studebaker took the profits generated by the Lark in 1959 and used it to diversify their corporation rather than putting it into new designs and plant modernization. They had a chance to survive but chose not to use it.
If you can get your hands on it, the PBS documentary from the early 80’s, “Studebaker – Less Than They Promised” does an excellent job of telling the sad story of Studebaker, their bungling management and the greedy union, and blames all of them for their demise.
Now on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=studebaker+less+than+they+promised
Actually, the bulk of their acquisitions were made with S-P stock. But they did have to make some partial payments with cash.
FWIW, there was no way they were going to survive for the long haul. The factory was ancient, their engines were getting old, the chassis was outdated, and by the 70s, the demands on emissions controls and safety, as well as the growth of the Japanese imports would have killed them sooner or later; more likely sooner.
The automobile business is very capital-intensive, and the $28 million from the ’59 Lark was not nearly enough to fix all of their problems.
Exactly. In a modern capital intensive business you are either in the game or not. Studebaker was not.
The factory was ancient, their engines were getting old, the chassis was outdated,
The V8’s only real sin was it was heavy, but not outrageously so for the early 50s. They did not have an OHV 6 until the early 60s and that was a conversion of the old Champion six. The conversion was not well done either and the 6 tended to crack it’s head.
AMC’s conversion of the 196 to OHV was very successful and done in 56. AMC’s first generation V8 was also heavy, and did not go into production until 57, six years behind Studebaker.
The plant was old and inefficient, but AMC was trucking assembled bodies from the body plant in Milwaukee to assembly in Kenosha well into the 70s. Studebaker had a modern building on Chippewa Ave, which was used to produce a trickle of trucks, instead of moving volume car production in.
The bottom line is AMC and Studebaker both had handicaps. The difference is AMC management wanted to be in the car business, and sold Kelvinator to keep the car business afloat. Meanwhile, Studebaker’s management focused on getting out of the car business.
Here is a pic of the Chippewa plant from the early 60s, when Studebaker bought it back from Curtiss-Wright…C-W had bought it as part of the Eisenhower administration orchestrated bail out of S-P in 56. The building in the background is plant 8, the service parts warehouse.
To this day, there is plenty of expansion room around the Chippewa plant. Harold Vance begged the board to invest more in plant and equipment in the late 40s, when the company was flush with war profits. The board paid out the cash in dividends instead.
I’ve got the book! Found secondhand a while back. Not uplifting, unsurprisingly.
Having recently visited South Bend, the entire Studebaker story has taken a new dimension and prompted a deeper appreciation of these cars.
I agree with Fratzog in that the profits from 1959 could have made a nice contribution toward survival. However, it’s doubtful it would have fully financed all the needs Studebaker had, so maybe their ultimate action was the best avenue given the situation.
Also, having driven around downtown South Bend and seeing the remains of the Studebaker properties, the entire layout of the place appears to be highly cumbersome for automobile production. However, for having outgrown the carriage business, they did pretty decent for quite a while.
Yeah, the whole independent auto manufacturer thing seems like even if every one of them had made perfect decisions every time, they were all, inevitably, destined to close, regardless. That meant that the only ‘real’ decision was what would be the best time to raise the white flag and begin the shut-down procedure. In Studebaker’s case, it was during the Lark’s success that, even with that profit, there was no scenario in which they could survive in the long run. IOW, they got out when the getting was good.
Actually, the Studebaker plants were models of the height of modern auto production — with the plants designed by Alfred Kahn — for 1928. After their sales crashed in 1953, they didn’t have the funds to move or update the plant any further. I think they looked at moving production to their Chippewa Ave. truck plant, a more modern, WWII funded structure. But the costs involved weren’t ever justified by their numbers they were producing.
Once a donward spiral sets in, it is hard to pull out of that.
Take a tour of the old Body Assembly building, and do it before Kevin Smith renovates everything Studebaker out of it in the purpose of internet data. You don’t build cars this way anymore: Start with the bodies being assembled from individual stampings on the ground floor, and moving up the building (via elevators at each end, one floor at a time) for lead-filler and finishing, then painting on the next, then dash-board construction, and then final installation of interiors on the top floor — before being moved back down via those same elevators to the ground floor and moved by truck to the chasis-body assembly building. Seeing this is to understand a kind manufacturing that doesn’t exist anymore. One that takes lots of people moving individual pieces through multiple tasks, repetitively.
All the while this was going on, other workers were building the components going into the car bodies in the center of each floor while the car bodies moved down the outer sides on moving conveyors in an un-airconditioned environment in the summer lit in a mild gloom of incandescent and, later, four-strip fluorescent lights. “Fathers and sons working side by side,” and, “Craftsmanship with a Flair,” were the slogans. How about, ‘Help, get me out of this hell hole”? Now imagine Studebaker pushing out over 300,000 bodies in 1950 and you can start to feel the frenetic activity that must have permeated the plant.
With Alfred Kahn having designed almost every major auto facility in the ’20s, it’s amazing that Ford didn’t have more riots at River Rouge, and Buick, with 50,000 folks assembling cars in Flint’s ‘Buick City’ plant, didn’t provide the spark of a revolution!
Actually, the Studebaker plants were models of the height of modern auto production — with the plants designed by Alfred Kahn — for 1928. After their sales crashed in 1953, they didn’t have the funds to move or update the plant any further. I think they looked at moving production to their Chippewa Ave. truck plant, a more modern, WWII funded structure. But the costs involved weren’t ever justified by their numbers they were producing.
Studebaker exited WWII with a considerable pile of cash from war production profits. Harold Vance begged the Board of Directors, repeatedly, to invest more in plant and equipment. The answer was the same as it had been in the early 30s: the board insisted on paying out fat dividends to stockholders. Studebaker’s board had been dominated by bankers since Fred Fish married a daughter of one of the brothers and brought in Goldman and Lehman.
Building 84 was built in the old plant 1 wagon works area, which was completely built up. After 84’s completion, Erskin had most of the other buildings on the block torn down. If he had cleared the entire block first, 84 would not have been forced into the 6 story design, but spread out more, and, maybe as a two or three story building, there would have been room for conveyors to carry the bodies from floor to floor, rather than elevators.
Chippewa offers a tantalizing alternative. On my other computer, I have an aerial view of Chippewa and plant 8. Extending the north wall of the Chippewa plant and joining it with plant 8 would have provided close to 3 million sqft of space, with room for plenty of expansion. The much larger cost would have been the equipment inside, and the board probably was refusing to walk away from the investment made in the teens and twenties downtown.
Was building 84 really that huge an obstacle? AMC’s assembly plant was in Kenosha, while it’s body plant was in Milwaukee, 40 miles away. In a pamphlet I have that Nash published in 48, it is stated they had 40 trucks hauling bodies from Milwaukee to Kenosha daily. Imagine what that road looked like in the early 60s, when AMC was selling about three times as many cars as they had when that pamphlet was published.
Interesting comments, thanks. Perhaps not enough of the written history is paid to the board’s decisions to fund (or not fund) investment. Then again, a corporation is run to satisfy multiple parties and interests, even those opposed to the basic long-term viability of the corporation itself!
The history of that kind of interplay is often lost yet so crucial to the outcome!
The history of that kind of interplay is often lost yet so crucial to the outcome!
The same thing happened at Curtiss-Wright in the late 40s. Paul Shields of Shields & Co was on the board. The company was loaded with war profits, but Shields pushed others on the board to pay out the profits in dividends, while laying off thousands of engineers and cutting R&D.
By 1950, C-W was out of the airframe business, all the aircraft plants sold. When the President of C-W and the lead engineer of their preliminary jet engine research project went to the board to report encouraging results and ask for a serious development budget, not only was their request refused, the President of the company was heavily criticized for the little he had already spent on jets.
In the early 50s, C-W licensed jet engine designs from the Brits, but never developed their own jets. When demand for their Wright piston engines declined, C-W exited the aircraft engine business.
CW’s piston aircraft engine business not just declined, it dropped off a cliff. Lockheed Super Constellation and Douglas DC-7 sales went to zero overnight when the 707 and DC-8 were test flown for airline executives. Pratt and Whitney had all the initial engine orders. Lockheed went to Allison for the Electra turboprop engines.
CW management didnt see this coming, or somehow didnt care?
CW management didnt see this coming, or somehow didnt care?
CW, like Studebaker, was controlled by bankers whose primary interest was maximizing their own short term profits. When long time CW President Guy Vaughn protested, Paul Shields forced Vaughn out of the company.
When the next President of CW was criticized for spending any money at all on jet development, he resigned, probably because he could see where the company was headed.
The board then recruited Roy Hurley, iirc from Ford Motor, as President. Hurley was able to restore a little R&D funding and licensed the Sapphire from Armstrong Siddeley, which CW had some success with as the J65, but the company never recovered enough to transition to jets of it’s own design.
In addition, Hurley followed the board’s push to maximize short term profit by charging an arm and a leg for engine service parts, so the airlines were plenty happy to get away from Wright engines.
It was Hurley who negotiated the back door bailout of Studebaker in 56. The scheme was structured so that CW leased the South Bend Chippewa plant, and the Packard engine plant in Utica, for a one time, up front, payment to S-P, which kept S-P above water. In exchange for leasing the plants from S-P, CW was promised a pile of fat, guaranteed profit, defense contracts.
Hurley also got the Mercedes distributorship for S-P, which was part of a package to get Daimler Benz commercial diesels for distribution by CW.
Great article, Thanks! I’ve always thought the Lark a very attractive car, but then I am a great fan of simple 3-box design. The Studebaker dealer in our town added Mercedes in the early sixties and then Datsun around the time Canadian Studebaker production ended.
A masterful article. Just outstanding.
As styling became an ever more key element in selling cars in the ’50s, and looks were changing fast, the 1953 standard greenhouse with its heavy and rather truck like door window frames was a fatal flaw.
Cadillac, and from recent writing here at CC, Graham introduced thin frame door window designs in 1939, and that was the general trend of the market from there. By 1953, the market was crazy for frameless hardtop designs, and by extension, most stylists were doing what they could to make sedan frames as unobtrusive as possible. Strangely, even the 1952 and earlier Studebakers were better in this respect.
In addition to the heavy handed door frames, the rear canted C pillar made this a fairly distinctive design, and it made every Studebaker look like last year’s model, no matter what they did with the rest of the car.
Studebaker doubled down on this with the Starlight / Hawk (naming conventions were another Studebaker weak point) by offering it with the heavy handed door frames – and even worse, this became the standard for the 1959 – 1961 versions as hardtops were eliminated – on a luxury oriented coupe? What were they thinking?
The fact that they waited until 1962 to really address the 1953 greenhouse on the standard Studes, and finally properly addressed the hardtop issue with the Hawk the same year was by far way too late.
The ’53 coupe is a beautiful car. To me the best looking to ever come out of Studebaker. Thanks for brightening up my morning with this comprehensive article. Every time I thought of a different connection, reading on a little further the same thought would come up in the text. Great write up!
What a great piece.
Think of the nice little niche Studebaker would have had if they had offered a Lark with the interior trims of the Clipper. An Ambassador from Studebaker ? What better way to appeal to ex-full size buyers not wanting to go full “compact”. Profit to be made there as well. And predating the Valiant Brougham by many years.
JP: Motor Trend did a styling analysis in an issue featuring the 61 cars and pointed out the miscues on the Lark such as raising the trim line on the sides to follow the upper fender line rather than the natural body crease on the 59-60. The smaller chromed tail lights were a miss for them as well. They appeared less than substantial and diminished in comparison to the body.
IMHO: the grille was not as well integrated as the earlier versions. The 59-60 and 64 were just right. The vents that took the place of the tail lights in 65-66 ruined a decent facelift in the front.
Sad story, but a very interesting car.
Great article. The ’59 and ’60 Larks are cute as a button, just right-sized with a decently finished interior as well. Always thought the ’61 thru ’63 models were less than stellar, kinda ugly really, while the ’64-’66 models really cleaned things up. Should have had in 1961 the squared up modern looking cars they were offering 3 years later, and the Thunderbird-style roof added to the Hawk for the 1960 model year. Would any of that have made a difference? Probably would just have bought some more time, but they still would have closed eventually, just too small to really compete.
Poor old Stude, it was always a case of too little too late, very much like the situation AMC found itself in 15 years later.
The silver & black Sunbeam is awesome! Beautiful car, and I can say I have never seen one.
As for Studebaker, I liked some of their cars through the years, but sadly, many were outdated from the get-go for financial reasons. Just think what they could have accomplished if more money and time was available.
A sad end to a once-proud company.
Another great quality post from Paul that I truly appreciate and have for years.
That Sunbeam Rapier is basically a Hawk, scaled down to Lark-like proportions. The fins, the greenhouse, the nose all do match. If both weren’t styled by Loewy teams, it’d be a case of corporate espionage…
Thinking about the Champion as Studebaker’s first small car and perhaps the first major-manufacturer compact–how does it compare with the Willys of the time? I know those guys were *small* but I’ve never been sure whether they were competition for the Champion, or a size+ further down.
Its a two door version of the Minx sedan I have with taller fins, slightly longer front doors and especially for Zackman the rear windows roll down.
Thank you! Always nice to know.
I noticed that the advertisement was from a dealer in my old hometown, Wellsville NY. I had an old “Penny Saver” from January 11th , 1962 that featured an ad from the same dealership, but a different name. Don’t you wish you could have snapped up a few of these classics, at bargain prices?
Thanks for the Stevens ad, I live forty miles from Wellsville, the 100 Chamberlain Street address is now an empty lot and entrance drive for the river front plaza. Nice to know a ’56 Caribbean was selling so cheap when I was ten! The used Studebakers, checked in the period NADA books for used car prices of comparable Big Three models are 10-40% below those. By this juncture, Studebaker resale values were in the tank.
Do you mind if I post this ad clipping on Packard forums?
Feel free to use the picture any way you like.
Hi Tim
Later on, Stevens moved to the east side, no date but I suspect it was the early 1960’s. I haven’t identified this building or location yet. Stevens was still listed as a service garage in 1966 when they announced the end of production.
Just for grins, here’s a picture of the planned ’67 Studebaker by Marcks, Hazelqist, and Powers after the advanced Brook Stevens proposals were abandoned. The rear bumper was to be raised to just below taillight level while the grille was to be simplified into two box sections instead of four. MHP also did the 1966 facelift.
Cool little cars. When I was a kid in the 80s, a neighbor of mine was a Studebaker enthusiast…he had an Avanti, a Lark convertible, and oodles of dark green Stude pickup trucks, even a flatbed/stakebody and a couple of semi tractors. It was SO cool for a budding gearhead like me to have all of these interesting cars floating around…
I’d drive one today, if I could find one…although my bride might object.
Excellent article, Paul. Looks like a lot of effort went into this one.
Thanks, really enjoyed that. The contextual material is invaluable. Should any CCer be offered a Lark know that they have great spares availability. NOS in a lot of cases. A ‘vert has been rebuilt locally and everything was available.
Should any CCer be offered a Lark
I wish someone would offer me a Lark, especially that black coupe I shot. I totally fell in love with it, obviously.
Yes, Some unexpected cars have enough interested “curators” around and supplies of know-how and parts are available that won’t break the bank, (and not just tri-fives) Studebakers and Corvairs are among these. For those who want something different,but “doable” a Stude Lark fits, There is still great loyalty for a car “orphaned” a half century ago!
Considering the excesses of most `59 models, the Lark Regal comes off as a rather stylish looking car. Definitely looks a few years “newer” than a `59. The proportions are just right. As for the `62 Larks, I always found them to be pleasantly styled cars with just a hint of “German-esque” styling cues like the Mercedes like grille.I`ll take a Lark Daytona coupe or convertible over any of the `62 compacts anyday.
Thanks for the stroll down memory lane. My very first car. I was fifteen and my parents didn’t know I had purchased it. $100.00 and it ran. Flat head six, three on the tree with OD and very basic, not even a radio. I always considered it the ugliest car I had ever owned…faded turquoise paint and all. The best thing I can say about the beast, is I couldn’t kill it. Not that I tried, but I was fifteen and knew NOTHING about automotive mechanical systems. With the exception on the tranny, I tore apart and reassembled everything on that car. Torque wrench? We don’t need no stinking torque wrench! It was truly a monument to the toughness of 50’s automotive design.
Thanks for this very thorough summary of the Lark’s history. These are also part of Israeli folklore, having been assembled by Kaiser-Illyn in Haifa, the last cars assembled in 1967 and hence the last Studebakers ever. There were a few Israel-only models including a presidential car and a prototype for a 67 model. Alas, Mr. Illyn was running uphill due to the fact he was not connected to the ruling Labor Party (being politically connected was, and is, always important in Israel) and eventually folded. This is not the place to start telling the story of Israel’s motor industry but to me there was a huge missed opportunity to continue production in both Israel and Canada given that the prototypes and drawings could be had for peanuts…
… there was a huge missed opportunity to continue production in both Israel and Canada given that the prototypes and drawings could be had for peanuts…
The story I read of the end of production in Hamilton was one of the trunk lid stamping dies broke. The company would not spend the money on a new die, so when the existing stock at the plant was used, they turned off the lights.
I uploaded this before but for those who did not see it, this is the prototype “Halutz” (yep. It means pioneer in English), styled by someone who had seen the Scepter prototype as well as being influenced by BMW’s 2000 CS.
The German academic ex-pat connection is interesting, as there always seemed to be a lot of Studes in my hometown of Berkeley when I was growing up in the early sixties. But we didn’t know any Studebaker owners, perhaps because my Russian parents had a rather chilly attitude towards Germans (and German cars). Oddly, the only Studebaker I remember riding in was a mid fifties sedan – in England, in 1964. It belonged to the very British parents of a school friend, when we lived outside London for 6 months. It was yellow, and stood out “kerbside” in a sea of mostly black or blue Vauxhalls, Hillmans and BMC sedans. And looked positively massive compared to the already ubiquitous Mini.
The Lark is definitely a cute design. But the sedan does not fully endear me. The station wagon and the convertible do though. From that I gather that it is the roof line and C pillar of the sedan and maybe the downward slope of the belt line that rubs me the wrong way.
I have seen the convertible in the metal, curbside to boot. Now I need to look out for a wagon.
In the photchop rendition the wheels are even more disproportionate and the double down slope side view looks ungainly to me.
Try to find one of these (pic by Hanan Sadè) 🙂
Or that one…
The ’59-’61 Lark strikes me more than anything else as being an engineer’s car: compact, no-nonsense, practical, styling as tertiary consideration.
As enlargement, the ’61 Cruiser was the ‘civilianized’ version of the ’59-’60 Econ-O-Miler, Y-Body 113″ wb Taxi-only sedan models built in small quantities in those first two years. It was the modified version of the President Classic/President 120.5 wb Y-Body with the same rear wheel tuck as the W-Body 108.5″ wb received. For 1962, the shorter W-Body sedans were deleted, all four door sedans utilizing the Y-Body 113″ wb to the end in 1966. It was more spacious as the four additional inches were in the rear passenger compartment. It also gave the sedans nicer proportions, those of what would come to be considered “International-Sized” a decade hence.
I enjoyed this well-written and comprehensive piece on the Studebaker Lark. Apparently it falls to me to offer some thoughts on the actual ownership of one of these cars, a 1960 white 4-door sedan with the V8 engine and overdrive that I had for a while sometime in the 1970’s. I bought it quite cheaply from an older guy who was a shipfitter. It needed a transmission – I think first gear was gone – but was otherwise in decent shape. It ran well, and the body was straight and rust-free. I found a transmission in a wrecking yard, and had it installed at a local shop. (I was working twelve-hour shifts at the time, or I might have done the job myself.) The shipfitter had replaced a defective heater control valve with some piece he’d found in the shipyard. He’d added a long rod whose handle was just under the instrument panel; a jury-rig that I left alone since it worked well. I did a fair amount of brush-road and back-road exploring in the car that summer. Its relatively small dimensions made it well suited for that, while the V8 overdrive power train made for competitive highway transportation. I had the car for about half a year; if memory serves (it’s been a while) it was traded on one of the five or six 1957 or 1958 Plymouth 2-door hardtops I owned in those years.
Previously mentioned aerial of the Chippewa plant from 1961, with plant 8 in the background. iirc, plant 8 was the service parts warehouse and the roof appears to be significantly lower than Chippewa’s, which would limit utility as a manufacturing space.
Chippewa recently. Plant 8 has been torn down. To this day, plenty of expansion room around the plant, something that was lacking in the downtown complex. Chippewa is about 2 1/2 miles from the downtown complex
By the mid-’50’s production volumes and thereon for every year after except 1959-60, wouldn’t Chippewa have afforded completely adequate space for all car production? The highest truck production years were 1947-49 in the 64K-67K units range but down to 20K, 11K and 7K for 1956-58 respectively. Common sense would dictate consolidation in the least amount of floor space for the greatest production. It might have been a stretch at times but far more efficient than the old downtown plants. Truck production could have been moved to Plant 8 or one of the smaller plants downtown.
iirc, after moving truck production into Chippewa after the war, truck production was moved out in 50 when Studebaker won a contract to produce J47 jet engines under license from GE. Studebaker also leased a government owned plant in Chicago, and used their newly built car assembly plant in North Brunswick NJ. The Chicago and NJ plants made parts, while final assembly was done at Chippewa.
After the J47 contract was cancelled in 53, truck production was moved back into Chippewa and the NJ plant was sold, having never produced a car. as Studebaker sales had fallen so far the extra capacity was not needed.
Studebaker sales in the late 40s/early 50s were 200-300,000. Chippewa was too small to do the entire job, being about twice the size of Packard’s Conner plant, and we know what a disaster it was trying to get 60,000 cars out of Conner.
Then Chippewa was sidetracked by the J47 contract. By the time the J47 contract was cancelled in 53, the company had dropped $500,000 on the conveyor connecting the body plant to the assembly building.
20/20 hindsight says they should have put the body plant in Chippewa for the 47 model year, and trucked the bodies the 2 1/2 miles to the assembly building. Then use the profits from the late 40s to build a new assembly plant next door to Chippewa. But the board members were more concerned with getting the profits paid out in dividends to the big stockholders they represented, so refused to invest in new facilities and walk away from the existing facilities.
You may remember the national news reporting a huge building fire in North Brunswick a couple months ago. That was the former Studebaker plant. Vance had made a case to the board that a plant in NJ would save shipping costs compared to South Bend, so would put them in a better competitive position on the ease coast. By the time the plant was built in 50, the J47 contract offered better profits, so the plant was repurposed for that. By 53, South Bend was running so far below capacity that North Brunswick production would be redundant, so the plant was sold.
Here’s a pic of North Brunswick, as built.
Although I’ve never owned or driven a Studebaker, I’ve always liked them. I knew someone who had a 1959 Lark VIII, and I got to ride in it. It was an awesome car to ride and to drive. It wasn’t that different in size from a Toyota Camry.
> How was the Lark actually created? Studebaker Chief Engineer Gene Hardig took a ’58 sedan body, cut off the ends, shortened the wheelbase by tucking the rear wheel in closer to the rear seat, and gave it to the designers to come up with a suitable front and rear end. And as one small concession, they were given the budget for a flatter roof panel, to make it look a bit more modern.
The lower, flatter roof actually arrived a year earlier on the befinned ’58s, which along with smaller 14″ tires enabled the longer, lower look Studebaker pitched in their ads for their upscale models that were still trying to compete with full-size cars from the Big 3. The only exception was the wagons which had to wait til ’59 for the new roof. The change to the flat roof is clearly visible in the pics shown. I don’t know why Stude reverted to 15″ wheels and tires for the Lark, against industry trends.
What I liked about the 1959-61 Lark was its lack of fins. Some fins looked attractive, while others just looked tacky, for lack of a better word.
“Loewy put his stamp on everything from locomotives, ships, appliances, office machines, cigarette packages, consumer goods and anything else that wanted to look up to date during this decade of revolutionary design transformation”
Among other things his firm designed the Coast Guard’s “racing stripe” which can be seen on ever cutter in the service. This “racing stripe” has been imitated by many of the world’s Coast Guards.
Where’s Wilber Post and Mr. Ed ?
Interesting article. The parents of a school buddy of mine had a Lark, in that sort of olive green and a neighbour had an earlier Studebaker.
Other than the fact that both had two doors, I cannot see any similarities between the Lark hardtop and the BMW 1600/2002. Not a single line on the Beamer looks inspired by the Lark to me.
With an untrained eye, I can say it is real easy to mistake this car for a Valiant. Sometimes I take a side, rural road on my way home from work to avoid the freeway and unwind a little. About six miles in, there’s a neglected piece of property with a large barn in disrepair, rusting farm implements and cars in the field. I think it’s beautiful in a way.
I’ve always assumed that one of those cars in the field was an early-60’s Valiant with its signature grille but I’d have to pay more attention the next time I pass it–it’s possible that it’s a Lark. Like most everything else, it’s pretty well covered by the overgrown field. I can’t remember if it has double or single headlights, which would have been a real easy indicator in retrospect.
The Stude is a lot better looking than the Valiant from every angle, except shared style grill is the Valiant’s best feature
good article-probably a great subject for a “forensic” MBA style analysis.I drove several of these from the 1961 Lark to the 1966 Cruiser-they were competent automobiles.The problem (as I see it) is the ROI(return on investment) simply dictated the business be run on fumes.The question of engine substitution was technically pretty simple and could have been done years earlier.
Had I been counting, I have read, and re-browsed through this article perhaps three or four times. Great piece, great writing, I love the symbolism and the comparisons. It would seem many cars and styles took their cue from Studebaker for some time. I saw some 1964 Chrysler flash by as I was reading through this, maybe cued from the Lark. A great way to start the day.
A pleasure to read this in 2021. You’re a first class fact finder, info synthesizer, and storyteller, Paul, whether on matters automotive or all the memorable tangents (boozy faculty wife among many more). Bravo!
It was a treat to read this one again. Some additional things I have learned since our prior discussion:
I think Studebaker was consciously going for a VW/European vibe in one interesting way – where the paint colors offered in 1958 included many metallic colors that were stylish for the time, color selections were drastically reduced for 1959 and no metallic colors were offered. Whether it was because of cost or because those non-metallic colors gave the cars a German or European vibe, I cannot say. Probably some of both.
Also, one thing I learned relatively recently is that three 1959 V8 Larks were prepared by Holman and Moody and run with some success at Sebring in 1959. They finished 2nd and 4th to a pair of Jaguars that finished 1st and 3rd, and the 2nd place Stude was just seconds behind the winning Jag. I believe that H&M had time on their hands given the AMA stock car ban in effect at the time, and I am sure that NASCAR was more lucrative because they were soon back on those tracks. I am pretty sure that the things H&M learned in racing those engines showed up in some of the improvements the factory made in the V8s later years.
Finally, the Regal trim level in those Larks made for a really nicely trimmed car – possibly nicer than most lower price rides. The padded dash and nice quality materials were far from the cut-rate look of even the higher end Studes of 1958.
I’m wondering if Mid-Western Germans liked the Studebaker because it’s a German name?
Excellent overview of Studebaker’s last hit. Chopping the fat out of the existing 1953-58 design, as those were too small and too old to compete with Detroit’s ever huger cars of ’59-60, was a great idea for many reasons. They knew enough to emulate the early Ramblers in making a small, but not cheap car. The Lark also caught the trend of families who for the first time wanted a second car, often for errands while the big car was in use elsewhere. These people did not want something that looked cheap like a Scotsman or a Henry J. And of course the timing was great with the 1958 recession sending many looking for a more economical (or easier to park) car and the big 3 having no small cars in their lineup in 1959 to compete with it.
“Rally Round the Lark, Men (and girls, too)” is a headline I couldn’t imagine in 2021, though that ad is still a huge improvement from the ’58 adverts which were dour recitations of the car’s features that would prompt a “TL;DR” response in most readers nowadays. But Studebaker advertising was never better than passable. 1959 was the year Pontiac and Volkswagen began the legendary AF/VK and DDB campaigns respectively, showing how spectacular and convincing automotive advertising could be. Both of them reaped their rewards with massive sales increases in the 1960s.
A few corrections
– I believe it was Dick Teague, not Duncan McRae, who did the 1957 facelift. I know he did the revisions for the Packardbaker that year. McRae did do the ’58 revisions and the Lark.
– The flatter roof panel was not a concession made to make the Lark look more modern; the flat roof had already arrived on the ’58s along with 14″ rather than 15″ tires, both to lower the car, except for the wagon which had to wait until ’59 for the flat roof. The Lark went back to 15″ tires though.
– The windshield looked like a carry-over from the mid-55 wraparound unit but apparently had a different part number. I recall the ’61 had a slightly revised windscreen too, before it got a big reshaping in 1963.
Also, “Contrary to what is often said, Studebaker’s board would have been thrilled to see their car business succeed.” – well, yeah, of course the board would have loved it had throngs of buyers inexplicably descended upon their local Stude dealers in droves to buy their new offerings, but funneling their Lark profits into diversification acquisitions rather than reinvesting it in their core automotive division meant there was no realistic chance of that happening. I don’t even think the way they went upon acquisitions was effective, buying a dozen unrelated companies that usually weren’t standouts in their field, rather than a small number of strong companies they could focus on and build size and profits.
I thought the 1956-1958 Studebaker sedans were a product of Vince Gardner, with the 1958 facelift done by Duncan McRae.
It may be – I’m looking on line and see all three of those names mentioned w/r/t the ’57, but it seems Gardner either worked for or with McRae and the latter passed some of the design work to Gardner, certainly for the ’56 model (seems similar to how the ’53 “Loewy coupes” were really designed by Bob Bourke who was on Lowey’s design team. Anyone have anything definitive about this?
My source for the key stylists on the ’56 and ’57 was from Richard Langworth’s “Studebaker 1946-1966”. He did a lot of research and talked to many of the participants of that time.
But yes, you’re right about the ’58’s flat roof. I will amend the text.
The early Lark is one of my favorite automobile designs. I own a 1962, which used to be my favorite, but the early ones have grown on me more and more. It’s odd, because it’s a rather simple and unadorned design, yet it has presence. When equipped with a V8, they will walk all over most of the other compacts, and some more expensive cars too.
CC effect: I just watched Nov 2 “Car Wizard” youtube of a ’12 Bentley. Right next to it was a yellow Lark sedan.
Great article! Enjoyed (but with a little sadness) your chronicle of the Lark. One small quibble: you state that in ’64, there was no Lark, just Cruiser, Challenger and Daytona. You’ve forgotten the Commander – a restoration of a long-time Studebaker line. The lineup was:
Challenger – spiritual successor to the Scotsman
Commander – the mid-line, family-oriented Studebaker
Daytona – 2-dr HT and Convertible – the sporty Studebaker
Cruiser – the top-of-the line 4-dr sedan
And don’t forget the Wagonaire – Brooks Stevens’ brilliant but flawed concept of a station wagon with an opening roof.