(In anticipation of Halloween, we’re going to feature one hearse each day this week.)
Since Halloween is knocking on our doors, it was terrific to find this old beast for sale on Craigslist, in Ruckersville, Virginia. $3k takes it, but caveat emptor. You’ll see why.
Although Cadillacs are usually associated with hearses, this modified 98 doesn’t seem to be a rarity. They were customized by Cotner-Bevington, which also turned some of them into ambulances. This is advertised as having the 455 Rocket engine and the 400 turbo transmission. You’d need it when fully loaded to reach speeds of more than ten miles an hour.
The rust worm has attacked! The buyer lists this as being yellow, and maybe it once was Omega Maize. I see more of a tannish-green, but Mother Nature can be cruel. That’s especially true inside the vehicle. Whoever ponies up the cash has a lot of work to do,
The floorboards are gone and it looks like the poor old thing is stuck in drive. Ah, but I think I see some air conditioning. This does not seem to offer the “Air Cushion Restraint” system that was offered on some cars in 1974. These early airbags inflated with a wallop and buyers, in retrospect, had a right to be skeptical. Especially if there were dropping a lot of dough on a big yellow and green customized hearse. It does have the federally-mandated 5 mph bumpers, and at least there’s a radio.
Here’s some Brougham for you too. I have vague memories of the 70s, but seem to remember the color theme of my parents’ appliances and every Norman Lear sitcom: pea green, mustard yellow, brown, and orange, the color of rust. The crank window and the quilting are just right. The ambulance models were much more austere.
Perhaps a selling point would be the things you can carry. In this case, some muddy old tires, a scissor jack and an old car seat are just fine. This era 98 is described as the roomiest Oldsmobile ever, allowing ample space for kids, patients or caskets. The slightly bent-up vents in the back serve a practical purpose: chilling you down on your ride to the hereafter.
While stretched-out luxury cars remained the standard hearses, “Ghostbusters”-style ambulances were on the way out. That is thanks to the 1973 EMS Systems Act. In a nutshell, it meant that communities that got federal cash for EMS service had to have the truck and van based ambulances we are all used to now. The mandate kicked into effect in 1978, but Cotner-Bevington’s parent company saw the writing on the wall and closed the division in 1975.
The Oldsmobile 98 evolved a lot over the years and lost most of its plushness. It disappeared in 1996 when the LSS and the Regency were introduced. Then Oldsmobile itself was gone with the wind in 2004. There were no funerals for that.
From Flickr
Restored, these old war horses can be real eye-catchers at car shows if you can afford to keep them gassed up. It’s hard to say when this one was last registered. Those two squares on the front window aren’t very telling. One is certainly a completely outdated inspection sticker, and the other is probably one of the old county tax stickers that were phased out in most places by 2008. Just looking at those old tires and everything else, I’d say it’s been at least 25 years since that rubber met the road.
Oh, and at the end of the ad, the seller mentions the title burned up in a fire and a new one is being applied for. Until then you’re either stuck with the scariest unfinished project of all, or the most expensive Halloween prop on the block.
$3k? crack pipe for sure
Indeed. This thing is crusher fodder.
I won’t deny a 98 is a fine car, but I would be angered if a mortuary presented anything less than a black Cadillac for Aunt Enda’s final ride.
This color is also unfortunate, lacking proper dignity. It’s jarring to see predominately white hearses in Florida, seems to be a regional custom. I live in South Florida, and I have no issues with my triple black car in relation to cabin temperature or paint damage.
Agree, crack pipe price and way beyond restoration.
Five or six years ago, I had to meet with the owner of a funeral home about some peripheral topic. His business was one of three funeral homes in a county of around 4000 people – we are talking very rural extreme northern Missouri.
Anyway, I asked him about vehicle color. He said the arrangement was one business had black, the second white, and the third silver. That way, they knew who was doing what and there remained some distinction among them.
Undoubtedly, everybody plays their own variation of the color tune.
I once saw an aqua-colored Cadillac hearse. This was in the late-’90s, and it was a newer model too. I remembered pointing it out and asking my mom about it and her response was, “some religions prefer to celebrate death”.
Lots of funeral homes have a traditional “house color”. One notable example is the Forest Lawn chain in the Los Angeles area which has used the same shade of blue (on “limousine”-style hearses with curtainless rear quarter windows) for decades.
Many traditional African-American family-owned firms are known for distinctive colors as well. The one around the corner from our house has an immaculate mid ’90s Superior on a RWD Fleetwood chassis painted in a champagne metallic similar to the shade popular on late ’70s Fords. Their family cars are all late model DTS sedans repainted to match the hearse.
There is one African American funeral home in East Palo Alto that is known for having Chartreuse colored hearses and limos.
They say your sense of smell is the one most connected with memories, but when I saw those interior pics, it went the other way around – I know *exactly* how that vehicle smells, because it looks on the inside exactly like the ’72 Vega I bought for parts out of an impound lot. Not a memory I particularly cared to dredge up this fine afternoon, either!
yep.. .that moldy musty smell, slightly of sewage.
I parted out a 77 Chevelle that had better quarters than this one, but no floorboards and was left open to the elements so the interior was utterly trashed.
It too had the smell of dead car, not like the one of my keeper 77 that just smelled of old vinyl and grease/oil.
That interior looks like death warmed over!
— ba DUM BUM 😉
Kaiser of Argentina had manufactured in 1958/’59 the Carabella Funebre. Quite unusual configuration…
My ’72 Cotner-Bevington Oldsmobile Hearse:
Now, THIS is very nice!
An Olds hearse? That’s a new one for me. For some reason, all through the 80’s and into the 90’s, it seemed like any hearse that wasn’t a Cadillac would be a Buick. Eventually the Buicks disappeared since the B/C-body Lesabre/Electra went FWD in the mid 80’s, and it was all Cadillac, all the time. Which has always seemed a bit odd to me, that it was still more common to see Cadillac hearses after the RWD Fleetwood was long gone. Seems it’d be harder to convert a unibody Deville/DTS than a BOF Town Car.
Also never knew that a federal regulation was what killed the car-based ambulances. Any idea why the truck/van base was prescribed? Easier for the paramedics to work standing up, perhaps?
I think that it was more a matter of that they had to be made to be useful. Prior to that edict about federal spending, ambulances were often owned by the same funeral home that would use it as a hearse. There isn’t much incentive for it to be a good ambulance if the business that owns it could get paid for two rides if you’re dead but only one if you’re alive. Even the smallest of vanbulances would afford triple the cubic feet inside as the hearse ambulances. More IVs, more O2, more room to treat the patient from different angles or with more than one person, etc.
The whole philosophy had changed. Instead of putting the sick or injured in the back of a Cadillac and getting them to the hospital as quickly and often recklessly as possible, the mindset was to give them the same treatment they would get upon arrival at the hospital while still en route. Despite heavy opposition from the medical community, the concept of the EMT/paramedic was born. Instead of an ambulance attendant who often doubled as an usher or apprentice embalmer at the funeral home, you got a trained medical paraprofessional. (in those days often a Vietnam combat medic vet)
Long story short, big as they were there simply wasn’t enough room in the back of a car-based ambulance to perform the sorts of procedures now being done en route to the hospital.
Pontiac was in on this as well.
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/blog/cc-capsule/cc-capsule-the-pontiac-commercial-chassis-1971-to-1975-the-overlooked-rarity/
Jason, our local undertaker used a mid-1960s Pontiac as a hearse. It would probably been based on a locally assembled “narrow track” Laurentian.
Actually, they did make a few hearses on the downsized FWD H/C body Oldsmobile and Buick for a few years, but they were rare, there was also a time between 1985 and 1993 there that you could have bought either a FWD DeVille based hearse or a RWD Fleetwood/Brougham based hearse depending on your preference.
When the LeSabre hearse seen below was offered you could have still gotten at least the RWD Buick Estate Wagon as a hearse as well, you could have still ordered a Buick hearse based off the Roadmaster until 1996.
The funeral home that serves the locality where the hearse is for sale used to have a fleet of forest green Caddies.
Back in the 80s, someone in Indianapolis bought an old hearse, mounted a big fiberglass chicken on top and rented it out as a completely stupid party limo. They eventually switched to limos, probably because the back of a hearse is really not that comfy. This one would have been perfect for chicken duty at one time. What an unfortunate color combo.
Those Cotner-Bevington Oldsmobiles were perhaps the least attractive funeral coaches ever made. Something about the proportions was just awkward. But, I guess you got what you paid for back then.
Oops, forgot the picture.
That thing looks like it should be able to shoot lasers from its eyes. The Chicken From Hell…
The Brooke Swan Car used to spray scalding water from its head to clear the way through the hordes of the great unwashed…
Does anyone else see this picture and immediately think of the movie “Stroker Ace”?
“Fastest chicken in the south”
These style hearses are just creepy. Regular ones like today make me uncomfortable enough, but these give me the chills.
I don’t think I’d be giving 3 grand for that rust bucket. I might consider $300.
I personally think hearses need to be Cadillacs or Lincolns.
Some years ago an auto wrecker in my area had a couple of these big Olds 98 ambulances in the yard. They were complete and in surprisingly good condition. Pity no one was interested to buy them both and make one good ambulance.
I’m impressed by anyone who puts forth the time, money and effort into restoring old ambulances, hearses and police cars. Those vehicles deserve to be preserved for future generations.
It doesn’t seem to have the rows of rollers that all hearses I’ve ever seen have, even an old Model A hearse at the Old Car Festival at Greenfield village. More work for the pall bearers I suppose.
Did funeral homes use vans for removals and pack em/rack em/ stack em bake and shake runs to the crematory back then like they do today? Perhaps some used a car like this.
If you look at the photo of the rear compartment there’s a panel in the floor. Combination cars such as this one usually had two panels in the floor that could be flipped over. Casket rollers one one side, flat floor on the other. Some combos even had removable landau bar panels that went over the rear quarter windows.
Another clue that this is a combo are the HVAC vents mounted along the sides of the rear compartment. A straight hearse wouldn’t have those.
My local Craigslist has a 66 Cadillac hearse for sale that may or may not be in slightly better condition. The asking price? About $2,000.
I wouldn’t pay $1,000 for this one. But you gotta love the colors used: “maise” for the exterior and green for the interior.
Just like fire trucks are changing colors, so are hearses. Funeral homes in Tennessee were white 10 to 15 years ago.
Well, there’s one kind of favor I’ll ask of you
Well, there’s one kind of favor I’ll ask of you
There’s just one kind of favor I’ll ask of you
You can see that my grave is kept clean
And there’s two white horses following me
And there’s two white horses following me
I got two white horses following me
Waiting on my burying ground
Did you ever hear that coffin’ sound
Have you ever heard that coffin’ sound
Did you ever hear that coffin’ sound
Means another poor boy is under ground
Did you ever hear them church bells tone
Have you ever hear’d them church bells tone
Did you ever hear them church bells tone
Means another poor boy is dead and gone
Well, my heart stopped beating and my hands turned cold
And, my heart stopped beating and my hands turned cold
Well, my heart stopped beating and my hands turned cold
Now I believe what the bible told
There’s just one last favor I’ll ask of you
And there’s one last favor I’ll ask of you
There’s just one last favor I’ll ask of you
See that my grave is kept clean
C-B specialized in Oldsmobile; Miller, Meteor and S&S Cadillac; Flxible (no “e”) Buicks; National Chevrolets (mostly I think for the military and as combination cars); Packards were done by Henney in Freeport, IL.
Some of these cars had creative designs and nice workmanship and they are cherished by collectors today.
More cars can be seen on hearse dealer websites; I look at them once every year or so. Go see sites for Doug Scott Funeral Cars in Glendale, CA and C W Coach in Cincinnati.
That piece of junk wasn’t built as a Hearse , it’s an Ambulance .
It’s also worthless except for parts .
More’s the pity .
-Nate
It would make more sense as an ambulance, because the interior would make people sick. What an ugmo!
But I went with the seller’s claim.
I’d want a Hurst/Olds Hearse! lol
You’ve reminded me of a grammatical pet peeve of mine – people who pronounce “hearse” as “hearst”. I’ve heard this multiple times and it always grates on my ears.
But to them it would be, effectively, a Hurst/Olds/Hurst.
I’ve never realized how the fender skirt dipped into the rear door area on these cars like it does until looking at these pictures. Odd looking with the skirt missing.
This is what’s known as a combination. It’s designed to be used either as a hearse or an ambulance, hence the quarter windows. This particular one is the short model, which does look ungainly.
A dedicated ambulance has a high roof.
This is what today’s subject would look like in better times. This is a ’73.
Put three rows of seats and dual AC in that, and I’d drive it.
Exactly. The funeral home I worked at in the late 70s had just been out of the ambulance business for a couple of years and still had a couple of combinations in the fleet. In prior years, they had run 2 red/white dedicated ambulances, 2 straight funeral coaches and 2 combinations that could switch-hit. The combos still had functioning sirens, the old motor driven kind that would dim hell out of the lights when you hit the switch.
To a man, they were delighted to be out of the ambulance business once the EMS took over. Lots of investment for little return, mostly community goodwill.
Ambulances and hearses are icky, but they make such good looking station wagons when the rear side window isn’t blanked out. Plus one of them gave us Buffalo Springfield.
Geeze.
Sure are alotta negative Nellies on here. No, I wouldn’t give 3k for it, but for half that I’d be temped. I’ve owned worse.
Beyond restoration? Ya gotta be kiddin’ me. Hopefully one of the Professional Car Society guys snags this one. It deserves it. I think this one was originally configured as a combination coach, meaning it could pull duty as an ambulance or hearse.
I vote for combination too. The a dedicated hearse of that era (USA that is)
usually had blind rear quarters, not the wagon like windows in this rust pit.
A close inspection would find evidence of mount for ambulance lights.
Assuming the rust hasn’t got there first.
Here in Aus we have plenty of Furd hearses. Black or white, they’re based on a stretched Falcon platform.
And we follow the British look, with full windows along the whole side.
Its actually in my will that the hearse for my funeral is not to be a Furd.
The link below has some info on Aussie hearses.
http://theothersideoffunerals.blogspot.com.au/2012/03/cultural-differences-in-hearse-american.html
That has to be the biggest and ugliest padded vinyl top of the Brougham era. The whole car- in excellent condition- would still be extremely ugly in those colors. Bleeccch!
Ruckersville, VA is very close to my home. I see a few other old vehicles around. Is this a private residence rather than a junkyard?
On a side note, JFK’s body was transported in a ’63 Pontiac ambulance from Andrews Air Force Base in suburban Maryland to, if I recall correctly, Walter Reed Medical Center in DC after being flown from Dallas on that fateful day of 11/22/63.
Yes, there was a brand new white 1964 Cadillac from the O’Neal Funeral Home in Dallas from Parkland to Love Field and then the 1963 Pontiac Ambulance from Andrews to Walter Reed and the same ambulance was used the same night at around 4 in the morning when the President was returned to the White House after the autopsy and embalming were completed at Walter Reed.
http://www.cbsnews.com/videos/jfks-body-brought-to-the-white-house/
This photo appeared in LIFE magazine. I find the ghostly image of Jackie’s reflection in the window quite eery.
The blood stains on her legs are fairly sobering too…..
It may be that “used car lot” on 33 as you head toward Stanardsville.
Oh, that place; I know it well! Thanks!
No power windows?
That’s a good one! Most of these types of vehicles didn’t even have radios. Nothing looks odd than a radio delete panel in a Cadillac dash.
See?
You do understand it depends on how cheap the original buyer was , right ? .
In the 1960’s we had a cherry ’49 Cadillac Hearse , it has both radio and heater , we lopped the top off it and added plywood sides , made a dandy single horse hauler .
We also had a 1950’s Packard Hearse with radio , it made the foolish mistake of not starting on cold January morning so Larry rolled it in it’s side and torched off the body and drive train mounts , made it into a nice hay rack….
We had another Cadillac hearse used to ferry the younger Children from their dormitory to the School mess hall daily .
All of these oldies had factory fitted radios and heaters ~ in those days heaters were not standard equipments except on higher end makes .
My 1980 Cadillac S & S Victoria hearse was built on a base Fleetwood chassis and had AM-FM radio and AC .
-Nate
Air conditioning is standard from 1975 and up on Cadillacs and by 1980 the base AM-FM radio was in lots of hearses, but I’ve seen 1977 and up style Cadillac hearses with a radio delete panel in them too, as you said it depends on how cheap the original company that ordered the hearse was.
The ones I drove (77-81) all had stereos and power windows. Vinyl bench seats, though.
I did say “most”.
Power windows started becoming more common after the 1977 versions, which use the standard Cadillac door panel, as opposed to the picture above where Cadillac just supplied generic GM cranks, handles and window regulators and they were applied to a plain upholstered door that was made by the body builder. Remember that Cadillac just pretty much sold the body builders the frame and the car from the A-pillar forward, they had to make everything else.
It’s looking pretty hopeless. I have a soft spot for early 1970s Oldsmoboats, but this example is just a heap of junk waiting to be scrapped. Now, if it were a ’73 Delta 88 Sedan with a Rocket 455, it could be just as rusty as this hearse, and I’d be interested.
It’s worth maybe $300 AFTER you pull the motor, tranny, driveshaft and rear assembly for transplantation into that ’73 Olds Omega with the straight six you’ve been hankering for. Toss the six and the other assorted goods into the back of the hearse after you’re done for the extra payoff on the scales.
You could say it needs to be (removes sunglasses) …cannibalized
Some fun vanity plates for a hearse. Kept the names short because vanity plates are usually limited to eight letters.
Dead Man
Dead Guy
Dead One
R U Next
Go N Style
Plant Me
Last Ride
Lucky One
Lucky Guy
It Was Fun
Bye Bye
Times Up
Expired
Curtains
Finished
Finis
The End
As unfortunate as that car is at least it ain’t this…
Can I get one with Eco Boost and AWD? 😛
You could be the fastest one to the graveyard. (Oh, wait…)
We regularly service one at our dealership that has EcoBoost and AWD. So, yep 🙂 .
Wouldn`t be caught dead in it.