(first posted 3/28/2016) It is to this car-spotter’s advantage that North Sheridan Road in Chicago’s north side can move slowly during warm, languid summer afternoons. If you aren’t in a hurry to get anywhere, it can be fun to walk down the sidewalk or ride the 151 or 147 CTA bus and count the classic cars in traffic. North Sheridan runs roughly parallel to Lake Michigan, and for many who live in the neighborhoods of Edgewater or Rogers Park (or further north), it’s the quickest route to get to Lake Shore Drive, which is basically four lanes of expressway-like travel into downtown. It was on one, such Saturday afternoon after grocery shopping when I spotted this brown, bovine beauty inching forward in traffic like an animal that had found itself lost in the city and was just going along with the herd. And what a beautiful brute it was.
Oldsmobile produced just over 16,000 of these Custom Cruiser wagons for model year 1975 (just 2.5% of total Olds production that year), in both two- and three-row configurations, with or without DiNoc. The wagons came standard with Olds’ 455 c.i. big-block V8 which produced 195 hp, mated with GM’s ubiquitous three-speed TurboHydramatic transmission. The dry weight of the most basic Custom Cruiser was just over two-and-a-half tons. The heaviest ’75 Custom Cruiser, at nearly 5,200 lbs., weighed only 200 lbs. less than the lightest 2016 Chevy Tahoe – a difference of roughly 3.5%. That’s mindblowing to me, especially considering the new Tahoe’s weight includes a host of safety features and equipment now required by the federal government.
The new Tahoe is undeniably a large vehicle, but the Custom Cruiser appears to my eyes to have more visual bulk – stretched long, low and wide, based on GM’s largest full-size, B-Body platform ever offered and riding on a 127″ wheelbase. Part of the reason the current Tahoe looks lighter than this Olds to me could be due to its linear styling, versus the Olds’ complex shapes and curves…but what curves and character lines this zaftig Custom Cruiser has! This Oldsmobile is a visual feast, with heavily sculpted bodysides, wraparound glass, and cathedral-shaped taillights. When’s the last time you saw one of these in person that wasn’t at a car show or in a demolition derby?
Sadly, I bore witness to the destruction of a GM “clamshell” wagon (so nicknamed for the rear tailgate, which slid completely out of sight under the body of the car, with a turn of the key) at a demolition derby in Michigan, when I was maybe twelve or thirteen. The car in the ring wasn’t an Olds – it was a Chevy, if I recall correctly, but this was the mid-1980’s, and none of the other cars in the arena could hold a candle to that B-Body behemoth. I grew up watching shows that featured spectacular car crashes (“CHiPs”, “The Dukes Of Hazzard”), and lived to watch that stuff on television. Somehow, in person, the thrill of victory had felt more like the agony of defeat, as I watched the battered clamshell Chevy – once a clean, straight-bodied beast – moan loudly through its busted exhaust as it limped around the ring after winning its title at the Genesee County Fair before very inevitably heading to the crusher. As if witnessing the implosion of an old, once-grand building, I felt an inner emptiness after this experience that left me utterly confused. I was supposed to have liked this.
Our featured car is a true survivor – an automobile that was rare, even when new. Lansing’s GM division produced almost twice as many Starfires in ’75 than full-size wagons. Looking at this car, I had many questions I wanted to ask the driver. How did you come to acquire this fine specimen? How many owners? Miles? Years since you’ve owned it? May I sit in it? Will you lift the hood? What did you do with the fender skirts? Oh, and yes…as is obvious from the pictures, the fender skirts were missing. I’m not going to lie – I don’t dislike the look of this car sans fender skirts, but I hope that they’re in the garage somewhere for safe keeping. Sadly, I had two arms loaded with grocery bags when I spotted this Olds wagon coming southbound. While I could sense the driver had noticed me taking pictures after quickly setting my grocery bags down, there was no time for an in-depth interview. I shouted, “Nice car!” to him, and he waved back. Sometimes, that’s all you get, especially when folks have places to go.
“It’s a good feeling to have an Olds around you,” states this page out of the ’75 brochure. The phrase of having an Olds like this “around you” is like saying a yacht or a tank or a swimming pool sits “around you”. Just read the text outlining its features: “semi-transparent” woodgrain vinyl applique, front-facing third-row seats, and a storage compartment hidden beneath the cargo floor in the “wayback”. This was heady, heavily-engineered stuff, even for this era of GM overkill. For all of the technological and creature comfort wonders outlined in the brochure, I’m most curious as to what kind of trouble the smirking kid in the navy blazer in the upper right got into before, during and after this photo shoot. Doesn’t he just look like trouble? He’d be the one I wouldn’t let sit in the wayback for fear of him making gestures at passengers of other cars. But I digress.
I’m glad this big ‘Cruiser, as of last summer, had yet escaped the fate of the demolition derby at the hands of some unappreciative yahoo. Large and in charge, this Olds glided with stature and grace down the main boulevard of an area that had been, up until the dawn of the 1950’s, the playground of the wealthy. North Sheridan Road is now lined with high-rise condominiums, mid-rise four-plus-one rental apartments, and a handful of private residences. It’s noteworthy that the high-rise featured in the opening credits of “The Bob Newhart Show”, where Bob and Emily Hartley had fictionally lived, is two blocks south of where I photographed this car (which would have been new when that show was in first-run). Thank you, Mr. Olds Driver, for giving me my Nineteen-Seventies fix for the day. Please keep this classic, American station wagon running, keep it pretty, and keep it looking as loved and appreciated as it did on this day.
Edgewater, Chicago, Illinois.
Saturday, June 6, 2015.
Related reading:
- From Woodgraincoasty: COAL: 1971 Oldsmobile Custom Cruiser – The Ultimate Wagon Of A Lifetime;
- From Paul Niedermeyer: Curbside Classic: 1975 Buick Estate Wagon – The Ultimate American Station Wagon;
- From Tom Klockau: eBay Classic: 1975 Pontiac Catalina Safari – A Lot To Love!; and
- Another great eBay find from Perry Shoar: Ebay Find: 1975 Chevrolet Bel Air Wagon – Economy-Sized Economy.
This is such a cool car. I lust for one of these the same ways as many guys lust for a Lambo, a Ferrari or a 911….
And it’s heartbreaking to read about these cars being destroyed in demolition derby-type events… this kind of behavior should be punishable by law.
I don’t even want to talk about cash for clunkers. Makes me want to cry.
Wouldn’t have been eligible. Nor would most of our malaise loves.
Not for the federal C4C program, but there were quite a few state-level programs, usually funded by one or another oil company to avoid having to clean up their own pollution, and these gobbled up quite a few ’60s-’70s cars.
CfC was a disaster on multiple levels. Of course, some of Those People loved it as it was Social Engineering, Socialism, Handouts, Wealth Transfer, Corporate Welfare, Crazy Environmentalism, and Big Government rolled into one expensive boondoggle. Pay attention–there’s folks calling for another round of that mess; and I don’t doubt that Goofy Pete would fully support it, like he’s bought-into “Zero Vision”; the only Government program that exists specifically because it’s TOTALLY IMPOSSIBLE. (The utter, inevitable, and predictable failure of Zero Vision is exactly the excuse needed to requisition MORE money, MORE restrictions, MORE regulation…and that’s how you grow Big Government. Thanks, Petey.)
Demo Derbies I find personally reprehensible, but at least it’s not costing me anything in taxes. They’re a waste of vehicles that could be resuscitated for the Economically Disadvantaged, (or me) or used as parts-donors for other vehicles. Any kind of waste is undesirable. But “That’s Entertainment”.
A couple of decades ago, I bought a small stash of Big-Block engines of various brands. Seemed like most of them were take-outs from cars purchased by the current owners expressly for Demo-Derby use. The 455/454/Turbo 400 came out, some version of Chevy 350/TH350 went in, and “off to the races”.
I love how you add a little local flavour in your articles. Where a car resides is an integral part of a Curbside Classic’s story.
These Clamshell wagons are beautiful beasts. I’ve only ever seen one in the metal, here in Brisbane actually. There was a pizza place that had some kind of crypt theme – no, I don’t really understand either – and for their company vehicle they had a very effective moving billboard: a 1974 Chevrolet clamshell wagon painted in black with a coffin in the back. With petrol prices higher here than in the States, it must have been very expensive to fill up. But these make the contemporary Ford wagons look utterly dull and the Mopars just a tad ungainly.
Theres a 75 Chevy clamshell doing hearse duty in my suburb, its mint.
+1. Beside cars I love maps, I love atlases, and I very much love the fact that CC covers several continents. Somehow i feel it is important to know exactly where a particular car has been spotted and how it relates to its environment. Sometimes a car seems to fit right in, sometimes it looks exotic or out of place (which begs the exciting question How on Earth did it get there in the first place?). It’s all part of the story.
And, yes, this is an absolutely fantastic wagon. I can’t help liking these products of what Joseph calls the era of GM overkill. They’re like a swan’s song, as if GM engineers went “OK, we know there’s an oil shortage and we’ll have to be reasonable and start downsizing and everything, but let’s do it one last time, let’s do a farewell tour”. It’s just great.
That’s awesome. I too am always filtering through the intended messages of articles, movies or TV shows to get a sense of the “flavor” of the place where they’re filmed or where the story takes place. I realized the other day while watching some reruns on Investigation Discovery (fondly referred to as “The Murder Channel” in my house) that I knew where every gruesome crime took place and remembered my impression of the locale from watching previously, but I’d totally forgotten how the stories turned out. Guess some of us are just wired to have certain interests, be they cars, geography, sociology, etc.
Tell me about it, I can’t bring myself to throw away my first Rand McNally road atlas (bought 1985 in Montreal :-)!
I groan in horror when I see such classics as Ford Granadas’, Jaguar Mk I’s, 1980s’ BMWs five and seven series and Mercedes W124 featured in movie car chases. You just know they will be wrecked at some point during the film; and they generally are.
Safe to presume that it will be Audis’ that will be getting it in the years to come; no loss there in my opinion!
Pretty sure the last regular use Olds clamshell wagon I saw was about a decade ago. A customer at the local hobby shop had one that he used to haul large radio controlled planes around in.
I never see Clamshell wagons anymore! The last one I saw was years ago and it was not in nice shape! But it was an unusual Canadian model.
A Laurentian.
I love the name “Laurentian” (it has such gravitas), and I really dig the script font of the fender-mounted badge. Très bien!
Is it pronounced “Lauren-T-ian” or “Laur-ench-an”? Never actually heard it spoken.
It is pronounced “It”. 🙂
BOOOO! 🙂
(and, thanks, Joseph)
(LOL ^) CJC, I just assumed it was pronounced the second way.
I always called it “Laur-ench-an”. The T would be blend with the ‘i’ en francais the make the ‘ch’ sound.
Mmmm…that would depend on who’s speaking what kind of French where. Parisian French would have this name pronounced “lo-ra(nh)-tyaa(nh)“, where (nh) is French’s rear nasal-glottal “n”. Canadian French and Canadian Franglais might do it differently.
Growing up my next door neighbors had a 1975 Custom Cruiser, navy blue, no woodgrain, lighter blue interior. The thing was H UG E. It made my family’s 1974 Coupe de Ville look small.
I remember the car road very nice and had a good amount of power for such a huge car. The first time I saw the clam shell open, I was like, “WOW look at that!”. That was the coolest thing I ever saw.
The Custom Cruiser served my neighbors well, as they had the car a good 10 years. I don’t recall them ever having any major problems with it.
Have always had a thing for massive wagons. Growing up in the eighties and nineties, none of my friends or family could understand why I would be excited by these behemoths. They just looked to me like something that was transported from an alternate reality. In a way, that is pretty accurate.
Such a beautiful survivor! The 1971-76 B-body wagons are probably among the most distinctive full-size wagons post-1960s, and the pre-1976 Custom Cruiser in particular had the best styling. A refrigerator-box Tahoe doesn’t hold a candle to this design!
The Cruiser’s particular fender skirts undeniably added a whole extra dose of character, but I actually think I prefer the look without them. Thanks for sharing Joseph!
Thanks, Brendan! And I share your preference for the pre-’76 models with their round headlights. This may echo something you might have already said (I’m thinking of your great ’77 Buick Regal Landau post from last summer), but there’s something questionable about restyles that put rectangular headlights on cars that were designed for the round units. Sometimes it works, but more often times it doesn’t.
During my high school years, a close friend’s dad had one of these, a copper 75 with no woodgrain. Massive. They bought it used and kept it until they could no longer afford to feed it around 1981 or so. If someone told me that I would have to pick a 1971-76 GM B or C body car to drive, it would be one of these Custom Cruisers.
A visual feast, indeed! The color of this particular car really complements its curves — and (though I love woodgrain), the lack of wood helps in that regard too.
I’m surprised that just 16,000 were made — I never thought about the production numbers of these cars before, but I guess the vast majority of Olds wagons were the B-body Vista Cruisers instead.
1974-75 was a nasty recession that followed on the heels of the 1973 oil embargo, that had caused gas prices to jump substantially from what they had been just a few years before. Big expensive cars (especially those that swilled fuel like no tomorrow) were not great sellers in 1974-75. I would not doubt that these recovered some for their final year in 1976 when the big stuff started selling again.
I believe Vista Cruisers were stretched A bodies and ended in ’72. There wasn’t a B body Olds wagon in the late 60s until this one in ’71. Buick had a one-year-only B body Estate Wagon in ’70, which was a weird decision.
This Olds demonstrates why I never could quite feel the love for the downsized ’77-’90 B-body wagons. For starters, the clamshells had a unique look for each of the four GM divisions – the Custom Cruiser has distinctive Olds sheetmetal with character lines shared with the sedans. The cathedral taillamps are shaped completely differently than Chevy’s concave rectangular rear lights. I think only the roof and tailgates are shared. From 1977 onwards, all four divisions shared front and rear fenders, doors, and taillight surrounds (the exception being the ’77-’79 Buicks which used Buick front fenders because they wanted the portholes; an awkward stuck-on panel near the rearview mirror helped them mate with the Chevy/Pontiac front door). The overall look is flowing and elegant, nothing like the boxy shape that would replace it.
Nor did the downsized successor have anything like the clamshell’s roominess. The ’71-’76 cargo hold was much larger than the ’77’s even by GM’s measurements, despite the curved track for the rear window reducing the height of the tailgate opening. The front and 2nd-row seating areas were wider. And the 3rd row, rather than the rear-facing seat the downsized wagons got, faced forward.
I frequently rode in a Custom Cruiser of this generation, not sure which year, because it was in the rotation of carpool wagons when I was in elementary school. Depending on whose parents were driving that day, my ride to and from school was in a ’66 Ford Country Squire with side-facing 3rd-row seats, a ’66 Dodge Polara with no 3rd row, a late-’60s wagon I can’t recall but had a rear-facing seat, and this Custom Cruiser, blue inside and out. It felt so much newer and more luxurious than the others, with soft vinyl seats and lots of wood paneling inside. I remember the heating/AC controls at the far left of the dash, which didn’t allow passenger to veto the temperature selection. I never managed to snag a ride in the forward-facing 3rd row unfortunately, which is where all the kids preferred to be seated. Many kids back then were often forced to ride cross-legged in the “way back” of 2-row wagons back then; fortunately I was never involved in a collision when thus seated.
I took my wife to the hospital to have our first child in a VW Bug. Picked her up in a ’72 Buick Roadmonster Estate Wagon. Not just in comparison to the Bug, but to just about any other car on the road, it was HUGE! 5,300 pounds, according to the registration. It ran on ambulance tires. Best mileage I ever got in it was 13 over the highway. I worked a mile from home. If I only drove it to work and home for lunch, in the dead of winter, it got 2 mpg becaue the choke never came off. Think of it; 4 miles a day and I filled it up (a full tank was 26 gallons) in less than two weeks. When the gas crisis hit, it hit me in the wallet really hard. Installing an accessory vacuum gauge didn’t help a lot.
I bought it because instead of taking everything we needed for the kid in the Bug, we could take everything we had for the kid in the Buick. When I sold it in 1980, I continued to see it around town for at least another five years. I could tell it was my ex-car because of that vacuum gauge. It had its share of mechanical troubles, but that clamshell tailgate worked flawlessly the whole time I owned it.
I learned to drive in a 1972 Buick Estate wagon.Crystal blue with a 455 4bbl engine…It was my Dad’s first car with A/C. We had it for 6 years. We called it the hearse or the BU-hog. Living in Buffalo the salt got to it and within 4 years holes had developed in the front fenders behind the wheels.
My Dad replaced it with a 1978 Estate Wagon with the Olds 403….a superior car in every way. Much quieter, gorgeous interior with the brushed chrome bezels on all the instruments, better fuel economy and quicker too.
“based on GM’s largest full-size, B-Body platform ever offered and riding on a 124″ wheelbase.”
This wagon, along with all 1971-76 B-O-P B-body wagons, actually rode a 127″ wheelbase, three inches longer than the 124″ used by Olds and Buick (and 1973-76 Pontiac) B-body sedans.
The wagon wheelbase was the same as the Olds and Buick C-body sedans, but it is my understanding that the wagons were technically considered to be stretched B-bodies, not C-bodies.
MCT, thank you for catching this! I’ll fix the text. It was also my understanding these were considered stretched B’s and not C’s.
The error is understandable, especially with the Olds that styled these as C body Ninety Eights instead of as B body 88s. The Buick Estate Wagons looked more like a LeSabre than an Electra.
It’s odd, though, that in 1975, the Custom Cruiser didn’t get the quad, rectangular headlights that the Ninety-Eight did.
Great find and nice photos! I remember thinking how ponderous these looked even at the time, primarily because of the standard fender skirts. The fender skirts made these cars look huge.
Custom Cruiser production for 1975 was depressed by the combination of the Arab Oil Embargo and resulting recession, which hurt cars sales through most of 1975. For 1976, production figures went up to roughly 24,300, which was impressive for a body style that was on its sixth and final year on the market.
I wouldn’t be surprised if Custom Cruiser production shot up even more with the debut of the downsized 1977 models, as it seemed as though Chevrolet and Oldsmobile full-size wagons were everywhere in the late 1970s and early 1980s.
Joseph-
I might have seen this same Olds last December! It was parked on my block on Division St. Cohort posts:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/chriscieslak/23904641126/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/chriscieslak/23635037170/
Too cool! That looks to be the same car. Let’s hope it is now sheltered in a garage or under a carport somewhere.
I hate to be the wet blanket, but…ugh. I have never liked the ’71-’76 B-bodies. Just way too grossly bloated and ungainly-to-just-plain-ugly from too many angles, full of poor engineering and cynically excessive cost-cutting and abysmal build quality. The wagons were considerably less offensive to my eye than the sedans, coupes and convertibles, though that beltline upswerve at the back of the rear door has always made me want to lose my lunch no matter who’s the offender (Fords were worse than this what’s pictured).
That was a key Olds styling element used on many of their cars from the late ’60s (Cutlass) to the early ’80s (the ’84 Omega coupe may have been the last). The ’78 Cutlass Supreme coupe had it, but it apparently hurt aerodynamics and was axed in the ’81 facelift. The 88 and 98 didn’t have it from ’77 onward because it had to share fenders with Buick.
Thanks for posting this – Great “in motion” pictures, as usual. It’s nice to know there is still at least one of these cars cruising around city streets, where they seem right at home (small parking spaces be damned). Last time I saw one, it was not in this nice of shape.
These pics make me think of a somewhat battered 1975 Custom Cruiser I had for a while during high school (this was several years before finding the ’71 from my COAL article). Like the rest, it was rescued from a derby yard, and needed some mechanical quirks worked out. Luckily the next owner continued to make needed repairs. (He later reupholstered the front seat, replaced a couple of dented doors, upgraded the interior to the fancier trim level with power windows, etc). While under my care, our school was doing its annual exchange student program. My friend from Germany was over visiting and the teacher had been sure to stress to everyone in the class not to let their exchange student friends drive while they were over in the states. So, naturally we got into the Custom Cruiser on a fine spring evening and headed to a deserted church parking lot, where I traded seats and let him drive. Later, I got out the camera. Needless to say, he enjoyed the experience! I still have the pics- if I get time they’ll appear here in a bit.
Here’s one of them. . .
A 3/4 view. Loved the way Olds lights looked illuminated at night! Really miss this, along with the sound and smell of a 455. The owner of the featured wagon in this sighting must enjoy these things in the present day : )
Great story and pictures, Woodgraincoasty. And I loved your piece that I linked to this article. Great stuff.
Thanks! I like reading your articles too- you’ve found some neat cars. I enjoyed the one about the ’75 Impala a few months back.
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/blog/cc-capsule-1975-chevrolet-impala-sport-coupe-a-taste-of-how-it-was/
Great catch!!
I have come to love much about the 71-76 GM C bodies and big wagons, but especially the beautiful curves, the wraparound rear windows on the wagons, and the little finlets housing the taillights. Also the differences in fender skirts, hood design, etc. I will always appreciate the downsized 77+ models for their crispness, quality, and longevity, but they cannot, in my view, match these for sheer style and presence.
I would love to have a Pontiac Safari or Buick Estate from this era to keep my ’75 Ninety Eight Regency company.
But other than at a show, I don’t recall ever seeing one of these from any GM brand in at least 10-15 years. I’ve seen Country Squires of the same vintage, but not these. I presume many were, as discussed, either destroyed in Demo Derbies or just beaten to death by years of family use and being passed on to kids.
On the Olds fender skirts, they are on my Ninety-Eight, too, but I can’t understand taking them off other than to wash them, not because it isn’t an interesting idea to do so, but because the rear wheel openings clearly weren’t designed for either/or, it’s kind of irregular looking back there if you take the skirts off, the sheetmetal is indented to fit the skirts when you hang them on the clips, so it looks odd with them off. However, I take the skirts on mine off every fourth or fifth time I wash the car just to blow out any dirt and junk that might have gotten back there.
I can’t find a shot on Google, but if you ever get a chance to see one of these from above, the tumblehome is amazing – the actuall roof is about 2/3 the size of the opening at the belt line.
Friends’ parents’ had these growing up and i remember acres of room and the akward split second seat to access the forward-facing
Been a long time since I’ve seen a clamshell wagon, don’t think I’ve seen one since the late 90s.
Great find. I usually obsess over pre-73 clamshells but that 75 Olds is nice. Works without the skirts even though that distinctive flare is part of its thing.
Great spot, and quite tempting though without the “semi-transparent” woodgrain vinyl applique 😉
Noticed that the ad’s laundry-list of features cites something called a “Message Center”; can anyone shed light on what that might be?
Very enjoyable post. Thank you, Mr. Dennis.
Pretty sure that’s a collection of idiot lights that warn you the oil is too low, a door is ajar, etc.
Ahh. Thank you, sir.
I hadn’t seen one of these clamshell wagons for ages, and then an absolutely immaculate ’72 Chevy Kingswood showed up street parked about two blocks away from my apartment one day in 2014. I’m guessing it was in for a minor service of some sort at the garage on that block, because I saw it that one day and then never again. Gorgeous car though–golden brown with flawless dinoc. It had either been restored, or garaged and pampered all its life, but impressive either way. And, yes, has to be seen in person to appreciate how huge they are!
Nice find and article, Joseph. I know the feeling of seeing an old car or truck I’d love to get a closer look at, but not have the opportunity to, but you got some nice photos of this one. It’s been ages since I’ve seen one of these. I suspect that not that many are still around. Back in 1980, I bought a 1974 Impala Wagon with a 400 and 4 barrel which easily moved it down the road. I bought it from the original owner. He said, ” I paid $5000 for this car, a dollar a pound, .” I gave him $650 for it. He also told me that he’d always let it run for a few minutes before taking it down the road. He’d drive at 35 mph for the first half mile, then gradually bring it up to speed. Another thing he told me was that he’d never done a wheel alignment on it, so unless it gets to where it needs one, don’t mess with it. It was a great driving car. It was spotless inside and out. He showed me the only damage to the interior where his son had slid a single sheet of plywood into it while working on a school project. I sold it after two years and I have no idea of it’s fate.
I’ve always liked wagons and would love to have a mid sixties Ford Country Sedan or Squire. Having missed out on a ’67 Country Sedan in December and not pursuing a ’67 Country Squire because of rust issues, I found and bought a much newer wagon from California. I hesitated to mention it here because of all the hate I’ve read about these wagons here on CC. It is (I know, I know, Paul), a 1976 Torino Squire Wagon. There, I said it. It’s rust free and is a pretty good looking twenty footer. Well, except for the wood grain vinyl, but a new kit comes with the car. I’ve always liked Torinos, but I never thought I’d buy one so new, especially not one with those big bumpers. But, because I always liked the body style, I caved in. I wanted to tell you about this one, Joseph, because of your story. This car was saved by the previous owner. He told me that it had belonged to a woman who had recently gotten remarried and no longer needed this car. She gave it to her son who planned to put it in a demolition derby. The guy I bought it from convinced the son to sell it to him, then he had it shipped to Denver. A rust free 40 year old wagon deserves to be saved, even if it is a ’76 Gran Torino Squire.
I’ve seen one in real life! I actually own it. I live in Finland.
I don’t think I’ve ever seen one without the roof rack. That reduces the mass a little.
This Olds has a trailer hitch, indicating it may have done some hauling in its day. A boat to the lake for sailing? A Uhaul trailer to move the kids out of the house?
Sitting in this traffic however, it is unhappily consuming copious amounts of fuel going nowhere. 10 MPG average in mixed driiving?
I hope it is still around, and something tells me it is.
“Brown bovine beauty”…I love it. 🙂
These were literally a pain in the rear for body men to repair after being rear ended. Trying to align the lower door and the tracks to mate with the glass above. Especially if the D pillars got moved at all.
My first boss bought one of these monsters for the business in , IIRC, 1975. Roomy, yes but compared to the exterior size….only just roomy! I drove it several times and my memories of it are: soft, floaty ride-who needs handling-, so-so brakes, and way down on power given the 455 engine. Overall it was not a vehicle that held ANY interest to young (@31) me; then or old me now.
Having $old Oldsmobiles before going to Art Center College of Design, some of their product was appealing personally, but not 98s or Toros…….except to $ell!! 🙂 There was a 455 equipped, Delta Royale that was rather a Q-ship tho…. :). Mostly these HUGE cars were true dinosaurs of the road that sucked tankfuls of gas. 🙁 DFO
Regarding the smirking boy:
Damien was very comfortable in the Oldsmobile.
Very well protected.
He was such a misunderstood, mischievous lad.
When I was 19 years old in 1982 I worked for a soaker manufacturer.
The warehouse manager owned a ‘76 Custom Cruiser freshly repainted silver. He offered, and I accepted the task of waxing the car with Turtle Wax, the old school method. I don’t recall what he paid me, but I do recall it wasn’t enough. It took me an entire week of lunch hours to do it. Due in large part to that experience, I have never, ever, waxed a car since then.
That was a lot of car…
Mostly remember the Chevy versions. Some Pontiac models too. One Pontiac, a beige one was a “woody”..Usually saw it from the school bus, in the afternoons.