Matt Wilda caught this superb ’55 Chrysler catching a few rays. It’s one of those milestone cars that we’ve unfortunately never covered here at CC yet, and today is not the time to give it full justice, with just one shot. It was the first mass-produced American car with 300 hp (hence the name), from it’s hopped-up 331 hemi V8. It was a blistering sensation when it arrived, and quickly set all sorts of speed records and dominated NASCAR that year. And of course, it looks the part, especially with the wire wheels. It’s the 300 I would put in my garage.
I think what’s most remarkable about the 1955 C-300, especially given the ad hoc way it was put together, is that it’s certainly the best-looking ’55 Chrysler Corporation product as well as the fastest. Its stablemates were none too shabby as well, but the 300 walked just the right line of seeming neither overdecorated nor unduly plain.
Early serious rear overhang. What’s the ratio, Kenneth?
When I was becoming car-aware in the early sixties, all cars were special to me. But I quickly learned that three American cars were particularly special: Corvette, Thunderbird, and Chrysler 300.
Beautiful car,even with the tacked on fins. Looks like a last minute design change.
I might be mistaken, but wasn’t the first 300’s most identifying feature (besides the ‘300’ emblems) was using an Imperial grille on a New Yorker body?
I guess it depends if you were in front of it on the road, or, more likely, in back of it.
Close; it’s the Imperial grille on a Windsor body–not New Yorker.
Every time I see one, I’m reminded what a looker it is. Hard to imagine such a beautiful car being whipped around Daytona. If you want to test the strength of those wire wheels…
I’ve never seen one. And it seems unbelievable how that enormous car could be as fast as it was. I was born and live too far away, and probably too late anyway, LOL.
I don’t remember seeing one of those in a museum (not that I’ve been to so many US museums with 50’s cars on them)
Brooklin made a 1/43 model of the ’55 and I bought an early one in red (which I still have).
I have admired the big coupe but always thought it odd that such a performance car had to make do with a two speed automatic. I believe by ’56 three speed auto or manual became available but that two speed auto in the introductory year was lame.
Chrysler didn’t have a three-speed automatic until fairly late in the 1956 model year and it wasn’t available in large numbers until ’57.
Before PowerFlite, Chrysler used a four-speed semiautomatic transmission, which had two ranges, each with two speeds each, and a torque converter. The idea was supposed to be that you started in the low range, let it shift between those gears, and then shifted to high range, which was like 3rd and 4th. However, with the converter, most people just left it in high all the time and relied on the torque converter for extra dig when starting. So, to go from that to two-speed PowerFlite was no big deal for Chrysler owners at the time.
For owners coming from other marques, the Ford and Studebaker Borg-Warner automatics generally started in 2nd and only used 1st if you started in Low, Dynaflow and Packard Ultramatic didn’t shift at all, and the four-speed Hydra-Matic shifted TOO much (and too obtrusively) for many tastes. (The dual-coupling Hydra-Matic was less jerky, but it came in for 1956, just a few months before TorqueFlite.)
Of course, the C-300 would have been better and quicker with TorqueFlite, but at the time, PowerFlite was pretty normative. It was like a ’90s car having a four-speed automatic; not advancing the state of the art, but in keeping with it.
And Moebius does this kit in 1/25. Not quite a factory colour.
It used the Imperial and New Yorker trim features on the shorter Windsor hardtop. Simplicity was its mainstay for appearance. No exterior rearview mirrors were originally offered lest the beautiful line of the car be interrupted. Upholstery was pigskin, if I am.
correct, Indeed, it was quite the car. Thanks for finding one and showing it to us.
One of the ways Chrysler was able to survive (barely) was, every once in a while, they’d have a hit. The 300 Letter Series is one of them. It’s fascinating that the C-300 didn’t even offer exterior rearview mirrors to keep the lines ‘clean’.
I’m a little puzzled, though, why Ford or GM didn’t offer up a competitor until much later. I guess there was, eventually, the Mercury Marauder and S-55 variants, and Buick had the Wildcat, but they didn’t have quite the same impact as the 300 letter cars.
Further, while purists tend to decry it, the 300 non-letter cars (known at first as ‘300 Sport’) were a big help to Chrysler’s bottom line. Yeah, 1965 might have been the last year for the 300 letter car as it was first conceived 10 years prior, but times were changing, and the non-letter 300 sold much better.
Not to mention that Chrysler was beginning to put all of their performance eggs into the Street-Hemi, a high-strung, detuned race engine that simply wouldn’t have fit in with the high-speed, professional cruiser ethos of the 300. Even the big, cross-ram wedge engines Chrysler was putting into the last letter cars weren’t exactly the smoothest, and didn’t have near the panache or tractability as the old, original hemi V8s.
I feel like the original 1957 Pontiac Bonneville would qualify, since it was pitched as a top-of-the-line luxury convertible as well as performance leader.
SIA did a comparison between the Bonneville and the ’57 300-C:
https://www.hemmings.com/stories/2013/11/24/sia-flashback-precursor-to-the-muscle-cars-1957-chrysler-300-c-vs-1957-pontiac-bonneville
You know, I thought about a competitor to the C-300 from Pontiac, and Wikipedia even states that the loaded with every bell and whistle (including fuel-injection) 1957 Bonneville was introduced to be just that.
But FI was expensive and maintenance-intensive, and the ’57 Bonnie was only available as a convertible. A much more affordable option would have been the Tri-Power that came for the following year’s car, and it could be had as a hardtop, as well.
But the 1957 300C was a whole different animal with Exner’s striking new Forward Look and its dual-quad 392 Hemi. It was the highest selling letter car and many consider it to be the pinnacle of the series.
Interestingly, the Mercury Turnpike Cruiser is mentioned as Ford’s offering against the 300. I never would have guessed that. Likewise, I wonder if Buick’s Roadmaster was intended as a competitor to the 300, as well.
It wouldn’t be until 1963 when the much closer Marauder and Wildcat appeared. But, by then, the 300 letter cars were fading. They wouldn’t last past 1965 with non-letter 300 cars selling much better.
I’ve never knowing seen one, but I have long considered this a very good looking car (along with the rest of the 1955 Chryslers), and perhaps the only 1950s Chrysler I could confidently identify.
I blame this https://www.curbsideclassic.com/blog/qotd/qotd-what-made-you-a-curbivore/