It was the best of times.
It was the worst of times.
In 1972, two identical dark red Coupe de Villes rolled off the Cadillac assembly line in Detroit. One went to the Washington, DC area, where it was purchased by a family that bought only Cadillacs, who made it a cherished family heirloom, kept like new for 40 years by multiple generations who all became well educated and successful. The other went to central Pennsylvania, where a retiring man who had spent his life in the coal mining industry purchased it as his best and last car. He kept it clean and well maintained as long as he lived, but his children, who were barely getting by in a decaying town whose coal mines had long since closed, kept the car but could not stop it from gradually decaying as well. Their fates reflected the places where fortune had sent them.
Inspired by Paul Niedermayer’s first Curbside Classic on the 1972 Coupe de Ville and Tom Klockau’s Outtake yesterday on a red 1975 Sedan de Ville, whose condition was somewhere between that of these two Coupe de Villes.
Beautiful. The wire covers are not correct, but otherwise a ’72 DeVille – Sedan or Coupe – has long been on my want list. Best styling of the ’71 – ’76 era, and you avoid the ’71 flow through ventilation mess.
Almost three if you count the white DHS (I think) in the top photo. Wasn’t that the “successor” to the deVille?
There will be more on that DHS (and more) tomorrow!
Looking forward to it. I have always like the DHS and DTS.
It’s got a stand up hood ornament, so it still could be a DeVille, its a tale of 2 and half DeVilles…
The base model was still a DeVille in this series until 2004-2005, when they all became DTesses.
The DHS replaced the d’Elegance trim series from the previous generation and the DTS replaced the DeVille Concours.
And so continues the long-running dispute between Nature and Nurture. I will confess to having these kinds of thoughts run through my mind – for every well preserved original car out there, there were 100 or 1000 more which were used, abused and sent off to the scrap heap. It is sort of amazing that the bad Caddy is still alive.
I will admit to a fondness for the looks of the 71-73 Coupe DeVille. I never liked “halo”vinyl roofs (the ones that left a little paint showing between the vinyl and the window edging) so would prefer one of these with a painted roof. But if I ever get one of these, it will look like the one from yesterday – no hubcaps, blackwall tires, and a bad exhaust system. Its purpose will be Vehicular Menace rather than as a nice car. For my inner Uncle Buck 🙂
The “worst of times” car’s story is actually something along the lines of what I wrote, I think. Not only is it still apparently registered and driven, it appeared to have all of its original wheel covers and was surprisingly damage free, which says to me that it has been cared for and still is. At the same time, the badly weathered exterior speaks to being parked outside speaks to many years of being parked outside without a budget for refurbishing the paint or vinyl top.
I also have been fond of the 1971-72 Cadillacs for many years. In my opinion, Cadillac did a great job of integrating increasingly large bumpers into the design, and they are the cleanest and best looking Cadillacs of the 1970s, better styled than most of the 1960s Caddies. Too bad that the quality of interior materials lets it down. It is the same situation that prevents me from liking new Mustangs enough to consider actually buying one: the designers did a wonderful job of drawing attractive exterior and interior styling, but the budgeting and manufacturing processes ended up using the cheapest and most unpleasant materials.
+1 — The ’71 – ’72 DeVilles are some of my favorite Cadillacs.
I have a thing for them too, 71-73, there was a 72 that lurked for years in a driveway in my neighborhood when I was a kid, I spent many times in my youth oogling its obscenely long flanks and comparing it to the new downsized FWD Cadillacs in the neighborhood.
It even had the power sunroof, it belonged to a gentleman who bought it for his wife who had died at some later point, and it just sat in the driveway for years and years, I don’t know how many miles it had, it was dark blue on dark blue with a white halo top.
Then one day, it was just gone. I don’t know if he moved it into the garage or if he sold it.
Nothing is quite as cool as a big old Domestic Beater that runs like a Swiss Watch…. and has all its original accessories fully operational (including the clock of course!)
Ahhh… the best of times for cars… at least until fall, 1972!
Beautiful barge. The DHS is pretty nice too.
Where was the second photo taken? I grew up in the coal region in central PA, and that building looks really familiar.
I don’t know but it does look familiar. Perhaps that is because in central Pennsylvania there are a lot of ugly buildings like that, in ugly, depressing, run-down towns.
That building actually looks like a repurposed schoolhouse.
The town was Mount Carmel, PA, which is located north of Harrisburg. More eastern than central PA, but eastern PA suggests the Philadelphia area to me, and Mount Carmel was definitely far outside the Philadelphia metropolitan area.
G. Poon is right about the building, I believe. It appeared to be a schoolhouse repurposed into a commercial building on the cheap, with all of its large windows replaced by standard house sized windows or completely covered. The town is full of derelict schoolhouses that have been abandoned, which is not surprising in a town where the main industry has closed and young people go elsewhere for jobs.
Okay, that makes perfect sense. I grew up in Shamokin and Elysburg, which are both less than 15 miles from Mount Carmel. Been there plenty of times. The locals pronounce it “Marnt Carmul.”
The old schoolhouses in the anthracite coal region fall into one of two categories:
– Catholic schools that have closed as the churches were consolidated. Back in the 90s, the Roman Catholic Church combined a lot of the churches in the area. Back in the day, these towns, which were chock-full of Southern, Central, and Eastern European immigrants, typically had multiple Catholic churches, divided by ethnic group. In Shamokin, when I was a kid, we had St. Joseph’s (Irish), St. Edward’s* (Italian), St. Stanislaus’s (Polish), and a Ukranian Orthodox Catholic church as well. Most had, at one point, Catholic schools associated with them.
– Smaller neighborhood public schools that were combined into district-wide buildings in the 1960s, 70s, and 80s.
*St. Edward’s in Shamokin, PA holds the distinction of being the world’s first electrically-lit church. Thomas Edison spent some time in Shamokin and Sunbury, PA, and personally oversaw the lighting of St. Edward’s.
The anthracite Coal Region reached its economic peak in 1917 with 100 million tons of anthracite extracted. It has become an early case study for economic collapse, including a book written about the area called “The Face of Decline.” What Pittsburgh and Cleveland experienced in the 1970s and 1980s, and Detroit went through in the 1990s and 2000s, started in the anthracite fields in the 1930s. Essentially, the area never really recovered from the Great Depression, and the anthracite industry was mostly gone by the end of the 1950s, and all but extinct by the 1970s.
The anthracite region had tried to diversify in the 1950s. Too bad they diversified into textiles, which all closed up in the 1980s and 1990s.
A little part of me has trouble feeling too badly for places like Detroit, when this country basically tore the land apart in the anthracite fields to heat their homes, and then left it all to rot. Where was our bailout? There was no such thing then.
Shamokin, PA once had a population of about 25,000. Today it’s less than 8,500.
A few months ago, Mrs. JPC and I were on a trip and found a website with classic radio shows. We listened to an early episode of The Shadow from the late 30s, and it was sponsored by – the Anthracite Coal industry. Those commercials had me ready to insist on Anthracite, but unfortunately, I have no real use for coal. I have intermittently wondered ever since if there is any private home still being heated by coal today. In the midwest, I believe that oil really started to displace coal in the 30s, and natural gas finished the job in the 50s. Here in Indiana, we are in Bituminous coal country (which I have always understood to be softer and cheaper than anthracite), and it is now starting to look like the same thing may be happening to that industry, with coal-fired powerplants looking to become a thing of the past soon.
I know of some folks still using anthracite in their homes, and new stoves and even furnaces are being manufactured by the likes of Harman and Reading.
I considered it when I still lived in Pennsylvania, but went with wood pellets instead, as I had nowhere to store the coal appropriately. Outside of Eastern PA, the cost of transportation makes anthracite too expensive, now that there’s no large scale demand to support distributors. They’d basically have to send a truck out just for you.
Anthracite makes excellent home heating fuel, and there still are some small scale mining operations to meet demand. A few million tons still are mined each year.
On the industrial side of things, anthracite was originally used for steel making until the invention of coke. Other than that, anthracite was too expensive for industrial use. The waste pieces of coal and slate, called culm, however, are now used to power and steam generation.
Until the 1930s most of the Northeast was heated by anthracite. It was mostly replaced by heating oil, which by the 1950s was not only lower maintenance, but cheaper, if you can believe it. Most anthracite pay in steeply inclined veins in the Ridge and Valley province of the Appalachians in Northeastern and Central Pennsylvania and usually had to be deep mined as opposed to strip mining. It wasn’t cheap to get at or to process, but it was so much cleaner to burn and store than bituminous.
I forgot to ask… what on earth were you doing in Mount Carmel? No one goes to the Coal Region without a good reason. It’s not exactly on the way to anywhere. 😛
Great post. Interesting to compare the fates of two of the same car, and glad to see them both still on the road. When I was growing up, I remember seeing so many Cadillacs descending down the automotive food chain. I think a lot of new Cadillacs were sold to people who liked to trade cars frequently, so there were plenty of 2 or 3 year old used Cadillacs going to second owners. While some of these used cars would have found loving long-term homes, I’d guess many more were seen as a cheaper way to get a Caddy and were driven hard and led rough lives. By the time they hit owner #3, they had fallen pretty far down toward junk status and would then be run into the ground. Finally, in many cases these former dream cars would be left abandoned and often stripped of parts in some of the rougher neighborhoods of New Orleans.
Sure, it steadily became more apparent that they were just wrong for the times, and sure, the quality of the furnishings was no longer anything special, but the ’71-76 series certainly looked good. While I like the ’71-73s best, I do like how they steadily made changes that made it look fresh, although the last models were perhaps a bit too blinged out.
A new ’73 SDV was my dad’s first Caddy, and I know it meant a lot to him as a kid who grew up with nothing, and having just been driving an AMC Rambler not many years before. They might have gone a bit over the top, as it was red (brighter than the car above), with white top and white leather. But it was a beautiful car. Later cars were more subtle, and eventually, by the ’90s, they just didn’t care enough about cars and transitioned to practical Hondas and Toyotas.
I still regularly scope out ads and such for late ’50s to ’70s Cadillacs.
Neighbor has a 1972 Sedan in Balmoral Green. Bastard is responsible for my obsession with 70s Cadillacs. Great guy though!
…made worse by the conflict between the addition and the original PA structure. Designed for and by the deaf and blind? A car port would have at least sheltered the Cadillac and not detracted any further friom the building.
I’ve always though the 75 and 76 fullsized Caddys were the best of the bunch. The newly approved rectangular headlights suited the bluff front perfectly and the battering ram bumpers added to the gravitas of the design.The only letdown is the dullness of the hubcap designs no turbine themed ones at all.
I understand the point to the story, but can’t really see the second De Ville to make the same conclusion
71-73 Caddies, my favourite American car of the 70s, and one of my favourites overall. Very few here and I don’t think I’ll ever own one as even the rough ones are over NZ$10K. Sigh.
Let’s go back to 1971, for a well to do family shopping for a coupe that matched their ‘status’. They could have:
1. The Cadillac deVille coupe as featured in this article.
2. Lincoln MK 3 (I assume the price then was comparable to the Caddy)
3. Chrysler Imperial Coupe (probably a bit cheaper than the Caddy)
4. Mercedes S class coupe (price? probably quite a bit more than the Caddy)
5. Rolls/Bentley Corniche (different league?)
6. BMW E9 CS (Price? and much smaller)
7. Jag’s XJ Coupe were still a few years away.
8. Japanese mnfr didn’t market a comparable coupe in US.
Of the above bunch, the best investment that family could have done was buying the Merc Coupe. According to Hagerty, a condition 4 1971 280SE coupe valued at $40k+, Corniche of same condition would be just a bit less than $40k, deVille coupe $12k, and BMW 2800CS $17k. However, if that family took the Bimmer 3.0CSL, it could be well over $100k now.
Back in 1971, not sure if the dealership for Merc/Bimmer were wide reach enough to smaller cities. For those folks, Caddy would have been the logical choice.
Though of course you are assuming a static $0 for repairs over time.
Good post, but I think the Lincoln Continental Coupe might be a more accurate competitor to the Coupe DeVille (rather than the Mk III). And the Lincoln is more attractive (and rare) in my view. I do agree with the post above though, the 75/76 square headlight Caddies are much better styled than equivalent Lincolns.
And Carmine is dead right – The Europeans would spend a lot more time in the service bay – and at the end of a tow hook……
Interesting analysis here is a break down of some luxury coupe price points for 1971 all are MSRP base prices
Cadillac Eldorado….$7383
Lincoln Mark III……..$8421
Cadillac De Ville……$6262
Lincoln Continental..$7172
Imperial……………….$6044
Mercedes 250C……$6625
BMW 3.0cs………….$8000 (appox)
The two surprises to me were how expensive the Mark was and what a comparable bargain the Coupe De Ville was
Thanks for the research. I had remembered that the Mark was significantly more expensive than a regular Lincoln (or Cad or Imp) but did not have the data to go with my recall. I also recall that by 1974, Mercedes prices were up A LOT (but then everyone’s prices had jumped in those inflationary years.)
What about 1971 Mercedes 280SE 3.5? What was the price back then?
I am surprise by how much cheaper were the Caddy in comparison to the Lincolns. Come to think of it, Lincoln has fallen even harder than the Caddy, and they will continue to fall now that Lincoln share showrooms and service with Ford.
To be fair, many Cadillac dealers share space with other GM makes (but not all). And there are still some standalone Lincoln dealers–the one in my area does not sell Fords.
“What about 1971 Mercedes 280SE 3.5? What was the price back then?”
$14,905.00 base MSRP
Jaguar XJ….. $7600.00
Rolls Royce…. $20,000.00
I didn’t know Lincoln made a coupe version of Continental, and you are right, it would be a more accurate competitor of Coupe DeVille.
The small Pennsylvania town hit home. I found my current 1979 Mark V Collectors in a coal mining town, side of the mountain slag heap, 45 degree streets, peeling clapboard houses, then out of a one car beat up old garage comes a one owner, beautiful Mk V, 22,000 miles, every option, original owner. The owner’s husband had died some 20 years before and she wouldn’t sell the car. Instead, she had her nephew come down from Cleveland twice a year and drive it to the local Ford dealer for service. Less than 1,000 miles in 18 years, 30 some oil changes! Everything on the car works as new and I drove it back to Houston on the original tires. So, don’t judge a car by its town!
@Tom Klockau
By now most (if not all) Lincolns share showroom with Ford, at least that is the case here in SoCal LA/OC area. If the vehicle is under warranty, there’s no reason not to use the dealership. You just can’t compare the level service and facilities at Lexus/BMW/Merc with Ford. I won’t touch a Lincoln for that reason alone.
My parents traded in our ’68 Plymouth Fury size wagon for a ’72 DeVille, in fall 1975. It was a great ride, but my 3 younger siblings [aged 6-10] missed laying down in ‘way back’ of the wagon. I was 14 and liked sitting up looking outside, but they “had to” lay stretched out. So, in the Caddy, they took turns laying across the back seat over other sibs’ laps.
They got used to sitting up when they got to pre-teenage years, and we all squeezed into a 1980 Regal as our next family car. Dad wanted a ‘sportier’ 2 door and better mpg.
This was cool, Robert – great, atmospheric shots.