Datsun 1200 Coupe – photo from ClassicCars.com
I grew up in northernmost New Jersey near the Palisades, which are the tall cliffs that overlook the Hudson River above the George Washington Bridge. I was 13 or 14 years old the first time I took a bus into the city to see the International Automobile Show in the New York Coliseum, an exhibition hall on Columbus Circle in Manhattan. This was a few years before OPEC and catalytic converters and 5 MPH bumpers ended the golden age of automobiles.
1965 International Automobile Show – photo credit: Michael Dolan, Flickr
The drab, windowless Coliseum wasn’t much to look at; however its three floors were crammed with the newest cars sold in the U.S. by no fewer than six dozen manufacturers both familiar and obscure, some in far-off Brazil (Puma) and Switzerland (Monteverdi). Readers of Curbside Classic won’t have forgotten brands like TVR, Stutz, Iso, NSU with its Wankel rotary, and Marcos, but who remembers Amante or Otas Lombardi?
Most cars at the show were displayed with locked doors behind velvet ropes; a few were left open so I could slide into a leather seat behind a steering wheel of polished wood and imagine myself on the open road.
Photo from my copy of the 1970 International Automobile Show catalog
I collected shopping bags full of glossy brochures printed on heavy paper, brochures which I brought home to study and commit to memory. My collection of sales literature disappeared in one of the many moves I made as an adult, so I was pleased to find websites dedicated to their preservation in digital form. (See, for example, https://www.oldcarbrochures.com.) In particular I wanted to know if there really was a lab-coated “Dr. Oldsmobile” or if I’d imagined him. No, I had not misremembered.
What was Oldsmobile thinking?
The State of New Jersey insisted I wait until I was 17 before I could get a driver’s license. I took driving lessons from my high school gym teacher in a Pontiac Catalina wagon so enormous that someone sitting in the way back may well have been in a different time zone from those of us in the front. Fortunately I was allowed to take the state exam in my mother’s Volvo, which was considerably easier to parallel park. I got my license; now I needed a car of my own.
What car should I buy? I had only the money I’d saved from as many part-time jobs as I could fit around my schoolwork. An Amante GT was out of the question – think of the insurance costs alone!
This week, when I was searching the Internet for photos of a car similar to mine, I was dismayed to discover that someone had already written a “Cars Of A Lifetime” post about the Datsun 1200, and he’d done it very well! You can read Ed Hardey’s post about these Datsuns HERE, for more information about the car’s technical specifications and about Ed’s fiancée, too.
Why’d I buy this particular Datsun? Unlike Ed Hardey, I had at that time no experience working on cars myself, nor did I know anyone who did, so I was looking for a fun-to-drive, inexpensive car that didn’t need a lot of work. An older gentleman in a nearby town was willing to dispose of his seldom-used second car at a reasonable price, so I handed him a wad of cash and the little Datsun was mine. (Thinking about it now, it’s likely that the “older gentleman” was considerably younger than I am today.)
A 1972 Datsun 1200 was the nearest thing to an exotic sports car I could afford. No doubt you too will feel the excitement when you see the photos I found of a ’71 coupe, advertised at ClassicCars.com for a price 40 times what I’d paid a half-century earlier. In fairness, their car had nicer wheels than mine.
The ClassicCars photos show a car with an undeniably aerodynamic fastback roofline and a pair of functional air vents on either flank to quicken the pulse. And it’s painted high-performance orange, just like mine! (My mother insisted on calling the color “butterscotch.” She was not a car enthusiast.) The 1200cc four produced 68HP on a good day, which meant I couldn’t get into too much trouble; I could drive pedal-to-the-metal without attracting the attention of the local constabulary.
Speaking of pedals, my Datsun had three, which was one more than I was accustomed to in my parents’ cars. One of the part-time jobs that had funded my car purchase was working in the evening as a parking lot valet at upscale restaurants. We didn’t get too many stick-shift cars among the many Lincolns and Buicks, but there were enough VWs and Fiats for me to get some practice using a clutch. (I offer my belated apologies to their owners.) Anyway, I’m sure my neighbors were entertained to see me stumble-bumble around the block in my orange car the first week I owned it, trying to figure out what to do with my feet.
Another of my jobs was working weekends and summers in the Palisades Interstate Park, a half-mile-wide strip of parkway and cliffs between the George Washington Bridge and the New York state line 21 miles to the north. I sold hot dogs and Coca-Cola (or maybe it was Pepsi?) to people who fled from the city for picnics along the Hudson River. There’s a multi-lane Palisades Interstate Parkway above the cliffs, but my Datsun and I preferred the narrow, winding road at the base of the cliffs from Alpine to Fort Lee.
Henry Hudson Drive – photo by the Palisades Parks Conservancy
I usually worked in a stone hut built during the Depression by the Civilian Conservation Corps a hundred yards from the 18th-century Cornwallis House. According to legend, the British General Charles Cornwallis had supper in this house in 1776 while his soldiers climbed a secret path up the cliffs as they chased George Washington’s army from New York to Pennsylvania.
When I worked in the park, the narrow service road ran between the historic house and the cliffs. This was no problem for me in my little car; however I sometimes had to drive a dark green van laden with hot dog buns, cola syrup, and CO2 tanks. If ever you’ve driven an old Dodge Tradesman you’ll know that the steering wheel, accelerator, and brake pedal do what they’re supposed to do, but not very well. A pair of large rear-view mirrors made the big van even wider, and I fear I may have hit the Cornwallis House more than once. On a later visit I saw that the service road had been re-routed to pass in front of the house.
I drove the Datsun for five or ten thousand miles, and it was a mostly trouble-free experience, although once the muffler fell off on the Connecticut Turnpike. The problem with a lightweight rear-wheel-drive car, one which has indifferent tires on 12-inch wheels, is that it isn’t well-suited for snow-covered roads, especially if you’re an inexperienced driver, which I certainly was. To make matters worse, after high school I went to college in New England, and this was at a time when we had real winters. I had a few minor accidents, and I resolved never again to buy a car that wasn’t good in snow, a resolution that lasted until I bought a Fiero, many years later.
I’ve owned twenty cars since my first, and the 1200 coupe was neither the fastest nor the slowest, nor was it the biggest or smallest. It was, however, the most orange, and it served me well for two years. I sold my little Datsun when I went abroad for my junior year of college, and when I came home I bought something that was its complete opposite, built on the other side of the world from Japan.
Related CC reading:
Curbside Classic: 1972 Datsun 1200/Sunny Coupe: The Yang To The 1972 Cadillac’s Yin
It looks like I grew up in the same era and same general region (but just north of the NY/NJ border) as you.
Two of our high school’s three driver’s ed cars were also gigantic, early-mid 70’s Pontiac Catalinas. To this day, other than U-Haul trucks, I believe that they’re just about the biggest vehicles I’ve driven. Our high school’s third driver’s ed car – a Dodge Coronet – drove like a sports car by comparison.
Great write-up. I also recall our local auto show was the highlight of my year, though in Philadelphia where I grew up, the auto show was much more modest than New York’s. I always wanted to go to New York’s show, but never did.
Sounds like the Datsun was a great first car for you.
Those datsun 1200s got quite a following in NZ, Datsun shipped engines to Humber 80 racer Dennis Marwood who tuned them before fitting into new cars called 1200 SSS no not the Japanese version these were moredoor sedans but they went and handled well for the times and very well for a Japanese car and successful in dirt road rallying, very very few genuine SSS survive but there were plenty of clones.
A perfect first car. Light enough to feel somewhat quick if the gears are rowed properly, and ideal for back-road bombing. Everyone should start out on something like this.
A few sand bags in the trunk would have helped a lot in the snow.
I remember driving one of these as a rental, it was cheap and cheerful, the rubber floor mats made for easy clean up and it had *just* enough power to get where I wanted to go .
I never was a big fan of that popular “International Orange” so many were sold in .
-Nate
I like these a lot more now than I did when they were common. I look forward to seeing your next piece!
“Thinking about it now, it’s likely that the “older gentleman” was considerably younger than I am today.” So often I have that thought.
Looking back these little rear drive Japanese cars had a pretty short run. Maybe 10 years before front drive became ubiquitous. Yet they were absolutely everywhere when I was a teenager.
Alpine Road – that narrow winding road at the foot of the Palisades – was a favorite of mine. I used to imagine I was driving the Targa Floria in my ’65 Corvair equipped with quick-ratio steering, dual exhaust and grippy bias-belted tires!
Never owned one, never drove one, might have worked on one. Maybe. But to me they were one part of the Datsun Triple Crown they had from ~68-73. The 1200, the PL510 and the 240Z. But people loved those cars. Much more fun than their competitors over at Toyota, which at the time was their only immediate competition.
Unfortunately soon to be replaced with the B210, the 710 and the ZX. Excuse me while I get sick. Signs of the times perhaps, but a reminder better isn’t always better. Depends on how you measure it.
A nicely-written piece, sir.
I had a fairly irrational hatred for 1200’s, what with the (then) Japanese standard awful seats, vague steering, unrefined handling and underdamped ride, but truth is, Nissan could do worse, and proved it with the next iteration in the form of the 120Y/B210, which added the further insult of deep ugliness.
Another truth is that the things were good for many people. Even when rust left them as no more than a collection of wheels joined by a driver’s seat, the mechanicals would not give up, and that is unquestionably cheap and reliable motoring.
My first new car was a red LB110 I bought to survive my early days in college. Gas was 25-28 cents a gallon and rumored to exceed 50 cents a gallon within the year.. I could afford the 29 dollars monthly payment, the 50cent gas prices, and the housing costs, college tuition IF I budgeted close.
I put nearly 100,000 miles on it over the next 4 years till I got married when we bought a new pickup; a Ford F100, and a Nova SS. It returned around 34 mpg but had a propensity for burning exhaust valves every 40,000 miles (early EPA regs and air pumps, egr, and goofy timing) It was great fun to drive in the mountains of SOCAL but chugged up inclines with ‘consideration and debate’
I wish I had it yet today, because it helped me through my education years by its economical nature. (Paul Newman got his start in racing with these and the PL510, then the 240Z) Great little lightweight ~