After our fake Fargo pickup the other day and the Dodge B-series vans yesterday, how about we combine them for this splendid find by nifticus, a genuine Fargo A108 van, spotted in the Vancouver, B.C. area.
Here it is in its full splendor. This is of course the 108″ extended wheelbase version of Dodge’s A-series vans, sold as a Fargo in Canada, which made for a better ride and weight distribution. Yes, increasing the wheelbase and corresponding length of a vehicle invariably improves any intrinsic shortcoming in that area, and the 90″ wheelbase Dodges had plenty of that, as I know from personal experience.
Why didn’t I paint my Dodge purple? This sure looks familiar, except for that nice moderns seat. That has to be a major improvement over the very basic seats in these. The dash-mounted shifter for the Torqueflite is visible just behind that ‘spoiler’; a padded bar added in 1968 or 1969, to slightly improve the abysmal passive safety of these vans.
The twin exhausts strongly suggest this is a V8-powered A108, with a 318 LA stuffed between the front seats. Given the light weight and light rear axle loading of these, the benefits of the longer wheelbase and better weight distribution were particularly advantageous with the V8.
TIL Fargo also sold vans (though I shouldn’t be surprised).
Pretty much the entire truck line was sold as either Dodges or Fargos in Canada. Not every town had a Dodge dealer and in much of rural Canada back then the nearest one could be hours away. Plymouth dealers made up the slack with the Fargos…..
Maybe Prince should have composed a song “Purple Van , purple van “.
I still wonder why the stylist thought it would be good to exaggerate the size of the headlights.
The cheap looking ‘pie plate’ headlamp bezels didn’t help. Chrysler may have considered recycling a variation on the futuristic turbine appearance from their Turbine Car’s bezels. It at least would have allowed the front clip some added elegance and refinement.
Those bezels are not even as good looking as pie plates. They look like cheap aluminum ash trays!
If I was the owner of that van I’d paint those pie pans purple to make them less noticeable.
Even if Chrysler did something as simple as using chrome trim for the upper air inlets, it would have improved the front end design immensely IMO. It at least would have downplayed the harshness of the oversized bezels.
I’ve been familiar and using photoshop since it’s inception.
I’m impressed with with your work. More please.
Exaggerated headlight trim was a recurring styling theme for Chrysler passenger cars of that era as well. Look at a ’62 Fury or ’64 Polara, for example. ’63-’65 Darts also had a “bug eye” look.
Doug,
IIRC, the Dodge pickup trucks sold about the same time as these vans also had the outsized headlight trim rings. Have to maintain styling “continuity” across the product line, ya know.
What’s harder to believe is that 2 piece windshield…in the late 60s!!!
Not a single piece of curved glass on this thing. Definitely intended as an appliance.
Flat glass meant big savings for me when I needed to replace any of it. A competent glass shop could make it from stock automotive safety glass in a few minutes. As I remember, the GM vans of that era originally had a single piece flat windshield.
I’ve noticed people here say “appliance” like it’s a bad thing-I always thought if my refrigerator or toaster were built (or ran) as poorly as some cars I’ve driven, I would be long gone by now!
Yep! And on the flipside, a month ago when a mechanical failure necessitated a car replacement, I decided it was time to see how the other half live and get an appliance instead of something unusual (by dint of age or scarcity or whatever). What made me do so was the realisation that I like appliances. Well-engineered, -designed, and -built ones are an enduring joy to use (e.g., KitchenAid mixer).
I bought a 9-year-old Honda Accord. I can get it serviced at a dealer or any independent shop; they all have all the necessary info without my having to do any homework or make sure the service manual is in the back seat when I drop it off. There are no discontinued parts for it, so I don’t have to hunt and hoard. So far it gets the job done without hassle; here’s to appliances!
Dodge even had that headlight trim on their heavy commercial trucks:
http://www.olddodges.com/dodgefarm/cnt900/73CNT900_3.JPG
Dodge designers liked the split windshield on the original VW van. Chevy van designers liked the vent windows on the original VW van. Another design feature that is widely copied on the 2nd generation VW van is the sliding door.
That van has quite newly issued license plates, another indication that it’s still in daily use.
I logged thousadns of miles in these things in the mid 1960’s and hated the way they looked but they ran and ran and ran and………
Now whenever I see a survivor like this it makes me smile =8-) .
ChryCo _CAN_ be great again , hopefully in my lifetime .
-Nate
I haven’t seen a Fargo van in a long time. Here in the Great White North, You could buy either a Dodge truck or the identical Fargo version was sold by Plymouth dealers. There were Fargo versions of the A series pickups too. I think ’72 was the last year for Fargo, by that time most Chrysler dealers were selling the full Chryco line so no real need for it anymore. Somehow I doubt Plum Crazy paint was a factory option, but it doesn’t look bad!
Here is another Fargo van that I saw in the area.This is a shorter-wheelbase A100.
Great find, I really like the pie pan Mopars. Especially cool in Fargo livery.
I’m not really a van guy, but there’s something oddly appealing about these vans. I wonder if Virgil Exner wasn’t involved somehow. The shorter wheelbase version I like better, though.
memories! my dad delivered milk in a lwb fargo cargo van like this. 3 on the tree and the mighty tower of power slant six. I first learned to drive standard on it. I learned 2 things that day. they were pretty tough old buggers when you are revving the snot out of it, the old man is screaming at you to shift from first to second and you shift from first to reverse and nothing mechanical breaks. the other thing I learned is glass milk jugs(remember them?) WILL break when propelled forward at speed by an idiot learning to drive standard.
I swear forever after you could smell spoiled milk anytime you turned the defrosters on!
WE got huge numbers of Fargo trucks and pickups over the years but a Fargo van from Chrysler is a new one on me, Fargos from Isuzu I see fairly often but not from NA, these vans are missing from our automotive landscape their place taken by things like Commers, Austins, Morrises,Bedfords, and Fords from the UK, US models though here in small numbers are rare sightings.
The other Fargo van.
Geeze, what a honey of a van—ordinarily I tend to hew to the view that they have to be turquoise or gold (optionally with white two-tone), but this purple works.
And the dual exhausts might or might not indicate a V8 engine.
“might not” in theory, but practically speaking the odds of a set of Dutras compared to a 318 are very, very low. The 318 was not uncommon in these later stretch vans.
Aw, yer only sayin’ that ’cause it’s true! »sulk«
Not that it particularily matters, but this appears to be a pop-up as well.
Looks like the owner added 3 point inertia belts as well.