The 1963 Chrysler 300 “Sport Series” pictured above may not look like a rally car, but in 1963, the folks at Chrysler decided to give North American rallying a try anyway. The most prestigious event they entered was the Shell 4000 Rally across Canada, and the results were surprising.
My interest in Chrysler’s toehold in rallying came from this advertisement that I keep in my collection. Scott Harvey, the man pictured at the top, was not only a Chrysler engineer but also a dedicated racer in his own right (biography here), and getting his employer involved in rallies and Trans-Am races was more than just a hobby for the dauntless Mr. Harvey. Whether anyone laughed at the big 300 is hard to say, but it was the only car at most rallies with an automatic transmission, a virtual sin in the world of 1960s amateur motorsports.
The Shell 4000 Rally (aka Trans Canada Rally) started in Vancouver, British Columbia, on April 20, 1963, and finished up in Montreal 4,000 miles later. It was one of five international rallies that the RAC (Royal Automobile Club) counted toward the World Rally Championship for Manufacturers, so it was no joke; after all, crossing the muddy plains provinces in April proved to be a test of man (and woman) and machine. Speaking of women, rally racing in the 1960s was one of the few forms of motorsport where women were accepted as part of the fraternity, and they thrived in such an environment: Names such as Rosemary Smith and Pat Moss-Carlsson are still well-known among historic rally aficionados. The only form of racing where that’s true today seems to be drag racing, where women have won many national championships.
For those who want to spend hours learning about the history of the rally, there’s an excellent website that I’ll link below. The webmaster has also posted several official rally videos on YouTube that were produced after the rally was completed, and many of my still images come from the video documenting the 1963 Shell 4000.
The cars themselves, by the way, were not 300Js (only 400 of those were built in 1963); instead, all evidence suggests that they were 300 “Sport Series” with the optional 360-horsepower 413 four-barrel (a 305-horsepower 383 was standard). Chrysler entered four of them in the Shell 4000, but the advertisement says that they entered many more smaller rallies that year, allowing Mr. Harvey to win the SCCA rally championship.
Information on any rally-specific upgrades the 300s received is limited, but Sports Car Graphic’s July 1963 issue printed the pictures above, which show the necessary timing equipment and skid plates added to the Chryslers. Mechanical upgrades probably did not extend to the drivetrain. As an example that power wasn’t everything in North American rallying, the winning Chevy II was a dealer-prepared six-cylinder car driven by a pair of Wisconsin engineers; skill, reliability, and luck were more important than what was under the hood. Ford of Canada won the team prize in Falcon Sprints that were prepared like the Monte Carlo Rally cars, but they had stock 164-horsepower 260 two-barrels instead of the upgraded 260s in the cars destined for the Alps. In reality, the 300s probably had more “Firepower” than was necessary.
The rally film is in remarkably good condition, but it’s still hard to draw a bead on the color the 300s were painted. Based on the United States’ racing colors, I’d guess they were painted “Oyster White” with blue racing stripes. Chrysler used special tires for the event: a set of “non-expandable” Goodyears produced in Luxembourg. Because these maintained their rolling diameter, the car’s registered speed would be more consistent, a very important trait in an event as precise as a timed rally. With that being said, the Wisconsin engineers in the winning Chevy II had no such tires, just a set of Firestone snow tires in back.
The images in Shell’s video show how easy it was to get stuck in the mire, but there are plenty of good shots of cars speeding over the plains and through sleepy Canadian towns.
Perhaps the most interesting vehicle in the rally was this 1951 Bentley Mark VI driven by brothers from Ontario. The car had over 350,000 miles on it at the time, and was still in Don McQuirk’s ownership (he was one of the brothers) in 2018 when Hagerty posted this article.
The still images show that the Chryslers were set up with the usual array of exterior lighting that you might find in any rally car of the era.
And even though the 1963-64 Chryslers get a little static these days for being Exner’s final stand at Chrysler, and therefore a little strange, one must admit that the styling was actually rather clean; they’re not bad-looking cars at all. This one even appears to be wearing its factory wheel covers.
One thing that is made clear in all of the articles and videos produced about the event was that rallying was an attainable motorsport. You or I could get a car, maybe find a little local sponsorship, take some vacation time, and have an adventure of a lifetime. The cars weren’t million-dollar hypertuned all-wheel-drive compacts. There was a very small crew. Sure, we might not win the event like the engineers from Wisconsin, but we’d have an awful lot of fun. And we’d be exhausted.
By the time the Chryslers rolled into Montreal, they had had a good showing, but they did not win the team prize—that went to the Falcons. But the day of the “have fun” amateur rally was starting to end as manufacturers such as Ford and Chrysler started to sense an advertising buffet by promulgating their successes. See the ad for Scott Harvey and the 300 near the top of the article.
How did Scott Harvey do in his hot 300? He tied with his teammate for fifth place, not bad for driving a luxury bruiser. One Al Bochroch drove a 300 in the event and reported about it in Car and Driver in their August 1963 issue. He said this about the 300:
We must congratulate Carl Preuhs, the chief mechanic of the Chrysler team, for a wonderfully prepared and sound-running car, and congratulate Chrysler as well for building a machine that could take a couple of softies like O’Leary and Bochroch on a wild, pitching, car-breaking 4000-mile ride without missing a beat and in complete comfort. Only one beef did we have about the car, the whole trip: that damn square steering wheel.
If Chrysler (ahem, Stellantis) wants to transport me back to 1963 and give me a chance behind that “damn square steering wheel,” I won’t complain.
Related Reading
The Shell 4000 and BC Trans-Canada History Page (this is absolutely the go-to page for anyone interested in the Shell 4000 Rally)
Vintage Car and Driver Road Tests: 1963 Chrysler 300-J – “A More Beautiful Brute” (by Paul N)
Thanks for that, I’d never heard of these being rally cars. In the pre-modern era, the bigger cars did make the odd appearance in rallies and the longer the duration of the event, the more likely they were to have some success. Mercedes-Benz in the late 1970s won some long-distance events with the 450 SLC 5.0 (also automatic) and in 1973, one of the four Phase IV Falcon GTHOs Ford Australia built (before the homologation project was aborted) was used in rallies. As a rally car the GTHO was about as improbable as a Chrysler 300 but it proved competitive, even winning the odd stage but the sheer weight of the thing made for much lateral movement and although the tire treads never wore out, that was because the sidewalls were so prone to failure. Re-registered as a road car, the Falcon was later written-off after a head-on crash.
You’re welcome! I also think of the “big” Mercedes Fintails that did battle in international rallies of the early 1960s, and they were pretty successful, too.
Yes, and as you mentioned, women of the era were successful in rallying. On November 4, 1962, two Swedish women (driver Ewy Rosqvist (1929–2024) & co-driver Ursula Wirth (1934–2019)), in a 220 SE Fintail (Heckflosse) won the sixth Argentine Turismo Standard Grand Prix, conducted over five days and 2,874 miles (4,625 km) on some of the country’s gruelling, mountainous roads. The women not only won but dominated the event; for the first time, a single vehicle won all six stages and they set a new race record. To rub it in, all other competitors were men. Ewy Rosqvist also mentioned the steering wheel, her only complaint about the 220 SE was that when driving in the mountains, she’d have preferred one with power steering. The chap in sunglasses is team manager Karl Kling (1910–2003) who was a factory driver in 1954-1955, driving both the W196R F1 cars and W196S (300 SLR) sports cars.
I have a Matchbox version of her car from that event!
I am a longtime fan of the 63 Chrysler, owing to spending a lot of time in and around one that was owned by a high school friend. I got to drive it a couple of times, and it was a very different experience from my soft-riding 67 Galaxie. I can see how one of these would do well in a rally.
I will confess that I had never noticed this rally ad, despite having immersed myself in car ads of that period years ago. And I never knew about the rally history these cars had, so thanks for this.
Fun to watch segments of this video. I think I would have preferred to take a ’63 Valiant instead of the big 300.
You refer to these cars being the “Chrysler 300 Sport”. I’m not aware of that model, just the 300 and the 300-J. There’s no reference to it in the brochure. Was this some kind of limited availability, or?
The regular 300 (non-letter-series) was labeled the “Sport Series” in several sources I looked at, so I guess “300 Sport Series” might be more accurate, even though I have seen them referred to as 300 Sports. I’ll update the title and a few references in the text to avoid confusion.
https://www.chrysler300clubinc.com/1963-300.html
Not a big deal; just a bit curious as I’ve never come across that name for them before.
Another good article about an event I’d never heard of .
I like smaller cars but obviously the Chrysler’s suspension did very well here .
-Nate
Thanks! I know that Scott Harvey campaigned some Valiants in other rallies, maybe even in Europe…I’ll have to look into that.
Now in my advanced age I wish I could go back in time and ask my Dad what he was thinking in 1963. I was age 12, and went car shopping with him. I remember us going to see a Chrysler 300 2-door hardtop, an Olds Starfire 2-door hardtop, then a 1963 Ford Galaxie 500 XL fastback. He did buy a 1963 T-Bird hardtop. Today, I wonder why he shopped the 1963 Chrysler 300. Questions I wished I had asked 40 years ago.
Chrysler used “sport series” in its 1962 marketing materials to describe the expanded 300 line. In 1963, the marketing materials called the expanded line “300 Sport Series.”
The roof mounted swiveling spotlight was a feature that Scott Harvey usually installed on his rally cars. It wasn’t a typical rally item.
Probably a lot less fatiguing to drive than the Minis, SAABs and Escorts one would normally associate with rallying success.
Mind you, likewise the DS…