In my mind, clouds are analogous to dreams. I mean this not in the sense of what we see in our minds when we’re deep into slumber, but that to which we aspire or aim for. The phrase “head in the clouds” can have the negative connotation of one being out of touch with reality. I choose to view it as someone having an elevated perspective that’s not burdened by all of the constraints of logic. Grounded thinking is necessary, but so is imagination.
Clouds are big, floating masses of condensed, vaporized water that drift along overhead, changing their shape and patterns as they cross the sky. The sheer bulk of this 5,000-pound, triple-white 1978 Eldorado added to its impression of being like a road-going cloud when I had seen it parked in my neighborhood over sixteen years ago. It seemed apt that the sky was overcast on that day in late winter.
Seventy-eight was the final model year of this generation, and on display here is the end result of the classic, Detroit formula of lower-longer-wider having been consistently applied to Cadillac’s premier personal luxury coupe. Sitting on a wheelbase of 126.3 inches, this car stretched a gargantuan 224″ in length and was just under a truck-like 80″ wide. Its 425 cubic inch V8 provided 180 horses of motivation to its front drive wheels, the latter feature being one of its original selling points when the Eldorado nameplate had first been applied to a personal luxury coupe for ’67. Production for ’78 was just over 46,800 units, with a base price starting at around $12,400, which translates to about $61,900 in 2026, almost exactly five times the original figure.
The ’78 Eldorado may have been Cadillac’s largest, most opulent coupe, especially in Biarritz trim, but it wasn’t the most expensive non-limousine that GM’s luxury brand had offered that year. The Fleetwood Brougham cost about $440 more, and the smaller, European-sized Seville started at about $14,200, about $1,800 dearer. Still, the Eldo was a flashy, aspirational luxury coupe that while too garish for some, seemed to represent the ultimate end of ladling every possible idea of traditional, American luxury onto a two-door body. The nebulous size, the comfort and convenience extras, the sumptuous interior, acres of chrome trim, a padded vinyl roof, and other such features added up to an extra helping of everything.
Making a hard pivot, I have been a fan of the artistry of Canadian singer / songwriter Joni Mitchell for over half my life now. In fact, I’ve referenced her works in some of my previous essays here at CC. In the late ’90s and somewhat hampered by the cumbersome process of previewing album tracks on the excellent resource that is Allmusic.com through my dial-up internet service, I had discovered Mitchell’s Court and Spark album from 1974 and had purchased a new copy of it almost immediately afterward. It wasn’t just Mitchell’s introspective lyrics, the jazz-inflected chord progressions, or the slick sound of the hugely talented L.A. session players, but the combination of everything and more that was my introduction to her greatness and the start of my appreciation for the rest of her body of work.
In her original composition “Both Sides Now”, originally recorded in the most widely-known 1968 hit version made popular by Judy Collins (whose works I also appreciate), Mitchell had penned lyrics that detail the disappointment that follows when dreams don’t align with actual reality. Some sample lyrics:
Rows and flows of angel hair
And ice cream castles in the air
And feather canyons everywhere
I’ve looked at clouds that way
But now they only block the sun
They rain and snow on everyone
So many things I would’ve done
But clouds got in my way
I’ve looked at clouds from both sides now
From up and down, and still somehow
It’s cloud illusions, I recall
I really don’t know clouds at all
It’s hard for me to look at pictures of this Eldorado spotted on this bleak, overcast February day in 2010 and not think about how it might have represented, simultaneously, both the pinnacle and nadir of the personal luxury coupe craze. The size, weight, styling, fuel consumption, and general excesses of this car all represented the “more is more” ethos of the ’70s. What does one do when one finally learns or figures out firsthand that all the things that one has been chasing in pursuit of happiness, pleasure, or fulfillment do not provide them? Dreams die. Clouds evaporate. And if we’re fortunate, we’re not so broken and disillusioned by this that we can start to figure out what’s next for us, or a more fruitful place in which to put our hopes.
The next year’s ’79 Eldorado would shed just over a foot in wheelbase, twenty inches in length, almost eight and a half inches in width, and over 1,100 pounds in base curb weight. The base engine would also be downsized to a 170-hp 350 V8 which, combined with the new E-body’s drastic weight reduction, provided much better performance and fuel economy. Its more restrained styling was also seen by many as a stylistic move forward.
Is it such a bad thing then, sometimes, when some aspect of our lives or thing to which we had once aspired turns out to be exposed for the ultimately unsatisfying thing that it actually is? I do believe that our perceptions and expectations of things, people, and experiences can help shape whether they’re good or bad for us. Stated another way, I think that wanting the biggest, most luxurious coupe with everything on it – or a big collection of toys, a passport full of stamps, or garage full of exotics – doesn’t have to be problematic. The difference is in whether pursuit of those things rules one’s life. Bigger and more can be fun… until it isn’t. Just ask this recovering alcoholic.
As for this tarnished cloud of an Eldorado, in a best-case scenario it had long been recycled into like-colored appliances years ago. Such is sometimes the case with the things we once thought we wanted. I suppose the key is to have an open mind and to choose to be optimistic when some ideals die… and others replace them. There will always be more clouds against which to cast our daydreams. Maybe the trick is in appreciating them for what they are.
Edgewater, Chicago, Illinois.
Sunday, February 21, 2010.
The factory brochure pages were sourced from www.oldcarbrochures.org.
My first close encounter with a ’76 or ’77 Eldorado was at the Disney World Magic Kingdom parade one night, where they were giving one away in some sort of contest or fund raiser. It was nighttime but illuminated. I peered inside the opera window and imagined how posh and comfortable travel would be back there; it was so much fancier than the old station wagon I was used to.
Pricing the ’70s Seville above the Eldorado and even the Fleetwood Brougham is one of the most audacious things GM has ever done.
Judy Collins had a knack for discovering great songs that their writers hadn’t yet even released themselves. Not only was her rendition of “Both Sides, Now” released before Joni’s own version, but also its B side, “Who Knows Where the Time Goes” by Sandy Denny, was another spectacularly great song that was released before Denny’s take on her own composition. And if that’s not enough, Judy Collins was also the first to record and issue Leonard Cohen’s “Suzanne”, which for decades was his most popular and most covered song, although “Hallelujah” has since surpassed it.
The song “Ice Cream Castles” by The Time (and the similarly-named album its from) is a reference to the “Both Sides, Now” lyric.
Sandy Denny has been a relatively new discovery to me, but when I found a used copy of “Sandy” on CD for cheap, I immediately became a fan. I also read that Mitchell (at least initially) wasn’t a big fan of Collins’ interpretation of “Both Sides Now”. I have heard a later recording of the song by Mitchell, with her husky voice providing a very different take on her own poignant song.
As for your memory of seeing that prize Eldorado at night, I have always found something thrilling about car travel at night – and by extension, I suppose, the interior of a car when it’s dark out.
I like night driving/riding too, especially in certain cars whose dashboards look really cool lit up at night. The early-’60s Chryslers with “astradome” instrument panels with electroluminescent blue-green lighting, or late-90s – 2010ish Audis and VWs that glow red at night, are my faves. Illuminated gauges/buttons/knobs yet another thing that’s being replaced by screens…
A very meaningful commentary as per usual, and a fascinating example to base it on. Nice to start the day with something of significance to think about. Only on CC would it be based on an auto analogy!!
Thank you so much, Randerson.
I recall back in the day that these seemed somewhat rare, or at least that was my perception. I took particular note of the fact that they were front wheel drive, which made them seem sort of exotic to me…and made my American car-obsessed uncles regard them with some level of suspicion. Although I have no actual idea what they were suspicious of.
Both Sides Now, the Judy Collins version, was part of the memorable soundtrack of the summer of 1968 to me. That was one of the summers where my family took the long drive from Maryland to Maine (seeing family and my two Monkees-obsessed cousins at the trip midpoint)…and I must have heard that song dozens of times on the Plymouth’s AM radio along the 1600 mile round-trip.
I still like the song, although prefer the more sparse Joni Mitchell version. Great analysis of what it’s about, Joe.
It’s amazing how hearing a once popular song (or version of a song) can bring us right back to when we remember having heard it. There’s also something about hearing the AM radio, with its static and lack of definition (is that the word) through the two dashboard-mounted car speakers.
I do like the later Mitchell recording, but the Collins one is the one I think of when thinking of the song.
Our hopes and aspirations do not develop in a vacuum, they are planted in our minds by our environment. We are ‘socialized” into wanting what the people around us have educated us to want.
As consumers, the auto buying public was trained to accept what was familiar, and what was produced by our domestic manufacturers. They built what they built, and we bought what they built. The idea of longer, lower and wider being the ideal that was promoted by Detroit and most American consumers accepted that as an ideal.. for a time. After being exposed to non domestic products the consumer found that they had a choice, and many chose something else.
All that is to ask the question; did we really want cars like that? Or did we want them because that was what was offered and marketed to us? Most of us were never going to be shopping for an ElDorado, but the same type of thing had happened to most cars during the ’60’s and ’70’s. They just kept on getting bigger.
I have always found the ’67 Eldo to be very attractive and desirable, and it’s not really much smaller than the featured car. These have always struck me as being bloated and over the top, and not desirable at all. Sometimes too much is just too much.
Love this. Which came first: the chicken or the egg? What consumers actually wanted, or what automakers and their marketing teams told buyers they wanted?
It’s always surprising to me to read that the gorgeous ’67 isn’t all that much larger than the car in this essay. That ’67 is still one of the most beautiful GM cars of the ’60s, in my opinion.
Eldorados of this generation were and are cool cars…I love cruising in my 75 Eldorado convertible, just kinda floats along and never fails to get a thumbs up from other drivers…
That’s excellent. I agree that they definitely have cachet in 2026, just by their sheer size and gusto. I’d be one of those people waving or giving you a thumbs-up, for sure!
I had a 1976 with the 500. It was a great car for Boston winters. Bule with a white top and interior. Got creamed while it was parked. I replaced it with a 1977 which had the 425 and an 8-track so I bought a tape for it.
Of course it was Joni Mitchell.
Awesome – Joni Mitchell is the best.
What a great memory filled evocative Article. Thank you.
Thank you, Peter.
There is something pathetic about seeing what was once a high-end luxury car fallen on hard times, like this. The front end may not look bad, apart from the occasional stone chip; but then that front end is largely plated metal anyway. When you show us the sides, that is when the damage is obvious. The tides of time have done their worst. This is especially poignant in the shot of the driver’s door, arguably what should be the most welcoming part of the vehicle; against the background of white paint, and white vinyl from the top, the opera window, and what I assume is an opera light, there is that horrible contrast of the reddish-brown rust – and so much of it.
Prestige is such a transitory thing.
It’s made all the worse in my eyes by the thick chrome-and-aluminium-look band of Biarritz trim under the side windows. Not just an Eldorado: someone spent up big to purchase this car once, but somewhere along the way it has devolved to being not just uncared for, but so uncared for that it has fallen to this state.
Yet despite this devolution in status, it endures. Against the tides of time, it stands.
(Not to take away from Joni Mitchell in the least, but this song from Epica seems appropriate.)
Peter, your musical references are always on-point – thank you! I have never heard of Epica, but this song is gorgeous.
It also sounds like you nailed the pathos from which I had originally photographed this car over sixteen years ago and wrote about it and scheduled this post a month ago. It’s not just some beater Caprice – this was once a prestigious luxury car that may even have been garaged. By the time of these pictures, it was 32 years old and looking like this.
Prestige is, indeed, a transitory thing.
I have always been saddened by once-luxury items languishing unappreciated and uncared-for. You wonder what happened to tip this car from being somebody’s treasured, washed and polished pride and joy – to this. Sometimes in my mind I think up a back-story; sometimes I write it down. Other times I just ‘let it go through to the keeper’ and pass on to happier things.
(Epica is a symphonic metal band that usually has a much heavier sound; for this concert they were more or less ‘unplugged’, with pretty much just the orchestra, leaving Simone’s voice to star. I was listening to them last night, so the song was fresh in my mind.)
One minor point: The 1978 Eldorado had only 180 hp. From 1975 to 1977, you could order Bendix electronic fuel injection on the Eldorado, which gave the 425 195 hp. However, contemporary sources, including the Cadillac brochures, indicate that the injected engine was no longer available on the Eldorado for 1978, although you could still get it on the De Ville.
I think this was to make sure Cadillac didn’t end up with a shortfall of fuel injection systems for the Seville, which was selling very well. Eldorado buyers don’t seem to have been that interested in fuel injection (it was really expensive and didn’t make a dramatic difference in performance), but they were probably more likely than De Ville buyers to order their cars “with everything.”
Fixed it, thank you.
Beautiful as always, Joseph. As ridiculous as these cars were, I’ll always have a soft spot for them because my step-grandfather, a diehard Cadillac man, had a pretty blue ’75 (like this one https://www.curbsideclassic.com/blog/cc-cohort/cohort-classic-1975-or-1976-cadillac-eldorado-frozen-in-1953-think/) one trip when we visited him and my grandmother in South Beach. He never had any of his Cadillacs long because he kept totaling them, but that’s one that stands out in my mind. Of course, he loved cars and always took me around to local dealers to collect brochures, so anything related to him stands out in my mind.
Thank you, Adam. I really like the idea of South Beach, with its gorgeous art deco-styled excesses being the backdrop against which you remember your grandparents’ / step-grandfather’s same-generation Eldorado.
South Beach is one place I’ve been where I wish I hadn’t been on a hiatus from taking pictures at that point in my life. I’d like to go back.
I’d like to think you’ve kept at least a couple of your favorites of those brochures.
Very profound Mr. Dennis .
I prefer little vehicles but grew up with land barges like these that IMO truly were the best America could make .
Nice to see this one still going, battered a bit but not bowed, I know I could spiffy that paint up to a glossy shine .
-Nate