Motor Trend recognized the Pontiac Division in 1959 for…its Wide Track? I’m not exactly sure what else would have distinguished the Pontiacs from the rest of GM’s wild winged wonders that year. Meanwhile, in Great Britain, its polar opposite made quite a little splash. The Mini (actually called Austin Seven and Morris Mini-Minor initially) pretty much set a template for the modern small car, even if it was a size too small for the heart of the market. Needless to say, it made almost no immediate direct impact on the US market, although eventually its basic format (transverse engine FWD) would be adopted almost universally. Let’s see, what lasting impact did the ’59 Pontiac make? Well, along with the rest of the ’59 GM line they did introduce the low-set headlight front end, which was universally adopted too, and a lot faster than the transverse FWD configuration.
Let’s see, one car was the spark of a blast that radically changed the American car twenty years later. It proved the transverse FWD sedan in the mass market, which led directly to the massive switch to that layout at GM, Chrysler and Ford in the 1980s.
The other car had its wheels set a little further apart.
The Mercedes-Benz W110/111/112 “Fintail” is the only other vehicle I could think of that had a really long-lasting impact on the market. It’s the car that introduced to the American public the idea of buying a top-dollar luxury sedan from Germany, instead of sleepwalking to the Cadillac dealership. This notion has become rather well-established in the high end market.
I’m also betting Paul will push for the Corvair to be the CCOTY for 1960 on the grounds of being so influential to automotive styling around the world.
Wrong year – the W110 came out in 1961
I had a 1960 220S sedan with the “fin tail” body.
Well I was kind-of right, or at least not completely incorrect – the 190 W110 was 1961 but of course the 220 W111 was 1959. I blame the esoteric M-B nomenclature (or my sloppy so-called “research”!) This is a car I missed when scanning for CCOTY candidates. Incidentally, wikipedia lists two assembly plants for the Finnie – Stuttgart of course and Port Melbourne, Australia. I would need to check but I expect it was in the factory that ended up producing Toyotas.
Was ’59 the first year for the split grill Pontiac? If so, it was the first of a trademark Pontiac design cue that lasted until it’s death 50+ years later.
Does this one count?
So many forget that Pontiac existed since 1926 as just a ‘step up car’ from Chevy on the way to Olds, Buick or Caddy. Weren’t always ‘muscle cars’.
Technically, Pontiac was the companion make for Oakland, which didn’t survive the Great Depression, but the point remains. A lot of pre-V8 Pontiacs were quite stolid.
One dictionary defines “stolid”, as derived from the Latin “stolidus”, as “inert, dull, stupid”. Pre-V8 Pontiacs may have been dull, but they weren’t inert, at least until they put a bunch of miles on. Is it possible that they were stupid?
I guess so…as does the ’40 Lincoln. I rather like the design execution on the pic shown, too bad it didn’t stick around for their immediate post-war cars.
so…a shot at Pontiac or a shot at Motor Trend…hard to tell here.
I’ll vote for the Pontiac(s), if only because the illustrations used to market them were so cool (even if they bent the truth a bit).
1959…hmmm…that’s a tough one for me. I WANT to nominate the 1959 Impala, but I can’t.
I’d have to say ALL the big three’s full-sizers, but ONLY in hardtop coupe or convertible trim, with Caddy being the elephant in the room.
OR…OR my buddy up the street’s 1959 Volvo PV544 – now THAT was a cool car!
I am still learning about the big 3 cars from this era, eg all the different GM chassis layouts, so I’ll just say that I agree with the exception that I don’t think I could live with the Olds wide-spread quad headlights. On the other hand the Edsel is so iconic I don’t really think of it as ugly.
Also with the different sedan rooflines the variety caters to a lot of tastes, the wagons look ok too. But then I’m used to cars of this era being sedans and not coupes or convertibles, so I suppose I’m not so bothered by the presence of a B pillar!
The wide spread quad headlights is what ruins the 59 and many other Olds, gives it that “shifty eyes” look to me.
I vote Mini. 59 was the peak year of the British Motorcycle Industry, and if the Mini’s birth is any indication it was the peak of the Auto Industry as well. Nowhere to go from here, but down, down down.
Besides, here in Canada we had lots of Minis, although they didn’t like deep snow and succumbed to rust quickly and spectacularly. I’ve never ridden in one, but I do enjoy watching them vintage race at Mosport.
Pontiac for 59? Remember the Canada-spec Pontiacs rode on Chevy frames, so they weren’t even Wide-Track here.
No contest really. Many folk think the Mini was car-of-the-century. Some of the engineering solutions it used were less than elegant ( like the crude joint between the exhaust downpipe and manifold ) but it pioneered the transverse engine and the constant velocity driveshaft joint, which changed motoring forever. The fact that it became ubiquitous , appealing to entry-level buyers, sportscar buyers, and even the “upper-crust” , was a real surprise.
ACK!!!! That manifold clamp…. much like the clamp on a Ford tractor http://www.stevenstractor.com/parts/ford-1939-1964/9n-2n-8n/exhaust/muffler-clamp-kit.html
but sheet metal with sharp edges. It had the two FINE THREAD bolts with nuts and lock washers. There was only room for one hand in the ~2″ between the manifold and firewall. To fit the whole thing together, with the asbestos sealing washer, one bolt had to have the nut barely threaded on the end of the bolt and the other had to be installed and threaded on. Oh, the one hand had to hold the whole thing together whilst starting the one nut. Don’t forget the lock washer…
I’m not a fan of those cars.
I absolutely know your pain, having driven Allegros that 20 years later still used that infernal clamp! It would last maybe two tanks of fuel before leaking again no matter what you did. The secret to getting a seal that might last four tanks was to put a jack under the exhaust pipe to crush it tightly against the manifold while clamping.
Photo below, non-wide track Pontiac
The wide track Warren designed body on the narrower X chassis. Parisienne??
Well I had the same thoughts as I did for 58. Could not think of a good candidate. I think your mini is an excellent choice. Certainly better than the corvair which, as much as I do like it, is the american beetle in my mind. Styling alone doesn’t cut it. If it did you could select a kit car.
I like the mini. It has to float to the top even if you considered the whole era. A vw of any year would be second choice. For 1959 alone – I’ll buy into your premise.
My vote is for the Mini. That 1959 Pontiac illustration reminds me of an old MAD magazine parody in which someone drove a car that pretty much looked like a 1959 Pontiac, but with three headlights per side instead of just two. The late fifties in America was a time when reality and parody were sometimes indistinguishable from each other.
It’s gotta be the Mini. Not just for the design influence (transverse FWD etc) … while the Pontiac certainly made a big splash in the US (at least the marketing of Wide Track), the Mini was a much bigger change for small British cars. I mean, who really cared about Triumph Mayflowers or Austin A36s?
And not just in the UK, it created the concept of a globally “cool” small car. Without the Mini, there’d be no “Italian Job”, or mini skirts (at least not by that name), or IPod or iPad Mini, let alone “new” Mini. And, with the Cooper and Cooper S follow-ons, it must have been the first really successful high-performance small car (yes I know there were Abarth-modified Fiat 600’s first, but that was more of a niche … Mini winning the Monte Carlo Rally was world news).
Have you seen this missing scene from The Italian Job? (The original of course.) Minis and Alfas – so graceful!
While I might buy the mini skirt wouldn’t have been called the mini skirt I don’t think that if the car didn’t exist the iPod wouldn’t have been invented. Certainly we wouldn’t have the “new” (not so) Mini which wouldn’t be a bad thing.
Ironically, the Mini was not initially really called that: the Austin version was the Seven, the Morris the Mini-Minor to associate it with the popular (and also Issigonis-developed) Morris Minor. They had some difficulty with Sharp’s Commercials (later renamed Bond), which was already using the “mini” name for their three-wheelers.
I was referring to the ubiquitous colloquial use of the term “mini”; of course the short skirt and Apple music player would have happened anyway. As for the actual model name, was the Austin version the “Seven” or the “Se7en”?
It was frequently stylized “Se7en,” but that’s sort of like smart and MINI…
So many beautiful GM cars in ’59, but Pontiac isn’t one of them in my opinion. 1959 is my favorite year for Buick, Chevy, Corvette, and Cadillac. I couldn’t choose a CCOTY between even just those cars. The Mini? The drivetrain layout may have pointed to the future, but I couldn’t imagine owning a car any smaller than my 1984 VW Rabbit was, so I’m going to have to disagree on that one.
I looked up the specs of the two: the Rabbit was 8″ wider and 2″ taller than the Mini, and the difference in wheelbase was 14″. I may have been more comfortable if I removed the drivers seat and driven the Mini from the back, and I could have adjusted the passenger window without fully outstretching my arm.
I’m not being facetious about that last point either — I just measured from my left shoulder to the tip of my right hand, and it’s longer than the Mini is wide. These were ridiculously small cars.
I agree the 59 Buick is one of my favorites from the brand too as are the Chevy and Caddy definitely much more desirable than the Poncho, though I’d take the Poncho over the Olds.
“I’d take the Poncho over the Olds.”
PrincipalDan is going to hate you for that remark.
How tall are you? It’s worth noting that people are taller/larger now than they were in 1959, and Brits were smaller then (& probably now) than Americans.
While the very tall may struggle, space in the Mini is not as bad as the external dimensions indicate. The cabin comprises 80% of the length of the car, and while it is low, the seats are also set low. Width – it only accommodates 2 people and is more than 2/3 the width of a ‘normal’ car, not too much of an issue.
After a quick search I found some interior dimensions
Front headroom: 37.5 in / 952 mm
Front legroom: 43.5 in / 1105 mm
Front shoulder room: 45.5 in / 1156 mm
Rear headroom: 34.5 in / 876 mm
Rear legroom: 38.5 in / 978 mm
Rear shoulder room: 41 in / 1041 mm
Trunk cap. claimed: 5.5 cu ft / 150L
ps, I do not call myself a fan of the Mini
I give the 59 Pontiac its due, because it was the only GM division that couldn’t stand putting that big new body on the old 1958 chassis. 59 GM’s were bizarre enough without adding that two foot space between the edge of the wheel well and the tire. They look like like elephants wearing baby shoes. Not sure if it were DeLorean or Knudsen, but someone at Pontiac exhibited good taste with the Wide Track when there wasn’t much floating around.
I’ll go for the Pontiac. At least you could screw in the back seat with a modicum of comfort, something not possible in the Mini.
That’s why BMC made the mock-tudor traveller.
Between the two I’d have to go with the Poncho. It set the trend that immediately followed of longer, lower, W I D E R. Yes the majority of cars eventually went FWD and of the majority of those they went transverse too but that was some time off. The only car to follow in it’s drivetrain layout fully is the Honda 600 and it’s similar models. Everyone else divorced the transmission from the engine.
Of my own choosing I’d have to go with the 59 Buick for it’s looks. Long term it also foretold the ways of GM in the future with the other GM brands being forced to use it’s windshield, roof and frt doors on 4dr versions driving the styling of the entire company. However that too didn’t not foretell the immediate future as GM quickly returned to less commonality between brands for a few more years before inventing true badge engineering.
I think the only real rival for the Mini is the ’59 Cadillac, the Mini’s diametric opposite.
The Pontiac’s main claims to fame are a stylistic point that even the Pontiac studio didn’t embrace right away (the split grille was dropped in 1960) and an advertising slogan. It’s a cool car, but it’s not a noteworthy car except in a very narrow sense. The ’59 Cadillac became the apex (or the nadir, if you prefer) of a whole school of American car design and is still one of the most recognizable icons of its era.
The significance of the Mini goes beyond the details of its powertrain, which as Eric points out wasn’t really directly imitated (except on the Mini’s many actual BMC derivatives, of course). It didn’t have MacPherson struts or a torsion beam, either, but the Mini is still the conceptual template for nearly every small car that followed: minimum exterior dimensions, maximum interior space, with a water-cooled front engine and suspension and powertrain designed to be as compact as possible. The Mini marked the beginning of the end of the rear-engine/RWD/air-cooled format that had been the standard for subcompact cars to that point; just about everybody eventually jumped on the new bandwagon.
Of course McPherson Struts are long gone as is the twist beam. Sure most vehicles have some type of strut system up front but the last we saw with a real McPherson strut suspension in the US was the first US Escort and Tempo. Not sure if any car sold outside of the US still uses a McPherson strut.
Huh? Nearly every B- and C- segment car (and an increasingly number of D-segment sedans) has MacPherson struts, and a huge number of European superminis have torsion beam rear axles.
(It is spelled MacPherson, named for Earle Steele MacPherson, the engineer who patented the original iterations in the 1940s.)
No they don’t, a true MacPherson Strut is a very specific design where the sway bar doubles as the fore-aft locating device for the lower control arm. Now cars have either a separate strut rod or an A or L lower control arm that self locates itself in the fore-aft plane.
Yes I am aware it was named after ES MacPherson, I just have a mental block having spent many of my early years in a town named McPherson. Here is the Patent application for his suspension invention. http://www.google.com/patents?id=QupNAAAAEBAJ&pg=PA1&dq=MacPherson+suspension+1949/&source=gbs_selected_pages&cad=2#v=onepage&q=MacPherson%20suspension%201949%2F&f=false Note Col 1 lines 19-25.
The Saturn S-series also had a “true” MacPherson strut setup.
Forgot about that one, just another example of how Saturn was outdated before it hit the lots.
“Outdated” is often a subjective catagory to put something in.
The how about non-competitive. Saturn bench marked certain cars when designing the true Saturn, the problem was that by the time they made it too market all those cars had moved on and had been re-done. The true MacPherson Strut suspension excels in only two areas #1 It’s cheap #2 it’s light. It’s not particularly suited for FWD either, being designed for a RWD vehicle. Putting the driving power through it results in a lot of shifting of the suspension. You’ll find that FWD vehicles that use it have some strange alignment specs to counter the effect of the suspension moving as power is applied.
Not going to get an argument from me…I think Saturn should never have been. Money better spent on Pontiac and Oldsmobile.
I don’t think the original S series gets the respect it deserves though. They were very competative i SCCA, pretty robust little cars and cheap to run/own.
I had 2 as beaters/commuters. Spent very little to keep them running and never gave me any real trouble.
Everything has its ideal application.
People are very quick to dump on GM here and the bias is often very obvious. Makes for good friendly discussion though.
I thing the real Saturn wasn’t a bad car. As you mentioned it was fairly robust and economical.
However it would have done better if they brought it to market sooner and were able to afford to updated it significantly sooner. Which they could have done if they hadn’t decided to make it the basis for a new brand, built a new plant and reached into the GM parts bin for items that GM was good at making and had been proven.
Indeed Saturns were great cars; great if you owned a garage, because they’d come in for major repairs right after the warranty was up. At about 120,000 km, they’d self destruct into a pile of smoking goo.
I forgot your ran a fleet of these as Taxi’s….no you were a service advisor at a Saturn repair shop? 🙂
No, that isn’t it…they were just something you didn’t like so there is a need to crap on them. (Wink Wink nudge nudge)
I’ll admit I have bias sometimes, but at least I admit to it. I don’t talk down every toyota or honda that is brought up here even though I don’t care for any of them and never have…
And so you don’t think I’m just taking a shot at you..I always enjoy your stories friend from the great white north.
Philhawk is right. Seems to me that most people who dump on Saturn never owned an S series. My family had wonderful experience with them. Also had mixed experience with saturn once they became Opels.
The 1959 model was a whole new direction for the Pontiac line, and the identity it presented (not only in its design but in the magazine ads, featuring paintings like the one shown) was a lot more enduring than those of the other GM divisions at the time. So, considered as a set of marketing decisions, Pontiac had the real success.
Pontiac was unusual in that, starting in 1958, it began to identify its fanciest model on the front of the car in lieu of the marque name, with “Bonneville” in or above the grille rather than the “Pontiac” seen on lesser models; later the Grand Prix and GTO (among others) would also receive this special treatment that presumably helped buyers feel special as well. If any other U.S. car company did such a thing, it was sporadic, whereas Pontiac consistently maintained this badging practice over a period of more than 15 years; I think the ’77 Bonnevilles reverted to “Pontiac” on the front of the hood.
I can see the point for both the Pontiac and the Mini. But you all know me by now – I just can’t stand to let things settle.
Any love for the Studebaker Lark? Admittedly, it was a low-buck hack job on an aging chassis, but it foreshadowed a trend that would begin in earnest 20 years later – an intelligently packaged car that was roomy on the inside and of minimal size on the outside. It was sort of the 49 Plymouth or 76 Volare for 1959 – only with more rust.
Don’t worry, everyone. Only five more years and there won’t be any more Studebakers for me to nominate. 🙂
A couple of other nominations from me also
– Jaguar Mark 2, an iconic car and for years the fastest racing sedan you could get
– Porsche 356, the foundation for Porsche ever since.
The Jag wasnt that fast and was outrun on NZ tracks by Humber80s the cousin to my Hillman Minx which I nominate just to be different, The Minx 3a was called the most beautiful car in the world by the press at the time. Mini no way greatest POS ever
What a year – the Mini & the Caddy sharing the same planet. 1959 may get the award for Biggest Transition since that large asteroid created the Caribbean.
I have some affection for the dinosaur, but I’d have to vote for the mammal (or at least the quirky little creature that eventually became a mammal).
the cadillac takes the cake, closely followed by the mad buick intro of electra and lesabre nameplates, best impala ever…hated the front of the olds, the pontiac looks good now, but then just weird./… ford was kool in 59…not lincoln…. nor the rest.
It simply has to be the Mini-Cooper; despite it’s problems it was the first front wheel drive automobile with a transverse mounted engine and set the pattern for future automobile design. The Pontiac? Frankly, it reminds me of that “58 Bulgemobile” parody that Bruce McCall did for National Lampoon in the 1970’s. That was some of Bruce’s best work, you really should do a retrospective of his work sometime on your web site.
You’ll have to wait a couple of years for the Cooper. John Cooper hadn’t been near BMC’s little Mini in 1959.
The majority of Minis weren’t Coopers, Cooper’s essentially a trim-level. It’s just the Mini. Referring to all of them as Mini-Coopers is like calling all compact Toyotas Corolla-GS, or all large Fords Taurus-SEL
I don’t think ’59 Pontiac is great because of the car but that it represented the beginning of the bright light that was the Pontiac division throughout the 60s.
FWD and a transverse engine from the Cooper? That formula flooding entire uninspiring model lineups for 30+ years was pretty much was the nail in the coffin for old GM and others who adopted the layout to that extent. With rare exceptions it instantly separates the real performance oriented cars from the cheap poseur performance badged cars. Best example, ironically, is the Wal-Mart BMW image Pontiac morphed into later on.
I’ll cast my vote for the Mini – it’s always been high on my mental list of cars I respect, without desiring.
I won’t repeat how ground breaking, inspired and influential a little car it was, as it’s been covered. I am surprised to see so many folk griping about how they wouldn’t fit in one though – clearly judging the book by its cover there as the original Mini is a tidy TARDIS of a car! Back when they were common sights on the road here it wasn’t at all unusual to see huge men unfolding themselves (admittedly implausibly) from the drivers’ seat… I’ve known plenty of Mini owners over the years and large or small they all seemed to enjoy being in them.
BMW’s MINI makes me sad each time I see one precisely because it’s so conventional and uninspiring… not to mention big on the outside and cramped on the inside.
I have to agree with you on the BMW Mini (I’m not using that “MINI” bs!). My wife is rather smitten with them, has been since the release, but I could care less. Even though her father raced them at Sports Car Club of America events when she was (very) young, I think that was the extent of her exposure to them. She hasn’t been in one in more than 40 years!
My exposure to them isn’t a whole lot better to be honest, but if BMW wanted to launch a whole line of FWD cars, why didn’t they just do it? Why re-animate the Mini name for something only Mini-shaped? The modern car doesn’t even come close to what the original was able to do. BMW doesn’t race it (any longer), and other than some absolutely ridiculous ’boutique’ versions, no real logical expansion of the Mini brand. I have more confidence that GM will do more with the recently-announced Opel Junior (racing, etc.) than BMW has done with the Mini.
Between the cars that are available in the US (Mini, Fiat 500, Chevy Spark, Smart Fortwo, Toyota (Scion) iQ), I think I’d go for either the Spark or the 500.
Is “Junior” what they’re calling the Adam over there? Far better name!
I hadn’t really thought about it before but I think one reason I like the reincarnated 500 is that FIAT used it to launch their cracking little two-cylinder “TwinAir” engines, which recapture the spirit of the original in a small way… as well as being a hoot to drive! The MINI on the other hand is just another FWD hatchback as you say.
…
oh and at the risk of seeming like a po-faced Brit:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uCUsPnKD1gk
😉
Hah! I agree with Mr Cleese! And also with your comment about the TwinAir engine recapturing a bit of the original 500.
@Splateagle: Over here, the initial reports called the Adam the Junior; it’s stuck in my brain and I can’t seem to get it out. I’m hoping we see them over here badged as a Buick, it would make a great competitor for the Mini and I would be highly interested. Over here, we’re not getting the Twin Air, at least not now. The original 500’s weren’t tremendously popular in the US, so we missed out on all of the ‘nostalgia’ about the car. With Fiat being gone 30+ years, the folks who are seeing the cars now are seeing something absolutely new to them.
BTW, I DO know the difference between caring less or not, I just like to say it that way to see who’s paying attention… You win! But I like John Cleese anyway and I am a bit of a semanticist. So you get a double win!
I’d have to go with the Bonneville, as my grandmother had a metallic lavender ’59 Catalina convertible with white interior. My Uncle Chris got it after she bought her ’65 T-Bird convertible. Both cars are fondly remembered!
I nominate the Mini, but would prefer to drive the Pontiac. The Mini was ground-breaking in so many ways, although my ex-British Leyland dealer mechanic Dad says they were hideous to work on (something about needing 30cm long and 0.5cm wide 8-jointed fingers to reach vital parts!). Friends had a ’73 Mini back in the ’90s, it was so much fun to drive. But I’m a big-car man, so would prefer the Pontiac any day, and would be happy knowing it it missed out on the CCOTY to the Mini.
1959? My vote goes for the Cadillac, the ultimate car to me, no doubt about it !!! But I can’t forget the “real” 1959 car, the always cute Mini (it’s not a legend, it may be tiny outside but the amount of room in the cabin really is surprising)…opposites attract themselves !