Is this cool, or what? Yes, a yellow Hornet in front of a pink house in San Francisco is cool. Obviously. And it’s owner knows it all too well. And I’m drooling.
I’ve been wanting a step-down Hudson since 1961! That’s when I discovered an old Hudson sitting at the very dead end of Hutchinson Street, at the edge of the ravine that cut across Manville Heights. And I used to spend a lot of time with it, and in it too, if I found it unlocked. Yes, nobody gave a damn back then if some dweeby kid wanted to sit in your old car for hours on end. Front seat and back seat. I even found a bat in it once; maybe I left a window slightly open.
I still could spend a lot of time with one again, now.
Ralf K. only posted one picture of this car, but it’s more than enough. Too much, actually. It’s a painful reminder just how mad I’ve been about these cars every time I see one, since that first one on Hutchinson Street. Why did I fall for it so hard?
Did you have to ask? There was a Tatra 600 (“Tatraplan”) that lived down the street from our house in Innsbruck, and its shape impressed itself on my tender young brain way to deeply, as it’s dominated my thinking and feeling life way too much ever since. Buying VW Beetles was an attempt to assuage the issue somewhat, but it didn’t quite do the trick.
Anyway, when I discovered that old tired and mostly retired Hudson (a pre-Hornet version) in my neighborhood, thanks to discovering a shortcut to school through numerous back yards (yes we did that too. In fact, I eventually optimized my one mile walk from home to school by an almost perfect diagonal line through the neighborhood, via driveways, yards, and a ravine or two, almost totally avoiding streets. Nobody had a fence back then). Anyway, when I discovered the Hudson, it was a Eureka moment. Aha! Americans did aerodynamics too! And quite nicely, at that. Too bad about no rear engine, though. And a flathead engine? Come on; Tatras had aircooled hemi engines.
So the Hudson became my proxy Tatra. And they’re a lot more affordable too. What am I waiting for?
Here’s a full CC on the Hudson Hornet
Paul, you are waiting for the Hackenberger auction in Ohio June 15. Hudsons,and even a Tatra if you want the real thing instead of the American version.
http://www.vanderbrinkauctions.com/auctions_pictures.php?detail=205
I personally would be interested in at least 10 cars there, Studebakers, Triumph TR3 and Spitfire, International Travelall.
If we could round up a few CC’ers to go together we could support each other as we ruin our finances and destroy our marriages. What are we waiting for, indeed?
Wow – there is a large number of oddballs that I would love to see at that auction. That would be a long haul to get any purchases home for me.
I’m into a Hudson Hornet myself! Kind of reminds me of a movie we used to love, “American graffiti”.
I love that style – it’s brilliant!
The step down school bus isn’t quite working for me, but I like that earlier model in green a lot.
Not sure about the green one, but the yellow one is a 1954.
Paul, if loving a Hudson makes you a hipster, then twirl your mustache and put on your best skinny jeans and rock it properly! Rare now, and obscure, unless you count Pixar’s Doc Hudson, nobody knows about these cars any more, so knowing one does mean you liked them before they were cool. You have no idea how much this made me miss having my Dad around. I read the article, and my first thought was to ask Pop whether the Hudsons were considered luxury models or more pedestrian in nature. I remember that they were still being used in local stock car races in the early 60s, as their history in NASCAR was still fairly fresh in the minds of low budget racers of that time. However, every one I have seen since has been a fairly well decked out model, so I am never sure if I am only seeing the highly loaded models restored, or if they were upmarket cars, and nobody seems to be certain. For such a question, I would ask my Dad, but sadly, he has been gone for 12 years now.
I should have included a link to the CC in our archives: https://www.curbsideclassic.com/curbside-classics-american/curbside-classic-1952-hudson-hornet-a-victorious-dead-end/
Hopefully it’ll give you some insight into these great cars. Yes, they were the terror of NASCAR for a number of years, with their legendary 308 cu.in. flathead six!
To answer your basic question, yes, these were mid-market cars, competing with GM’s Pontiac/Olds/Buick, Chrysler’s Dodge and deSoto, and Mercury.
Count me in on step-down Hudson love. While I never saw it, my Grandfather had one, so maybe it is in my blood.
Last fall, I stumbled on a Hudson Club show outside the historic J. Sterling Morton mansion in Nebraska City, NE. What a candy store of color and chrome – including a convertible! All the pictures I took of the cars included my kids, trying to recreate some historic family photos.
So, I’ll leave out the modern photos, but here is the family Hudson – my uncle on the left and possibly a Shell station service man delivering or picking up the Hudson?
Awsome photo. Even a picket fence in the background.
Hopefully the service man is not going to ride back to the station on the tricycle in the foreground 🙂
“Hopefully the service man is not going to ride back to the station on the tricycle in the foreground.”
That comment is worthy of me – I’m long accused of “dad jokes.” Thanks for the laugh!
The tricycle is a bit of a mystery. My mother, the youngest, was just a few years younger than my uncle in the picture.
You could probably reproduce this picture today. It is in the Windsor Heights section of Des Moines. I last saw the property two years ago, and the street is still much the same, but perhaps a little run down.
Ha ha ha! That made me think of Jonathan Winters riding the bicycle in the movie “It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World” Time to get that DVD out and watch it again . . .
My favorite Pixar movie scene. Sound is from a real vintage racing Hornet and it’s an authentic color.
The producers did their research quite well, didn’t they? My hat’s off to them.
I’ve wondered how much the use of a Hudson had to do with Paul Newman lending his voice to the movie. Knowing Newman’s well-known, life-long involvement with cars and racing, I have a hard time believing it was just a happy coincidence.
Even his race graphics were period-correct.
It’s interesting that we’ve gone back to the high belt lines and gunslit windows that these Hudsons had. I guess what goes around comes around, as the old saying states.
I do love Hudsons. I don’t really care for the yellow of the pic at the top but I do love those Hudsons.
Too me they always looked like they should be driven by a gangster’s goons while the boss man rode in his Cadillac.
I love these cars, full stop.
When I was a preteen I thought I might write fiction. I tried, badly, for a few years. The very first short story I ever wrote featured a protagonist who drove a step-down Hudson sedan.
I forget what the story was about, but clearly I’ve not forgotten his car.
How cool! What does “step-down” refer to?
Google is your friend:
Hudson pioneered the concept of pushing the frame out to the perimeter of the body, thus allowing the passenger compartment to ride lower in the car than any other marque. Rather than stepping up into a driver’s seat, you lowered yourself into it. Seems routine these days, but at the time it was revolutionary. SUV/CUV vehicles have reversed that trend, unfortunately…unless you’re over sixty with bad hips or knees. 🙂
Its major drawback for Hudson was, to do a body restyle meant redesigning the frame – and in the days before CAD, that was expensive…requiring money that Hudson simply did NOT have.
Strictly speaking, it’s not a “frame”, as these were technically “unibodies”, with everything welded into one unit. But obviously there were members that were similar to frame rails, and the Husdon pushed the main side rails out to the sills, allowing a lowered floor, hence “step-down”.
It was an advanced structure for the times, but made it more expensive to “remodel”, which basically is what sunk Hudson. The taste in areodynamic fastbacks was quite fleeting, and had turned to the more traditional three-box shape, and Hudson was stuck with an obsolete unibody.
I never quite understood why it was THAT difficult to have a re-design. Below is a projection (which has been floating on the internet for a while – no idea whose) of what the 57-58 models would have looked like. I do not see how this would have needed any changes to the chassis (=frame). Of course, a no lesser issue would have been what engine it would have used, and as much as I would have loved to see a hemi 6 under that hood by that time Hudson would really have needed a V8, which perhaps AMC / Nash could have provided? Hudson could have then been AMC’s “Buick” in a more natural way than AMC’s own mid-60s efforts.
trying again…
One more…
The third one…
And the last. Yes the person who created these was influenced by Exner. But they are still nice and not unrealistic.
Love those Hudsons. Chrome was the standard dashboard color with optional accent colors. Look it up and you’ll see what I mean. Sunglasses mandatory.
My great-granddad bought Pierce-Arrows in the 1920s when his business was flourishing, then went to three marques he considered high-quality (according to my dad, who remembers riding in the Old Man’s cigar-redolent cars) – Nash, Packard, and Hudson when the Depression hit. That was common back then; people just didn’t want to flaunt the fact they weren’t as hurting as the next guy (yet!) When my granddad bought the business along with a fourth cousin in 1938, he allowed himself a company car and bought nothing but Nash or Hudson.
I remember, vaguely, a Hudson that Gramp owned before he bought his 1955 Nash Ambassador in 1959. (Gramp’s idea of economizing was as many of the rest of us do – he bought the best he could afford, when they were used for three or four years.) That car was FAST. Hudson knew what most other automakers knew but ignored – cubic inches weren’t necessarily the secret to speed, but volumetric intake. That 308cu.in. six with dual carbs may not have had the cachet of a V8, but it had massive intake and exhaust valves. That, and two carbs, let that Hornet really pound out some serious performance.
I guess I became an AMC nut at least until 1973 or so, just because of the cars Dad and Gramp drove. Dad’s other favorite (Ford) is my daily drive, now. If one can just pretend the 1970s never happened!
Allow me to also share a Hudson photo. This one resides near me, pretty sure it’s not moving anytime soon. Love the patina.
Back in the 70’s, in Ohio, one of the farmers who lived down the road from Dad’s farm had a black Hudson, much like this one (it may have been slightly older). I don’t think it was a daily driver, but I would see it go up and down our road now and then.
I don’t know what happened to it, but he finally parked it beside his barn and it just sat.
A few thoughts when staring at the yellow Hornet:
1. Long hood short rear
Mustang and all cars today follow that practice. Was Hornet the first to do it?
2. Rear wheel pushed backwards
Citroen DS, CX all followed this practice. Rear doors went straight down.
3. Cab forward
So Chrysler didn’t ‘invent’ that in the ’80s, Hornet had it in the ’50s. And every car today has that cab forward look.
4. High waist line, low roof.
So again Hornets were way ahead of its time. That look became popular in the past 20 years or so? I think we are doing it now to save weight, glass heavier than steel or aluminium.
5. Three side windows on each side.
Again a common practice today.
Got to wonder what was the cx of these hornets,
These cars have always had an attraction for me, ever since I played with a model my cousin had. He is about the same age as the Hornet, and it seemed exotic and interesting, and different, in Yorkshire in 1970.
Nice looking car.
My father bought a new 1950 Packard, and when we visited family in southern California with it he and my mother’s brother who’d just bought a step-down Hudson sedan razzed each other quite a bit about who had the better car. In those years my southern California relatives also bought a new 1951 gray Chevrolet 4-door without even a heater and a new 1950 gray over yellow Chevrolet Bel Air hardtop with Powerglide. Thinking back on it now, good times for most of us….
I will post this pic anywhere, any time, because I’m so proud of it. This is my Dad’s ’53 Hornet, Twin H, Hydramatic that he bought from the widow of the original owner in 1972. A college chum of mine named Hugh Talman shot it while visiting and brought a print along to a shoot for the National Archives with Mario Andretti some 30 years later. When given the photo to comment on, Mario launched into stories of his early racing career in step down Hudsons.
Wonderful! What a treat that must have been.
That ravine on Hutchinson is right next to my father’s house! But he did not live there until the 1980s. There is a marvelous Hudson in Eugene, shown here. Perhaps you’ve seen it Paul. I love the badge which shows Henry Hudson’s ship from 1609.
Yes, I have seen it briefly going the other way once or twice, but never to photograph.
I assume the Hudson was long gone too by the time your father moved there. 🙂
I had very close friends who bought a house on Hutchinson in about 1973, and lived there until 1976. I was there often. And prior to that, in the winter of 1972-1973, I had a part time job doing some domestic chores for the old couple that lived in the beautiful big 1920s house (351) right at the end there too, on the SW corner of the ravine. Cronk was their name, I’m pretty sure. They built it new. I loved that house.
I see it was fully renovated/updated and is now valued at over $1 million on Zillow.
A Hudson to replace your Tatra addiction?… Guess you make do with what you find. Don’t get me wrong, Hudsons are superb automobiles, but they’re not from the same planet as Tatras.
There was a beautiful two-tone Hudson in sort of a dark copper color with lighter inset that I used to see around Greensboro frequently. I think the owner may have used it as an occasional driver because I used to see it parked in the same shopping center parking lot multiple times. Perhaps an older fellow who used his classic, weather permitting, to get to and form a part-time job?
I always had to stop and stare; I really was a beautiful car. Earlier than the yellow feature, more like the green one pictured.
Current street view of this address
owner has some serious classics
https://www.google.com/maps/place/3091+Turk+St,+San+Francisco,+CA+94118/@37.7774046,-122.4566531,3a,75y,164h,90t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1sqLPXMZxzG1gsmPJzbcTc3A!2e0!6s%2F%2Fgeo2.ggpht.com%2Fcbk%3Fpanoid%3DqLPXMZxzG1gsmPJzbcTc3A%26output%3Dthumbnail%26cb_client%3Dsearch.TACTILE.gps%26thumb%3D2%26w%3D86%26h%3D86%26yaw%3D164.47614%26pitch%3D0%26thumbfov%3D100!7i13312!8i6656!4m5!3m4!1s0x80858748f5273cd9:0x58d79d261fb7292b!8m2!3d37.777201!4d-122.45657!6m1!1e1