CC has previously featured two of these cars before, including one with the decidedly odd-looking single headlights like this. However when I saw this eBay listing with its close-up shots of the equally odd details of the ’60 Rambler’s interior which haven’t been posted before, I thought this was worth writing up and sharing.
Just so you know, the Deluxe was the lowest-priced offering in the regular Rambler line, which consisted of three series in ascending order: Deluxe, Super, and Custom. (Do you love the fact that the cheapest, plainest model is called Deluxe? So typically ’50s/early ’60s–each trim level is some sort of “fabulous”!) Dual headlights were optional on the Deluxe; standard on other series.
1958 Studebaker Champion for sale with 128 miles on the odometer.
Studebaker did a similar thing with its low-priced Champion models in 1958, the first year dual headlights were offered. Pods designed for duals (optional on Champions) were filled by single lights with metal “spacers” around them if extra-cost duals were not specified. The results were equally bizarre looking.
You’ve got to remember that the Studebaker and Rambler were economy cars, and any opportunity to keep the base price down was welcomed. At $2098, this Rambler Deluxe was priced with the new Big Three compacts–only the Ford Falcon at $1974 significantly undercut it.
I have memories of two of these cars in this same color: When I discovered this huge abandoned horde of junk cars in Rockaway, New Jersey, there was one of these black Rambler sedans parked among the ruins. It had so much junk piled on top of it (plywood sheets, fence sections, overgrown branches) that the debris formed a kind of garage which protected the car from the elements. Vandals couldn’t get to it, so the car was actually quite well preserved. Of course no one cared, and when the junk cars were ultimately cleaned out after the property changed hands, the poor Rambler was crushed along with everything else!
My first time walking the dog, circa 1969.
There was also one of these cars at the house in Cedar Knolls where we got our first puppy, “Puzzi”. (That’s an Italian word–I won’t tell you what it means. My father named the dog–Dad can be kind of a wise-guy malandrine sometimes!)
I now want to get to the interior, because even though this is a bargain-basement type car, it has a lot of swoopy, avant-garde design aspects which add to the creepy-fascinating look:
The driver is confronted with a futuristic, outer space-looking elliptical speedometer which somewhat resembles a TV screen of the period. There are a lot of leftover Nash features, including a WEATHER-EYE heater with its solid metal levers.
Also distinctively Nash are these strangely elongated single digits. Hudson, which also makes up part of this car’s ancestry DNA had single speedometer digits too. No one has ever explained why.
Another wacky futuristic feature is this push-button transmission control. You don’t start this car with the key–you first turn the key to “ON” and then press “N-START” to operate the starter. There’s a separate chrome PARK lever below, similar in appearance to the one on the 1957 Mercury. The transmission itself is a Borg-Warner unit like Ford used. By pressing “D2” you start off in second gear, and then it automatically upshifts to third as speed increases.
The seats, with that “random-cubist” mid-century modern pattern–look durable and in fine shape for a car this old! I like the door cards with that bold, thrusting triangle in highly contrasting black and white.
The Rambler six: overhead valves, 195.6 cubic inches, 127 horsepower. Look at all that pavement you see under the hood! Like Studebaker, there’s that so-easy-to-get-at oil filter! The fan blade looks blurred–I guess it’s running?
Here’s what Consumer Reports had to say about the 1960 Rambler six:
(This is a microfilm copy, but I think you can read it). Click image to enhance.
From the Tad Burness Auto Album.
This was Rambler’s typical sales schtick. Their satiric drawings making fun of the big Detroit “Bulgemobiles” were always hilarious!
Data plate.
Summing up, I really kind of like this 1960 Rambler. It looks fleet, sharp, and rather dignified in its “tuxedo” black and white paint scheme. It always amazes me that cars like this, originally intended to be “throw-aways”–use it up then scrap it–have somehow survived into the second decade of the twenty-first century. And I’m glad that quite a few have somehow beaten the odds so that we can experience the special aura that these cars have.
Among the 1960 compacts, I think Comet is the best looking, probably the best riding, with a lot of finely-crafted detail; Valiant gives the best handling and performance; and this Rambler is somewhere in-between those two in terms of automotive goodness. Corvair, Falcon, and Lark also have their special appeal. This was when an “economy car” was still solidly built, with some nice styling touches, and drove well. In the 1970s and ’80s, too many economy cars became plasticy, tinny, unreliable “penalty boxes” with almost no character. Now that nearly all of those have been scrapped, virtually no one misses them.
But if I ever were to buy one of these, I think I want the dual headlight version. Or is the “bug-eyed” look more fascinating? After all, if nobody preserved these oddballs, they’d be extinct!
I always liked that series of Ramblers. That one is fairly well optioned with the radio, automatic, and ohv engine. Not sure if the Weather Eye heater was optional or not. These are nice drivers although my preference would be the overdrive.
Some Chrysler products of that era used the “N” transmission button as a starter; some did not.
I suppose eagle eyed safety advocates might have found the placement of the gear selector buttons (Reverse on the Rambler where Drive is on a Chrysler) a potential hazard, but if they did I’m not sure how big a megaphone they had prior to Ralph Nader’s popularity a few years later.
(Transmission buttons below are from a 1957 Chrysler)
Rambler buttons were color coded. Drive ranges lit up green, reverse lit up red, neutral button lit up amber. It was actually quite colorful at night. Colors were less obvious in daylight though.
When I was little (6 years old) my mom and I took the northwestern train from Chicago to Kensho Wis to pick up a new 1960 delexe wagon the only option was overdrive and dual headlights no radio. What memories
I like Studebakers (Larks and later Hawks, Avantis, and trucks primarily), so I can’t say a whole lot, but I always thought Rambler styling through ’62 was just…goofy. Inside and out. The roofline and rear-door styling looks Eastern Bloc to me for some reason. I of course realize what they say about opinions and something else–everybody has one.
For me, the Comet could be rated as highly by CR as a Caddy, and I just still could not…get…past…those taillights. I’m accustomed to Larks but everybody else’s 13 inch wheels look dollhouse-tiny to me too.
Comet’s taillights may not be functional, or beautiful to your eyes. They make more sense when you realize that they were designed when it was intended to be an Edsel, which was known for its odd design details.
Couldn’t agree with you more about wheel size. It’s interesting that Studebaker and the Rambler American and Rambler Six and used 15-inch wheels (14-inch on the Rebel and Ambassador V8), while the Big Three used 13-inchers on their compacts. It may have been cheaper for the independents to use larger wheels and tires, versus designing and manufacturing smaller brakes to fit inside 13-inch wheels – or maybe the powers that be liked them for some other reason.
I have always found these Ramblers more fascinating than appealing. The odd single digit speedos and other old Nash holdovers are odd but interesting. These things certainly had a unique shape that I remember as being fairly common in my childhood. There was no mistaking a Rambler for anything else.
The “neutral/start” button seems like a big contradiction to me. You have the modern space-age pushbuttons for shifting gears, but then you go back to the old “turn the key then push the button” system for starting that was only on really old cars by then.
I agree that the dual headlight version is far more attractive. And I have always loved those big clothes iron-shaped taillights.
As starting in gear is dangerous, automatic cars require a lockout so that they only can start in Park or Neutral. By having to press the neutral button to start the lockout is painlessly enforced. Makes sense to me.
So how come the cars that were totally uncool when I was young are now becoming desirable?
Cars of the 1960s, with the strangest design elements, aged the worst into the 1970s. As a kid, I became interested in cars in a big way, around 1974. And cars like this Rambler, were the automotive equivalent of 1950s science fiction-themed b-movies. Like surreal artwork.
I used to wonder why, the most marginalized car makers, introduced the most bizarre, and polarizing designs. Made no sense to me, especially as a child.
Thanks for the link to the Rambler I encountered long ago. The white on your example does wonders for tempering the austere look these can have.
These single light examples do have a certain novelty factor in current times, which is undoubtedly different than how they were perceived originally.
Yet there is a notch in the bottom of the trim ring to accommodate the larger lights. What did that cost? Was it the same trim ring as on the quad-light models? I’m really wondering what cost benefit there was by offering two different facial arrangements, other than indirectly nudging an upsell.
Puzzi fits many dogs quite well.
This is just a guess on my part, but when these Ramblers were being developed there were changes coming regarding the legality of quad headlights. I’d say that AMC tooled up for both single and quad so as to be legally compliant regardless of where they were sold. Once the quads were legal nationwide, AMC was probably using up the single lights to cover tooling costs for them or even using up old parts.
That’s a possibility, but all the other truly new cars for 1958 didn’t do that, as that issue had been resolved by then. I’m struggling to imagine a ’58 Chevy or Cadillac with single units.
The single headlight version in the photo is just the cheapest rendition of the Rambler that year. Rambler saved-how much per car? By using two bulbs instead of 4? 2 sockets and matching wires instead of 4? Maybe a few bucks. The issue of quad headlights was settled, as Paul points out.
IIRC, hazard lights, aka emergency flashers, didn’t become mandatory until either the GSA edicts of the mid-60s or the federal laws of ’68. Yet this Rambler has them, which seems odd for a stripped economy car of 1960. I didn’t even realize the concept existed in 1960.
However, I do have *very* vague recollections of aftermarket (or factory?) retrofit kits to add them. Since the switch is mounted under the dash, I might suspect it was a retrofit.
Anybody know? (I bet Mr. Stern does!)
Yes, aftermarket kits were available. In my stash of Corvair parts I have such a kit, which was sold by Sears. I’m not sure, but it may be branded with Sears’ “Allstate” name. One of these days I need to dig it out and list it for sale.
Firt hazard lights I remember were our “68 Chevy” and our neighbors “68 VW. ((the “emergency 88”))
The ones in our car did not continue “flashing” if the brake was stepped on.
In the 1930s, Buick called their smallest model the “Special.” To start it, one would switch on the ignition and depress the gas pedal (still works). Here is my ’37 Special at the Colorado Railroad Museum last year.
Oh, do you bring back memories! Does your car have the humped trunk, or the ‘sorta-fastback’ flat trunk lid (mine was the latter)? As I was never much for photographing things most of my life, your picture is virtually the twin of my car, only the fog lights make them different. Mine was a compete stripped, having only an aftermarket Southwind heater in it, and I later added a clock to the glove box lid.
The stock ignition toggle had died a long time ago for the first owner, so she had a hole drilled in the dash above (I believe) the hand throttle and a plain on-off keyed ignition switch was installed.
In response to a posted question, my 1937 Buick Special is a 2-door, 5-passenger trunk-back Model 48 in “Coronary Green.” Highly original, less than 68,000 miles. Everything works, even the clock. I chauffeured 4 weddings through Hagerty’s DriveShare program last summer, which bought me a new set of tires.
The gas pedal starter was a Buick feature until 1961.
Thank you for including the selection from Tad Burness’ Auto Album. I had a copy with different cars (don’t recall this Rambler, it went up to 1961 or so) which I gave to my nephews who promptly dismantled it. Got it in ’67 or so as one of the scholastic books.
My parents had both a ’61 and a ’63 Rambler Classic Wagon, with the 6 and automatic (my Mother never got comfortable driving standard). I think both had the dual headlights (certainly the ’63 did), my Dad’s first car was a new ’56 Plymouth Plaza, though it probably had a heater, didn’t have a radio nor other options, it was flathead 6 with standard transmission (he hadn’t met my Mother yet when he bought it)…and of course, it had the dual headlights, quads weren’t quite available yet. The ’63 was totalled in front of our motel room in Catonsville, Md in 1965, we had vacated our house and were moving up to Vermont…my Dad bought a new ’65 Olds F85 wagon, that was the last AMC in our family (no other relatives ever had one).
Wonder what (other than styling?) was the impetus for quad headlights? Many cars after ’57 persisted in having duals, just with high/low beam in one lamp…do quads
have possibility of providing better light than duals? Seems like duals would be more aerodynamic than quads if integrated properly in front. Maybe if you broke just one light you’d still have some light from the unbroken sealed beam….but other than that, seems like duals could have persisted.
Pods designed for duals (optional on Champions) were filled by single lights with metal “spacers” around them if extra-cost duals were not specified. The results were equally bizarre looking.
Not equally bizarre, as the Champion had those grafted-on pods to accommodate the dual headlights, but then only mounted a single light. That’s vastly more bizarre! They should have just left the pods off.
I’ve become more and more fond of these with time. They were the most rational American car of its time, in terms of its size, proportions and space efficiency. The relatively tall body allowed the seats to be higher off the floor than other American cars. The unibody was well done, solid, and allowing a lower floor.
It reminds me a lot of some European sedans of the time, including the fintail Mercedes and the Fiat 1800/2100, and some others.
I could see myself behind the wheel of one of these, with the two-barrel version of the six and the three-speed/OD. And a low restriction muffler. 🙂
I owned one of these.
Deja Vu all over again.
I had a used 1960 Rambler Custom as my first car.
Not only was it memorable, it was unforgettable!
I had the 4 headlight version, 3 on the tree, even a radio.
Owning a used one showed if the young owner was mechanic material. I learned a lot about wrenching this thing to keep it road ready. Like keeping the front suspension together, changing the clutch (in the enclosed drive-train), head gasket and tranny synchros. The list never seemed to end. Fortunately my Dad’s best friend was a mechanic.
In the mid-90s a customer of mine had one of these. I had a sick plan to surprise my wife on our anniversary. I was to swap cars with my customer for the day, and she and I would go to dinner at a fancy restaurant (with valet parking no less). Alas it was not meant to be as the temperatures were in the high 90’s that week and the car had no A/C. She probably would have refused to get in it anyway.
Would I own one again?
You bet!
These should have been the kias of their day. More features and size for the price. But amc just couldnt keep up
I like that the brake pedal on this one was apparently the same width as the one used with a manual transmission. My brother had one of these of the same basic body, I think his was a ’61 and it was quite roomy. Felt more like a full sized car. Not stylish though. The brake pedal width on later Rambler automatics was uncomfortably wide for me. Being used to driving a stick, I would sometimes reach for the clutch. Not good.
My Dad used to trade off his old used cars fairly frequently. He came home with the custom version. It was very clean and roomy, but since this was in the mid 60’s, it looked pretty old fashioned and somewhat embarrassing, at least to me. The following year my Dad traded this in on a ’60 Chevy Suburban. Not much cooler at the time, but would like to have that Suburban now.
The first compacts all had their pluses and minuses. Back then, brand-loyalty was a big thing and that, more than anything else, determined which one someone would buy, i.e., not much cross-shopping or conquest sales.
Which was unfortunate for the independents, particularly the originator of the compact class Rambler. Frankly, I rather like the somewhat avant-garde styling, inside and out, including both the quad or dual headlight versions.
Or is the “bug-eyed” look more fascinating?
Yes. Despite the McNamara frown the Falcon-and this Rambler-were acceptable alternatives to the dual-headlight Corvair or Valiant. This 7″ single headlamp Rambler with its Heckflosse-sized fins was fine in its day. And not bad looking even 60 years later.
Supposedly, the frowny Falcon was by design. The story is that McNamara wanted a clear sight line so the Falcon’s front fenders were intentionally curved downward.
While it certainly would help forward vision, the downside was not being able to see where the front fenders ended for parking.
When parents first married in 1960, their car was 1960 Rambler Deluxe in baby blue, 2 single headlights. Was traded in for 1964 Classic wagon, in turquoise. But after, no more Ramblers, were ‘sick of them’ by 1969.
As a kid, I had a strong dislike of those single digit speedometers. I suppose it’s clear enough though that “5” means 50 mph.
My gripe with today’s speedometers is that they show 140 or even 160 mph as the top speed, and everyday speeds are crammed into half of the dial.
Here’s my ideal speedo, from my ’98 Nissan Frontier — reads “only” to 110 mph, room for marking all 10 mph increments, with hash marks at every 5 mph.
That’s why my Ford Focus has an uneven distribution on the speedo.
(in km/h, this is not my car)
Yes, that’s another way to handle it. Some Ford models here in the US do the same, and I recall this treatment on Saabs as well.
The 1960 is my favorite year of Rambler. The high headlights, the simple egg crates grille, the RAMBLER lettering floating above the simple grille – super neat update from the 58 and 59.