Vintage Ad: The Ambassador Royal’e Limo – “Destined To Become America’s #1 Executive Limousine”
– Posted on March 30, 2020
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“Be the first corporate executive on the block to be sneered at by other corporate executives.”
I was all set to reply along the lines of “Pish tosh; that’s reserved for the likes of the Ford Falcon Executive Limousine, the Hillman Minx Executive Limousine, the BMW Isetta Executive Limousine, and the Subaru 360 Executive Limousine”. But then I remembered the Quantum Fetish Effect (think of a fetish, no matter how weird and contrived and implausible, and suddenly it’s always existed with its own community and website and network and Usenet group) and realised the danger and likelihood of it applying to cases like this, too, so I thought better of…
…erm…
…whoops.
Behold the Falcon limo, doubter.
https://trademe.tmcdn.co.nz/photoserver/plusw/847222222.jpg
Also available as the Executivo in some southerly markets.
I remember seeing these Falcon limos around 1987 in Buenos Aires, just before my family moved back to NYC. Been looking for them for a while. Thanks for the pic!
I’ll just leave this Citroen here along with the other ‘weird’ limos
During the filming of ‘Tucker, A Man and His Dream’ F.F. Coppollo came to the locations in his black Citroen DS23 limo. Cant find pics of it, but here are Tuckers.
Didn’t print, try again
Twin “I-Beam” Construction means We Crudely Tacked a “Fram’e” Under The Rust-loving Unibody After We Realized It Would Collaps’e Without It.
Oh, I thought it meant they used a Ford pickup front suspension. Along with the LeBaron windows.
That Ford truck suspension would go well with the 390 mentioned in the ad, which I assume is a Ford 390?
The 390 in the Ambassador was a variant of the 2nd gen AMC V8.
“Fram’e” and “Collaps’e” FTW. X-)
I guess panel fit wasn’t a priority, was it?
If this is the one they decided to photograph for their promotional materials, I can only imagine what the other ones looked like.
This was made by Armbruster-Stageway, a company that’s still in existence in Ft. Smith, Arkansas making funeral coaches. Back in the 1970s, I think most of Armbruster’s business came from limousines, sometimes from unusual donor vehicles, like the Buick below. I’ve never seen an Ambassador limo though — this is terrific… in a horrifying sort of way.
I suspect that many of these non-Cadillac or Lincoln limos ended up as hotel or other tourist-related vehicles. I doubt they captured much of the actual Executive market, but it was a good marketing aspiration.
Hmmm…it had to be difficult to lengthen it while maintaining the Buick sweep spear. It looks pretty good here but I suspect it doesn’t look as good in the metal.
Photoshop? However, rear door seems to be in the wrong place somehow.
Behold the horror. This bad boy exists today, and has been the subject of multiple polite magazine features.
It was used by the governor of Wisconsin for a while.
Incredible indeed.
I think I would have voted for that governor,
More than you want to know:
https://www.hemmings.com/blog/article/1969-amc-ambassador-limousine/
So awesome. Thank you for posting that link.
Thinking this photo was taken at Northerly Island based on the angle of the Chase tower (completed in 1969). What do you think Joe?
Oh, wow. Ryan, I think you may be right!
It’s interesting that Hemmings said AMC itself claimed no knowledge of it, you’d expect a significant percentage of those built would’ve ended up in their own corporate VIP fleet.
Interesting. I always considered AMC to be a rather plebeian car. But then again they stretched Chevrolets. Probably more for airport cars than executives and the hoi polloi, though.
AMC was trying to go upscale with the Ambassador, especially in ’69. The ads they used compared the Ambassador to a Cadillac Fleetwood limo (as the only two US cars to have standard air conditioning.) They often had a sharply dressed chauffeur standing next to the car in the ad. They even had an offer where some dealers would come to you for a test drive in one. Having noted that, I’m not sure if AMC pushed the stretch idea, or if it seemed to make sense to Armbruster or this Leasing agency….
I first saw one of these in an episode of Mission Impossible, back in the day. There is indeed a beautifully restored real one in the hands of a great AMC collector in WI, as the Hemmings article reports.
I’ve owned an Ambassador of this vintage and while not particularly exciting and certainly no Cadillac it was not a bad car. It did have some obsolete engineering like trunnions instead of ball joints in the front suspension and vacuum windshield wipers. Making it into a luxury “executive limo” is kind of out there though the conversion is definitely odd-looking.
AMC was trying to get a piece of the burgeoning ‘Great Brougham Epoch” with their Ambassador and to some degree did. They employed the pretentious, old, stretch the front end as long as possible approach, and the styling implied a more luxurious car than it was. Inside, they didn’t even have a fold-down center armrest either front or rear, or upholstery and finishing much beyond the Rebel/Matador. Making A/C standard did catch the attention of the public as it was still regarded as a luxury then.
Oh, good grief. Seriously? This isn’t, like, an April Fool joke a couple of days ahead of schedule or something? I guess not; it appears to be a real thing.
So, we’re meant to be impressed by this ad, which looks like it was done by a 5th-grader. We’re comparing 1969 limousines and we’re supposed to be pleasantly surprised that this one has power disc brakes. Leaving aside the rest of the multifaceted ridiculousness of the car itself, how are we supposed to pronounce “Royal’e”, which isn’t a word in any language? What’s that apostrophe doing there, were they trying for “Royalé” or “Royalè”? Those aren’t words, either. And “Wheelbase” is one word, not two. And whom are they quoting who uttered the phrase “I-BEAM” (shouted it, apparently)?
Oysh. None for me thanks, I’m driving; include me out.
To be fair, small business advertising from this era generally looks amateurish to modern eyes, because it is. No templates and fewer college grads with appropriate degrees. Not unusual to hire someone off the street with nothing more than enthusiasm.
I agree, this ad is typical of industrial and commercial equipment advertising at the time. The reader will have some expert knowledge of the products offered, so slick marketing isn’t necessary. Other commercial vehicle advertising ( is hearses) had a similar vibe.
Limousines like this are intended for budget minded buyers and commercial operators, as were the many Mercury and Pontiac limos offered over the years. Most passengers then and now don’t care if the chassis is a lower priced car or a higher priced one. So long as it’s long, limo-shaped and reasonably well furnished inside, they’re happy.
And then there’s this…
Only the auto companies had the money to do ‘proper’ advertising. The best examples of the period are VW and Pontiac’s.
I’ve been a part of different kinds of marketing activities for the last 3-1/2 decades and technology has changed things vastly. To compare what we see now to 50+ years ago, the difference is even greater.
This ad was something rather expensive to create and was well within the standards of good taste of relatively affordable print advertising back then. Like others noted, only the big players could afford to put together print advertising that was outstanding.
Find some magazines printed before 1985, you’ll see a lot more of this kind of thing. This is good old fashioned trade advertising, nothing flashy.
As always, there’s never just one. Here’s another Ambassador stretch limousine.
Is that a Hindustan Ambassador?
Looks like it,….. based on the 1950s Morris Oxford BTW.
Well, at least one of them still exists. It shows up at AMC events here in SE WI occasionally.
Look what’s next to it. Only seen one 1962 Ambassador 2 door sedan in person.
Reminds me of the poverty spec what if Dodge Dart limo I virtually made a few years back.
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/blog/photoshop/what-if-poverty-spec-limousine/
It was taken at Meigs Field in Chicago.
I grew up seeing that skyline.
The late sixties/early seventies Ambassador always vaguely reminded me of a Soviet-era ZIL limousine, and this conversion really cements it, right down to the weird way they did the middle stretch section. Normally, the fixed extension is ‘ahead’ of the rear doors to facilitate entry/exit. But, for some bizarre reason, the Ambassador limo has the stretch section ‘behind’ the doors, making it difficult to get back to/out of the rear seat. I can only surmise that it was cheaper/easier to do it that way.
The rear is a sedan with the rear door welded closed. The new rear door is a special fabrication with skin from a factory door. No idea why, except either that the standard door would be too small to access the middle seats or the whole thing would fold in half like a crepe if it were unbraced at the standard door.
Actually, the rear seat placed behind the door opening with the foldout jump seats facing forward was the standard configuration for all lwb sedans and limousines such as seen on the Cadillac 75’s until the ’60’s Lehmann-Petersen Lincoln limousines made the B-pillar stretch acceptable. Whereas the people on the rear seat have to move aside to allow additional passengers into the occasional seats that now face rearward with everyone’s feet all in the same footwell, it isn’t a comfortable configuration. Armbruster-Stageway had built hundreds of stretched sedans for six and eight door bus line coaches and airport limousines. They were far from glamorous, just work-a-day livery coaches.
Thanks.
Wow, I had never realized how much the beltline of the normal Ambassador undulated from A pillar to C pillar. That center addition really makes it stand out. And not in a good way.
But on the bright side, the Amby’s stretched front end looks right at home.
Yes, that’s what I was thinking:
Questionable stretch in the front, questionable stretch in the middle.
Just make the trunk awkwardly longer and it’s perfect!
I wonder what the V.I.P. Royale “Le Baron rear and side windows” options were?
Not very likely the Ambassador Royale limousine was going “to become America’s #1 Custom Executive Limousine” Maybe a favorite of the airport livery limousine, hotel courtesy town cars, funeral mourner coaches, general lwb livery segment. Ambassador was promoted as AMC’s luxury car but its wasn’t held in such regard by the general public, not on par with Cadillac, Lincoln and Imperial.
Have to give AMC and Armbruster-Stageway credit for trying….
This thing is as ugly as my granny’s feet and one cannot unsee it. Both will forever horribly instilled in my psyche.
This car reminds me of a swayback nag hoping to run in The Kentucky Derby.
And Chrysler produced something very similar.
Well, except that Chrysler actually tried to market this 4 cylinder wonder…and then seemed to wonder why none were selling!
It’s likely the two or three people who bought a Chrysler Executive-K stepped on the gas shortly after taking delivery (or ordered their chauffeur to do so) and are still waiting for an indication that something’s going to happen as a result.
Here’s the March 1969 writeup that the Hemmings article refers to–from the Kenosha, WI paper itself:
chrysler le baron (the fwd version) also had the limo treatment.
One Corvair enthusiast built this limo on his own. I don’t think it was ever intended for commercial use. More likely, it was intended to be a one-off “custom car”. It resides in the Corvair Museum located just outside of Springfield, Illinois.
In addition to this limo, people have done all kinds of crazy things with Corvairs – sectioned them to make two-seaters, mounted them on 4×4 chassis, stuck the engine in the front, put the engine in the middle, V8s, V12s. The variety seems endless!
One photo is never enough….
Really too bad this idea was not revived in 1978, using a Matador Barcelona Sedan.