A lawsuit was filed against General Motors in 1984, seeking compensation for losses allegedly suffered by a group of car owners. It’s not unusual for GM to get sued, but it is when it relates strictly to a marketing decision having nothing to do with safety or warranty issues. These owners believed they were harmed when Cadillac began selling 1984 Eldorado convertibles, since they were reliably assured in 1976 that their new Eldorados would be the last convertibles. This was a litigious form of the popular opinion that GM basically swindled buyers with a bait and switch. Read on and we’ll consider the merits of that idea and take a deep-dive look at the car, with the help of a well-preserved original sold at the Barrett-Jackson Scottsdale auction in January 2024.
This is an all-original example with 34 miles. Not 34 thousand or 34 hundred. 34. But this is not unusual in the world of 1976 Eldorados. Their perceived collectability made them the first car ever bought by large numbers of people specifically to be stored away unused. More on that later.
I’ll say right up front that the 1976 Eldorado convertible is one of my favorite cars of the 1970s, and it would probably even make an appearance somewhere on my all-time favorites list. So, I admit I’m a little biased, in the way that most readers here have strong opinions about certain vehicles. Why do I like it so much? I’m glad you asked…
From the dark automotive days of the 1970s, I think of this model as a breath of [not-so] fresh air blown in from an earlier, more optimistic time when fuel use and bodily risk were way down on the list of priorities for people looking to purchase their dream car. And apart from what it represents, in my opinion, this particular year’s model was very well done.
The front-wheel-drive Eldorado’s second generation debuted for 1971, taking the general shape of the beautiful 1967 design, elongating it, adding more side curvature and tumblehome, and giving it 50s-style rear fender skirts and fake air vents, plus trendy 70s-style rear quarter windows, vinyl top (full or half), and neo-classic front end.
By 1975, they’d dropped the fender skirts and vents, giving the lower body styling a feel much closer to the first generation. With the convertible, all that 70s greenhouse frou-frou was absent, of course, with just the clean, pillarless appearance common to post-war convertibles. In fact, I consider the GM “scissor top” used in the Eldo (and the 71-75 B-bodies) to be perhaps the best looking raised top ever.
The 73 and 74 models complied with the new 5 mph bumper requirements by bolting on a period-typical, extra-wide battering ram.
For 1975, the Eldorado pulled off a true Malaise Era miracle by making its fully law-compliant bumpers look better. Certainly better than in ’73-’74, and I think the front bumper looks better than even the ’71-’72. Stylists made it appear as if having longer fender blades front and rear was the styling point and the bumpers are just accommodating the longer fenders. The 75+ front bumper doesn’t protrude laterally at all and looks almost delicate, at least by 1970s standards.
Perhaps that was because they actually were rather delicate, as a curbside 1975 Eldo I found testifies. They appear not to handle impacts particularly well, and the vinyl body extensions become brittle with age when subjected to outdoor conditions, as automobiles tend to be.
The neo-classic front of ’71-’72 was also toned down. I think square headlights suit this car very well, working with the straight-across bumper and smaller grille to give the front end a less fussy, more first-generation feel even without the ’67-68’s concealed lights.
One 70s-style touch that really works is painted hubcaps, which were new for 1976. Black was standard, body color optional. I generally prefer the black, but either looks good.
All these changes came together in the 1976 convertible to make a great-looking car, I think. It looks more like a creature of the 60s than the 70s, to my eyes, conjuring a sense of Peak GM Glory Days that is unmatched in the mid-70s.
Many folks don’t care for the dash, though I’ve never understood why. It’s a very clean design, with the simple horizontal lines making the roomy interior look even wider. The lines are broken only just enough to allow an alcove for the steering column and the minimal gauges. I think it looks classy and restrained, not as beholden to contemporary trends as in ’71-’73. The trademark Eldorado/Toronado flat floor is always neat to see, made even neater by chrome-trimmed pedals big enough for a Greyhound bus and a thoughtful passenger-side trash can. Sierra Grain leather was standard on convertibles.
Both the dash and the door panels are common with Cadillac’s other large cars, as this generation E-body shared much of its body structure with the B- and C-bodies. Even the Seville used the same dash theme. In the big auction tent, the colors came out a bit muted in my photos. This internet pic from a similar car shows more of the Antique Light Buckskin leather, one of 8 interior color choices. Cadillac also generously offered 21 paint colors and 7 top colors.
If you’re going to put fake wood on the doors, don’t be shy about it. An improvement over 1971-72, I actually really like this treatment with a woodgrain door pull in a woodgrain panel inside a padded panel inside another woodgrain panel. It’s woodgrain turtles all the way down.
All the way back, too, with the woodgrain extending uninterrupted to the large back seat. The scissor-top is exceptionally compact and flat when lowered, with no intrusion into the back seat as droptops typically had (and still have today).
Another thing I appreciate about the Eldorado convertible is that the seats lack any Brougham-era frippery like pillow tops or crazy upholstery patterns. Just simple leather in a style similar to that used in Cadillac convertibles going back to at least the 50s. One contemporary improvement was the split bench, which was optional but common.
One more thing that’s great about the 1976 Eldorado: five hundred cubic inches! Naysayers will be quick to point out that specific output had fallen from 1970’s 400 hp (gross) to near wilting levels of malaise, only 190hp (net) in carbureted form, 215 with newly optional fuel injection. To that I will concede, while countering that high output is not really the point here. Cadillac’s second generation OHV V8 (1968-84) is known as a very robust engine with excellent smoothness and durability. With the largest production V8 ever, even in a state of managed decline, 360 lb-ft of torque @ 2,000 rpm will not be denied: 0-60 was 11 seconds in contemporary road tests, which was decent by 70s standards for a 5,300 pounder and really as fast as you’d want to go in a car like this, anyway.
Under the hood, the off-center mounting is about the only tell that this is not a conventional Detroit rear-wheel driver. Rear drive convention is also followed with a full perimeter frame and live rear axle (for 1971, the 1967 partial frame was extended all the way to the rear and coils replaced the leaf springs). Standard rear disc brakes were new for 1976, which is quite a change from the bad days of 1967, when even front discs were optional.
According to the EPA’s optimistic figures, don’t expect more than 16mpg. At least the 27-gallon tank will keep you from visiting too many gas stations. I always find window stickers interesting. This one has trumpet horns! There’s quite a bit of optional equipment here that one might expect to be standard in a luxury car.
1965 was the record for convertible sales in the U.S., at 509k, though on a percentage basis 1963 was the highest, at 6.4%. In 1970, that had dropped to 1.4% and down to 0.5% in 1975. The most common explanation is that open air cars became obsolete once air conditioning was an affordable and reliable option. I’ve never found that answer too satisfying, since the percentage only ranged between 2% and 6% in the decades before widespread AC, which was pretty low even in the best of times.
Cadillac announced ahead of time that they would sell exactly 14,000 1976 convertibles, which was almost twice what they had been moving in recent years. It sounds pretty bold to call their shot like this, considering all U.S. makers including themselves had been canceling convertibles for lack of sales. It seems Cadillac knew their clientele would respond to the moment. The number was based on how many tops they had available from their supplier and Cadillac’s division manager has said that they could have easily sold 20,000 if they had the parts. It was indeed a bull market for Eldorado convertibles that year, with some people buying multiple cars, many dealers charging significant markups, and short term resale values off the charts. Lots of buyers squirreled their cars away, treating them like an investment, rather than an automobile.
So was Cadillac malfeasant in how they marketed the 1976 Eldorado or in bringing the model back in 1984?
GM’s decision to drop their convertible models was totally reasonable. Sales had been steadily falling for ten years. In the regulation-rich 1970’s, it appeared that new rollover protection standards would soon outlaw topless cars. Chrysler and Ford had dropped convertibles in 1971 and 1973, respectively.
Given that Cadillac was the only American car maker selling a convertible in 1976 and that they planned to end it that year, it would have been marketing malpractice, and unfair to prospective buyers, not to announce the cancellation ahead of time. Cadillac’s rhetoric was fairly restrained, too. They referred to it as the “last of the breed” or a “collector’s item,” and said it “would not be repeated in 1977.”
Even accounting for the 1984 Eldorado, it’s fair to consider the 1976 model the last of its breed, provided that breed is supersized, massive displacement, factory-built, droptop Caddys. The latter-day Eldo was much smaller and a conversion done by an outside firm (ASC). It’s a nice car in the spirit of the original, but it lacks the full presence of the big old Cadillacs, and the top is not nearly as well integrated as the GM designed factory tops had been.
In 1976, Cadillac and GM had no reason to expect that they would be selling convertibles in the future, so even saying “the last convertible to be built in America,” as in the brochure above, wasn’t fraudulent because they surely expected that would be the case, as did most everybody at the time. The fact that convertible choice was down to one soon-to-be-gone model created the prevailing sense of the end of the convertible era more than anything Cadillac could have said about their car’s lastness.
Nor did Cadillac defraud anybody by bringing the model back in the 80s. GM is a for-profit corporation with responsibility to its shareholders. If they thought a new convertible would help their business through profits or prestige, they were not legally bound, or even honor-bound, to restrain their business in the present because they had called the old model the “last of the breed” several years before.
Every investment organization warns “your returns may vary” or some such disclaimer. In the 70s, the collector car market was far less developed than today, and there was little precedent for making significant money on old cars. There was no precedent for an “instant collectible” new car. Treating the 1976 Eldorado like a blue chip stock was purely speculative, at best, and foolhardy, at worst. This is why that 1984 lawsuit was dismissed prior to trial (as far as I can tell).
And Cadillac did issue a disclaimer at the back of their brochure (as automakers always did), but only someone with more money than sense would have needed it.
There was a tremendous amount of nostalgic excitement when Cadillac announced they would stop making their convertible. Ragtops were a beloved institution, right up until they weren’t. Most everybody loved (the idea of) convertibles, but hardly anybody was actually buying them anymore. Consequently, Cadillac enjoyed its brief surge in convertible sales in 1976 just before the flame went out, and fortunately for car lovers, convertibles later made their modest return from extinction.
Though the 1976 Eldorado didn’t end up being much of a blue chip investment, it’s finally getting its due from collectors (this example brought $93k). I think that’s because apart from all the “last convertible” business, it’s a beautiful, magnificent car that really was the end of the line for a certain type of audacious American dreamboat.
photographed in Scottsdale, AZ January 2025.
Related Reading
CC Capsule: 1976 Cadillac Eldorado Convertible – Fill ’Er Up With Happiness by Eric703
Curbside Classic: 1972 Cadillac Fleetwood Eldorado Convertible – The End Of An Exceptional Era by Paul Niedermeyer
1972 Cadillac Eldorado Convertible Walkaround & Design History with Chief Designer Wayne Kady I found this YouTube video fascinating. The original designer talks about the car and behind the scenes details on getting it produced, including that 71-72 decklid, which was an amazing piece of bodywork, sadly long gone by 1976.
The photos that aren’t mine were taken from Matt Garrett’s car collection page, part sales, part bragging site. With well over 200 very high-quality cars and high-res pics, it’s easy to waste hours there.
1982 Chrysler LeBaron Convertible – How The Convertible Came Back (And Why It Never Really Went Away) by Aaron Severson
Did Air Conditioning Kill The Convertible? by Aaron Severson
I remember the hype about these cars and remember that the adults in my world did indeed consider them to be instant “collectors items” (whatever that term means). The mid 1970’s was a time when collector car auctions were becoming a thing and restored classics were starting to bring big dollars, with high-end convertibles always bringing the biggest. I think the only other car I can remember getting this kind of treatment right out of the showroom was the silver/black 1978 Corvette Indy Pace Car replica. Quite a few examples of those with ridiculously low miles are still around.
I appreciate your defense of this car – I have spent so long as a detractor that it helps to get the other side. I can see your points, and they are reasonable ones. However, I am not yet able to cross this bridge. If forced into an Eldorado convertible of the 70s, it would be one of the earlier ones with the rear fender skirts for me. Even this requires trade offs. I prefer the cleaner flanks of the 73-74, but then you give up the less strangled engines of the 71-72.
And the 82 Corvette. I recall a collector friend buy an ultra low miles copy in 93′ for $22K – the factory sticker. Thirty- two years later —well you know.
JP, I am with you on these. They present a stumbling block for me as they come across like Hector the Bulldog from Warner Brother’s cartoons. Abnormally massive (visually) up front and dwindling in the rear. However, I think I prefer these to the 1970 to 1974 versions.
LOL, That’s funny!
Well to add that the 84 was an off line private coach builder ( the convertible part ) Like the professional cars Not by GM ! So thats probably there way out legally ? ………….
IMO, the 1976 Cadillac Eldorado WAS the last REAL convertible, and still highly collectible. For me, convertible on not the next generations Eldorados were a huge disappointment.
The 1976 Fleetwood Seventy Five always felt to me like the last “real” American limousine for the same reason; Cadillac made limousines through 1987, but those later post-’76 models always looked pieced together from parts made for sedans and coupes, which they essentially were, without the dedicated midsection of the ’76 and earlier models.
As Usual, I’m With Rick.
The color on the featured Eldorado cvt. Cadillac called Phoenician Ivory, and is my one of my favorites from `76. I was a sophomore in HS when these hit showrooms, and I instantly fell in love with examples in this shade!
The father of a friend of mine bought one of the triple white final (200) models–I think it was #133/200? Anyway, the mileage on that car last I saw it was under 50 miles. It had been “instantly” stored very carefully. My friend still has it, as his father left it to him in his will. He’s smart enough to have no plans on selling it any time soon. One lucky guy!
That is probably my favorite color, too, which is a big reason this particular car caught me eye and made it article- worthy!
Frankly us car people tend towards the irrational at times. I do as in I need another car like a hole in my head to join the other holes. Now take this fellow who put away the car in 1976 after spending $12K on it. That $12K in the S&P 500 would be $2,918,720 today. I’m pretty sure the car didn’t come close to that. Won’t even bring up $12k in Apple in 1980.
@tbm3fan: You hit the nail on it’s head. I’ve never understood this idea of storing such a beauty away for what? We all know they aren’t true investments and there’s probably only a handful of models over the years that come close to the return that you would get by properly investing. Plus, you wouldn’t have the storage costs and upkeep with that money in the market instead of a car.
Which leads into my state of mind on this stuff. Why not enjoy them? Yes, it’s really cool to see something like this with under 100 miles, but it gave the original owner little pleasure and I’m sure it will continue to be stored giving the second or third owners little real pleasure. So from you example, one would be way better off buying something like this and taking great care of it while enjoying it. Then take an additional 12 grand and invest it while leaving it there till retirement. The best of both worlds!
Yes, this. I can see not driving in winter, etc. In fact, I have a 2023 Camaro convertible (last of that breed, too). I just 5000 Miles after 2 1/2 years. It is not my primary driver but it get use. I do know that convertibles are again a dying breed. manual shiift even more so. When I bought it, there was all this talk of an all electric future by end of this decade–so another reason I bought what I did when I did.
But a 50 year old car with 34 miles? One would feel guilty putting even 50 miles on it. And, what kind of issues will there be with seals, other rubber parts, etc?
To each their own–but a fun car is less fun if you aren’t out and about in it.
The lead plaintiff in the lawsuit actually paid $5K over sticker for his car: He said he paid $16,250 in 1976. In 1991, he then offered in trade against some work he was contracting, claiming at that time that it was worth $12,000.
> Most everybody loved (the idea of) convertibles, but hardly anybody was actually buying them anymore.
This feeling seems commonplace when “the last (whatever)” going away is announced. I remember thinking that when I heard the last Hot Shoppes was closing and the last Howard Johnson’s restaurant was closing. I used to like eating at both of those! But as with so many others, I hadn’t been to either in the last decades of their existence. Like Paul Simon, I didn’t want my Kodachrome taken away, but Kodak did so anyway in 2009. But like too many others, I hadn’t shot a roll of Kodachrome since about 15 years before it was discontinued.
The trash bin in the footwell is a great idea I’d like to see return. I used the driver-side map pocket on the door as a trash can, which makes it an eyesore being more prominent than the kick panel area, but I need somewhere to dispose my fast-food detritus when I’m driving other than the seat or floor, and the door pocket is the most convenient.
That is a good point. I often lament something or somewhere that is ending even though I was not a good customer.
I love that trash bin, it was a clever use of space. I had a couple 80s GM cars with it. Not very convenient for the driver, I hardly ever used them, though passengers would. Still a great feature!
12.5K in ’74 , 93K now – strikes me that the original buyer would almost certainly have got better returns elsewhere although it is a damned nice car.
In ’74 you could have picked up a ’59 Gibson Les Paul Standard for a couple of thousand [ which seemed crazy money at the time]. -It’d have been a lot damned easier to store and maintain and it’d be worth at least a quarter of a million now.
Trouble was I could barely afford a packet of cigarettes back in ’74.
Great article. I love these even though I don’t really care for convertibles. But my preference would be the 71 or 72’s with the rear fender skirts. They just looked more clean to me and less bulky in the rear.
I’m old enough to remember that law suit filed by owners of the “last” Eldo convertibles. At the time I thought it was silly and glad it didn’t advance. In the automotive world, suits like this could be filed non-stop for manufacturers changing their minds. Not only that, but it wasn’t just Cadillac who brought back the convertible. In fact, I’d say Cadillac was only responding to the others who began offering them once again. I remember the lightly used 1988 Chevy Cavalier Z24 convertible that I picked up at one year old. My one and only and I vowed never again would I buy a convertible. Yet here I am many years later and find myself attracted to these or maybe a lightly used Allante?
Having a convertible for a daily driver is a much different thing than having one for a hobby car. I wouldn’t have one for my primary car, though I’d very much like to get a classic droptop.
You make a good case for liking this car on its merits. While its easy to be distracted by the sheer size of these cars, the lack of frippery (perfect term for the broughamy stuff) is interesting, and appealing. The clean lines of the upholstery, dash and even the exterior lines complement the Cadillac aura. And I absolutely agree that these cars look better as convertibles (even w/ the top up) than as coupes with those chunky B-pillars. This wouldn’t be among my top cars to acquire, but I do enjoy admiring them.
Great color on this one too… can’t remember ever seeing one like it.
The window sticker is interesting, because the car was bought from a dealer in the town of Richlands, Virginia – a town of about 5,000 deep in the Southwest Virginia mountains. The dealer (Jack Sykes) was a full GM dealer, selling all GM makes, I believe. There’s still a Chevrolet/GMC dealer on that site today, which is Richlands’ only car dealership. What I find interesting is that it’s not the location one would expect this kind of car to come from, and especially not one that just got stored away. I wonder what the story was about the original owner?
I just read the Bring A Trailer listing for this car:
https://bringatrailer.com/listing/1976-cadillac-eldorado-convertible-67/
…and it includes the following language: “This car does not have a title as it has never been sold to a private-party owner.” By that, I assume that the dealer himself hung on to the car? I can almost see this being the kind of car that sat in the showroom as an attraction for years.
(Oh, and the Barrett-Jackson, BAT, and other sites that featured this car misidentified the dealer as being in Richmond, rather than Richlands, Virginia. Richmond and Richlands are very different places.)
Anyway, this is the best period picture I’ve been able to find of the dealership:
Wow, thanks for that additional info!
Considering the frenzy about these I’m betting it did go in the prime showroom spot with a big “market adjustment”, which kept it there for a long time. I can also see those 34 miles racked up in the local parade, leading it off with whatever dignitary or pageant winner perched on the back.
At the time, considering the others had already dropped out, it was the last convertible built in America. Most of the target audience would have the wisdom to know that nothing stays the same forever. Bands go on their “last” tour. Restaurant chains discontinue a great sandwich for awhile. Etc.
Wonder why they picked on the 84 Eldorado, when we had American built Rivieras (same platform even) and Lebarons 2 years earlier? Or maybe it’s just the nature of those with the most money to burn?
Mustangs, too (1983) and Cavalier/Sunbird (1983-1/2). But Chrysler, Ford, Chevrolet, and Pontiac never advertised previous generations of those cars as the “last American convertible”.
“Perhaps that was because they actually were rather delicate, as a curbside 1975 Eldo I found testifies. They appear not to handle impacts particularly well, and the vinyl body extensions become brittle with age when subjected to outdoor conditions, as automobiles tend to be.”
I disagree.. the bumper held up pretty good in that pic. Beyond the bumper.. well..
True, I guess it depends on what speed the accident was. 10+ mph: excellent. 2 mph: not so good.
I like some big ol GM cars.. and Cadillacs.
BUT, what do ya do with a car with 34 miles? Is the new owner gonna drive it, or store it like the previous?
Low mileage is usually good, but THAT low.. I feel like it will need work regarding Rubber/seals, things that usually need to be “exercised” etc.
My mother in law worked for a meat market at the time Cadillac made their announcement that these were all that were to be. The owner and two investors went to (I think Bayview Cadillac in Fort Lauderdale) and bought the last 200!
They made arrangements for the cars to be properly stored and cared for. However, their return on investment wasn’t great. One of the investors became ill, forcing that either to other two bought him out, or needed to start selling off some of the collection. The two partners started to sell off just as many as needed to buy him out, but he told my father in law that they were only being offered 10% over window sticker.
My favorite year Eldo was the 74. Why? Because I bought a Cutlass Supreme from a man who’d just bought his wife a 74 Cream colored convertible Eldo. He paid me to completely detail it and told me I could enjoy driving it for a weekend! When I delivered it back, I was able to witness his gifting it to her. She cried! She’d been asking for a Cadillac for years.
Interesting story. Any idea how long they kept their inventory? I wonder if they made money. If they sold them in the first few years, they might have. What would the break even price be considering storage expenses? Hope for their sake they didn’t keep them til 84!
Driving that 74 must have been a blast!
We lost touch with them. I do know that the owner told my father in law about the just barely making much. But I don’t think they ever talked again.
Oh driving that 74 was both fun and very humbling. For him to offer to let me drive a car that he had shipped and his wife hadn’t even seen-well I was very lucky. But I made that car look brand new!
So how did that lawsuit turn out? hard to imagine the plaintiff having a winnable case, given GM’s disclaimer.
I know that it went through about a year of proceedings. It was filed in October 1983, but it didn’t get a lot of press attention until July 1984. At that point, the judge was still weighing whether to grant GM’s motion to dismiss the whole thing, which he said he would decide by the end of 1984. I dug through several online news archives and about nine months of Automotive News and found no further stories about it, which might have meant the judge dismissed the suit or that GM made some settlement with the plaintiffs that included a provision not to talk about it further.
The suit made some really grandiose demands: There were two plaintiffs (one of whom said he paid $16,250 for his Eldorado in 1976, about $5K over sticker), but they were asking for it to be treated as a class action suit on behalf of all 1976 Eldorado convertible owners. They asked the court to enjoin GM from producing any more convertibles (!) or else pay the class $50 million in damages for lost value! (The judge, so far as I know, did not approve the class action.)
I think the lost value argument was a hard sell — lots of things can be collector’s items without being of any great monetary value, and since cars depreciate heavily, “appreciating in value” may just mean “depreciating less than usual” — and the plaintiffs were actually charging fraud, not just misleading advertising. And in any event, the 1976 Eldorado convertible DID become a collector’s item and still is, even though I doubt anyone got rich off of it.
This reminds me of the old TV commercials for I think it was Danbury mint who proclaimed “and these are sure to go up in value!”
Well they didn’t! Nor did the Precious Moments my bought or the Hummel figurine collections.
When I bought my 1978 Fleetwood, and had it verified as a true 50,069 mile car, Hagerty underwriters told my agent it was worth “between $15,000 and $20,000”. To me, it’s priceless. My wife bought it for me. I don’t buy cars to flip like many people .
I think the featured Eldorado has probably fetched more than it will in the future
Yeah, “collectible,” “valuable,” and “rare” are all kind of separate quantities, even if they do sometimes overlap. A lot of collectibles are not very rare or especially valuable; some very rare things are neither collectible nor valuable because not enough people even want them.
Essentially these two fellows had spaghetti for brains and they were asking the Judge to save their meatballs.
It was a lot of things, but I don’t think it was that. The lead plaintiff was a real estate attorney (and later a big poker star), and is incredibly litigious. Prior to filing this lawsuit, he had sued a small Delaware town because he was mad that he got a speeding ticket there; he argued that it was a speed trap and got a federal jury to award him $130,000, which the judge eventually set aside out of concern that it would bankrupt the town.
A Hemmings web page says that the lawsuit was dismissed.
A fine defense of an object that remains, alas, indefensible.
It IS the last in one way, as it is the pit of Brougham at the end of the slide from that ’67, which, over-sized as it was, was crisply and classily restrained. By the ’76, my eyes are scanning for a bowsprit and small turrets, perhaps some twisted columns and a naked angel blowing a raspberry through a trumpet somewhere. It is the Palace of Versailles as re-writ within the budget limits of a white-suited bouffant man in Florida in 1976. It is a cheap and gaudy palimpsest of a properly classy late ’30’s or ’40’s grand Caddy. And for the final insult, those square lights that suddenly beset every US car of the period turn what remains on the castle-face into a Mack truck.
Otherwise, I have no strong opinions.
As a digression on the linked video, I have to say that, whatever Wayne Kady’s skills as a designer were, 20 minutes in his company would fly by almost as quickly as two or three hours does.
I disagree, but you put your point so grandly as usual, I can’t even remember why I disagree! Guess I’ll have to read my article again.
I do agree that Kady, probably like a lot of auto industry types, was not a scintillating speaker. But if you get past his delivery, the information is great (to car nerds at least).
I would wager that 1965 having the highest number of domestic convertibles being produced is due entirely to the introduction of the wildly popular Mustang. Ford built a lot of Mustangs for that inaugural year, and a lot of them were convertibles.
With that said, 14k 1976 Eldo ‘verts doesn’t exactly sound rare, certainly not in the context of a 1971 Hemi-Cuda with less than a dozen of those produced. While a Caddy with only 34 miles on the odometer is certain to fetch a good price at auction, I’m not sure the return would have been worth the effort and expense to properly store it over all these years.
Whatever collectible status they have is certainly based more on their notoriety than their rarity. I’m sure the production number helped keep the values down over the years. But a cool car is a cool car that some people will want to own and be willing to pay good money for. Like a 65-66 Mustang. They built a gazillion but they still hold value well.
In 1975, I was age 24, and recently returned to university after some time off. As an incentive to finish my degree Dad had gifted me a new 1974 Buick LeSabre conv. that I enjoyed. But when I first saw a 1975 Eldo conv. with its new body modification’s it was passionate love at first sight. I made a bet with a friend that if he bought a an old movie theater, I would design some plans and he could sell the property for double his money in a year. Bold of me as a young, still in school, interior design major. I completed the plans in a month, outside of my heavy class workload, and in three months he sold the property with my plans for more than twice his investment. I won the bet and was gifted a car of my choice, a 1976 Eldo conv. that was ordered in 1975. In all fairness, I did give him my Buick conv. as a trade-in. I checked off about everything on the options list: black painted wheel discs, hard cover parade boot, white with red leather interior and red pinstriping.
At the time this was my dream car and at that young age no thought of it being an investment. I remember one day, running the car through a car wash and someone offered me almost twice the window sticker. No sale, this was my dream car. Years and years of road trips: Richmond to Miami, Richmond to Houston Upon graduation I moved to Houston. One night the Eldo was parked, top down, at a nightclub and when leaving there was a black kitten the the back seat, That cat stayed with me for 21 years. I met my life partner at this time, at the same club, and he had found a small white dog stray. I had seen the same small white dog weeks earlier and tried to catch him. So we were now together, one black cat, one white dog, and the dog stayed with us for 18 years.
The four of us later moved to NYC in the white Eldo conv. The large interior with a flat floor was perfect for traveling with pets. The rear seat floor a litter box for the cat fit perfectly. More road trips to the Jersey shore, and a memorable week in Cape Code during hurricane Gloria. Did not need a wagon to comfortably carry a family of four, me, my partner, black cat, small white dog, when you had an Eldorado convertible.
Ten years and 100,000 miles passed in a flash. We found ourselves living in Philadelphia for a short period (mistake) and decided it was time to move back to NYC. I had kept my Eldo pristine, put an ad in Hemmings, and it sold in a week. I could almost write a book of my adventures in that 1976 white Eldo convertible and the wonderful top down memories.
Thanks for that great story. It’s nice to hear about one that was actually used and enjoyed, and that it was a good car for actual use. For a few years in the 90s I had a 75 LeSabre conv, with parade boots. That was a great car (as long as I was OK with a few typical old car bugaboos).
You see so many low mile 76 Eldos, it’s easy to forget a good percent of those 14k did get used as normal (but cherished) cars.
Did your Eldo get any body rust while you had it in NY/PA areas?
These aren’t my kind of car, but I did read “The Last Convertible” by Anton Myrer close to 50 years ago, which starts out with the main character many years older reading in the newspaper about the production of “The Last Convertible” which I’d presumed was this car.(the book doesn’t explicitly mention the model but the timing of the book made me assume it would have been the mid 70’s). The rest of the book is a flashback to the 40’s during the time he attended college and one of his roommates was a Frenchman who owned a Packard Convertible. Won’t otherwise ruin the story in case someone wishes to read the book but I found it entertaining but maybe a bit predictable story about someone else whose life seemed to be framed by cars.