In recent decades, mid-price cars and mid-price makes have often taken it on the chin, caught between cheaper makes moving upmarket and luxury brands moving downwards in search of greater volume. This is sometimes also true for middle-tier models of the same brand, like the old Buick Super, which was squeezed between the popular entry-level Buick Special and the fancier Roadmaster. In 1950, Buick found a new way to generate interest in the mid-level Super: a stretched-wheelbase four-door model called Super 126, which offered more car for not a lot more money. Rich Baron spotted one of these cars in 2024 — let’s take a closer look.
Rich shot this red Buick in Marin County, California, in December 2024. (Except as otherwise noted, all the photos in this post are by Rich.) Identifying it as a 1950 Buick wasn’t too difficult — the controversial “buck-toothed” grille, designed by former Buick styling chief Henry Lauve, is hard to mistake even if cars of this period aren’t your bag — but I had to read the badge to determine that it was a Buick Super, not the cheaper Buick Special, which was built in greater numbers. (Both the Special and Super had three “VentiPorts” on the sides of the hood, while the pricier Roadmaster boasted four.)
The Series 50, as the Buick Super was known in the catalog, dated back to 1930, when it was for a time the cheapest Buick model line. In 1934, Buick had added the cheaper Series 40 (later called Special), which slotted below the Series 50 in price, and the Series 60 (later called Century), positioned above it. This was more model and price gradations than the late ’30s market could really support, so the Series 50 disappeared for a while, returning for 1940. In a practical sense, the revived Super was essentially just a fancier Special, sharing the same wheelbase and 248 cu. in. (4,065 cc) straight eight, albeit tuned for a bit more power. However, it wasn’t that much more expensive than the Special and offered a nicer interior, so for a while, the Super outsold the cheaper model.
After Buick resumed civilian production in late 1945, the Super became the volume model. With raw materials in short supply and the public clamoring for new cars, the cheaper Special was a low priority. (When the first “all-new” Buicks debuted for 1949, the Special actually kept the older body and older styling until late in the model year.) However, it was a different story for 1950: The restyled Special and Super now about looked the same, and they still shared the same wheelbase and exterior dimensions. If you were content with more basic interior trim, the Special was a good deal cheaper than the Super, and bystanders or nosy neighbors would have to look close to tell them apart. For a bit more money, there was also now a Special Deluxe sub-series that gave you most of the Super’s exterior brightwork and some of its interior appointments.

1950 Buick Super Four-Door Tourback Sedan, Model 51 / “Old Buick, 1950” by born1945 – licensed under CC BY 2.0
So, you might well ask, “Why would people buy a Buick Super at all? Wouldn’t it make more sense just to stick with Special Deluxe?” Many people did just that: The Special became the best-selling Buick line in 1950, with the Deluxe models outselling the plain versions by about 2 to 1. The Super did now had a bigger 263 cu. in. (4,315 cc) engine, with 124 hp to the Special’s 110 hp (on manual-shift cars — cars with Dynaflow had 120 and 128 hp respectively), and it was available as a convertible or Riviera hardtop, which the Special was not. The convertible and hardtop were expensive, though, and the sales figures suggest that not many contemporary buyers thought the bigger engine and slightly better trim were worth the $156 price difference between the Super and the Special Deluxe.

The 1950 Super’s new “F-263” eight displaced 263.3 cu. in. (4,315 cc) — this one is in a Dynaflow car and has 128 hp rather than the standard 124 hp / Mecum Auctions

1950 Buick Super Riviera, Model 56R / Mecum Auctions
However, Buick had one more trick up its sleeve: the new long-wheelbase Super 126 sedan, known in the catalog as the Model 52 four-door Tourback. (“Tourback” is what Buick called its notchback models to distinguish them from the fastback “Jetback” body styles.)
For the Model 52 to make sense, it’s important to understand the peculiarities of Buick’s 1950 body program. While Buick offered an assortment of wheelbases in 1950, there were really just two basic bodies (sometimes described as the B-body and C-body, although see J P Cavanaugh’s “The Mystery Of The Missing B Body” for more on that convoluted subject), and the bigger of the two was essentially just a stretched version of the shorter body. Buick combined these body shells with two different front sections, one of which was longer (shifting the front wheels forward by 4.75 inches) to accommodate the bigger 320 cu. in. (5,247 cc) straight-eight used in the Roadmaster. These pieces were mixed and matched on the different 1950 models, as shown in the following table:
Model | Body Shell | Front Section | Wheelbase, Inches | Overall Length, Inches |
---|---|---|---|---|
Special, all body styles | B-body | Short | 121.5 | 204.0 |
Super, all styles except Model 52 sedan |
B-body | Short | 121.5 | 204.0 |
Roadmaster, all styles except Model 72 sedan |
B-body | Long | 126.25 | 208.75 |
Super 126 Model 52 sedan |
C-body | Short | 125.5 | 208.0 |
Roadmaster 130 Model 72 sedan |
C-body | Long | 130.25 | 212.75 |
Depending on how you want to look at it, the Super 126 was either a longer Super or a short-nosed Roadmaster 130, but either way, it was a significantly larger car than the B-body Super or the cheaper Buick Special.
In an ideal world, I would illustrate the size difference between the Super 126 Model 52 and the shorter B-body Model 51 sedan with a side-by-side comparison, but the brochure doesn’t show them both in profile, and Model 51 survivors are now pretty thin on the ground. (The gray Model 51 pictured above was the only half-decent photo I could find without contacting GM Archives.) Since the Special Deluxe used the same body and was the same size, that will have to suffice:

1950 Buick Special Deluxe Four-Door Tourback sedan, Model 41D / Bring a Trailer
You’ll notice that the rear sail panels of the Super 126 were a very different shape than those of the smaller B-body Buick. In addition to its longer wheelbase, the C-body sedan had a longer roof whose C-pillars intersected the rear deck farther back than on the B-body. This required an additional quarter window behind the rear door, creating what’s called a six-window (or “six-light”) profile. (The B-body was considered a four-window design; its front vent windows weren’t counted separately.)
Unlike some of the stretched-tail big cars of a few years later, whose extra length benefited only trunk space and bragging rights, the Super 126’s longer body provided a significant increase in rear legroom. The brochure proclaimed that the long-wheelbase car had “the rear seat roominess of a limousine—with the extra side windows for good looks and good looking out.”
The shorter-wheelbase Special and Super had drawn some criticism from consumer publications for offering mediocre legroom for their exterior dimensions, but the Super 126 had the kind of interior space you’d expect from a car this size, and it had nicer interior trim as well. Since the C-body weighed 125 lb more than the B-body Super, performance suffered a bit, but I doubt many contemporary buyers had high expectations in that regard.
Unfortunately, the front-seat shot is a bit blurry — not quite enough light for best results — but it does reveal that this car has the standard Synchro-Mesh transmission rather than Dynaflow. Dynaflow was standard on Roadmaster by this time, but it was still a pricey extra on the Special and Super (around $200), so not everyone opted for it. (I unfortunately don’t have installation rates for 1950.)
The bigger body put the Super 126 in an interesting market position. With a base price of $2,212, it was by no means an inexpensive car for 1950 — it was $683 more than a Chevrolet Styleline Deluxe four-door sedan — but it was only $47 more than an Oldsmobile Ninety-Eight sedan, and just $73 more than the smaller four-window Model 51 Super sedan, which Buick buyers apparently considered a bargain: The Model 52 outsold the Model 51 by about 2 to 1.
Although it was still 0.75 inches shorter than the B-body Roadmasters, the C-body Super Model 52 was roomier than the B-body Roadmaster Model 71 sedan, which cost $421 more. In fact, the Super 126 offered size and interior space comparable to a Cadillac Series 62 sedan (which shared the same body shell and was only a half-inch longer in wheelbase) for about $1,000 less. If it wasn’t quite as lavishly trimmed as the Cadillac, the Super 126 was no bargain-basement special — it was still a luxuriously appointed car with an eight-cylinder engine and an upscale badge.

1950 Cadillac Series 62 four-door sedan was 214.88 inches long on a 126-inch wheelbase, but it shared the same six-window sedan body as the Buick Super 126 and Roadmaster 130 / Connors Motorcar Company
Offering the Super 126 obviously carried some risk of cannibalizing Roadmaster sales, but Buick also offered an even bigger C-body Roadmaster 130 sedan, called Model 72 in the catalog, which combined the bigger six-window body with the longer Roadmaster front end:

1950 Buick Roadmaster 130 Four-Door Tourback sedan, Model 72 / Mecum Auctions
However, while the Roadmaster 130 was 4.75 inches longer than the Super 126, both overall and in wheelbase (which was actually 4.25 inches longer than a Cadillac Series 62), the Super 126 was just as big inside. If you didn’t need (or didn’t want) the Roadmaster’s bigger engine and fancier trim, the Super 126 gave you about as much car for significantly less money. (A 1950 Roadmaster 130 listed for $2,854, $642 more than the Super 126.)

Side-by-side comparison with the Super 126 reveals the Roadmaster 130’s longer nose, but the bodies are the same aft of the cowl
Although the cheaper Special Deluxe remained the best-selling Buick model for 1950, the C-body Buicks were very popular: The Model 52 Super 126 sold 114,745 units, 17.1 percent of total 1950 Buick production and by far the best-seller of the Super line, while the Model 72 Roadmaster 130 sold 54,212 units, about 8.1 percent of 1950 production and by far the best-seller of the Roadmaster series.
It was a winning formula, despite Buick’s controversial 1950 styling. (The peculiar grille treatment was a divisive point even at the time.) Buick ranked fourth in U.S. new car sales in 1950, falling short of Plymouth by not quite 12,000 units. Clearly, for a lot of middle-class Americans back then, bigger was better — and, judging by the abundance of giant pickups and gargantuan SUVs on today’s roads, that hasn’t really changed.
Related Reading
Automotive History: General Motors 1949-50 – The Mystery Of The Missing B Body (Part 1) (by J P Cavanaugh)
Automotive History: General Motors 1949-50 – The Mystery Of The Missing B Body (Part 2) (by J P Cavanaugh)
Automotive History: General Motors’ 1950 Body Interchange Program (by VinceC)
Curbside Classic/Design Analysis: 1950 Buick Special Sedanet – The Full-Sized Fastback Problem (by Paul N)
Vintage Snapshots: Buicks – In Their Best Decade, The 1950s (by Paul N)
Vintage Snapshots: Buicks On The Road In The 1950s (by Rich Baron)
Even the basic 1950 Special was a huge car. And an unusual one. The 48 Special had been on the old prewar B body, but there was no 49 Special, other than what ran at the tail end of a long run of the 1948 model. The 1951 Special would be on the new, smaller OB body (shared with Oldsmobile) that was more of a puffed-up A body than it was a proper B.
I still recoil at calling the 4 window 1950 Buick a B body. I never found any Fisher Body material that called it such (despite such identifications on earlier or later generations of B bodies) and I think the only reason people call it such today is out of the sense that “It was GM, so there had to be a B body, didn’t there?” In my view, GM offered only A and C body cars in 1950, with a C body that came in a shorter 4 window roof and a longer 6 window roof versions.
I think it is time for another installment of your “Trucking Adventures” series!
“Wouldn’t you rather have a BUICK ?” .
Yes indeedy .
I like the yellow / black Rivera best, it’s amazing how sporty that porky car looks .
Nice ’68/’69 VW Typ II camper too .
-Nate
A lot of good information here, well laid out. It took me too long to realize that the longer of two sibling cars wouldn’t necessarily have more interior room!
I really like the cheery phrase “the extra side windows for good looks and good looking out”—bravo to the copywriter!
It might be worth pointing out that this Super Model 52 had the same 126″ wheelbase as the Cadillac 62. What a bargain. And that the Roadmaster’s 130″ wb was of course 4″ longer than the Cadillac’s. That’s a bit brazen!
Was the Roadmaster’s straight 8 longer than the Super’s, or did they just want more room for the fourth ventiport?
I read in a Cadillac history that in the 20s, their V8 didn’t require the elegant long hood that Packard’s straight 8 did. Harley Earl or the market may have convinced them to lengthen theirs regardless. After 1930, they put their V12 in their V8 body, and it sold a significant percentage of a much smaller total until a new V8 arrived in ’36.
The big eight was longer and perhaps more importantly, heavier. It probably could have been made to fit in the shorter front end, but the extra wheelbase in front helped balance out the eight distribution too. And of course, it looked more impressive.
I think they could have found a way to shoehorn the fourth ventiport on the hood if they really tried.
I think it’s good that this model didn’t have the heavy chrome of the Roadmaster. It lets the wonderful extensive sculpturing of the sides stand out more.
Those are some very attractive cars. I wasn’t born till 1967, so these were all before my time. Yet I fondly recall seeing some on the roads when I was very young. In fact, my dad rented a farm from an old guy who had a twin to that yellow one. I’ve always loved that car even though it was quite old by that time.
I like the style of these Buicks over some of the other GM and Fords and even Chrysler/Dodge’s of that time.
Back then there was a lot of autonomy between the GM divisions who were free to try different ideas and build and maintain their own identities. Buick was always the darling of the corporation since it was the bedrock that GM had been established on. Cadillac was a division that was bought later, and brought into the GM fold. I was checking out a ’48 Roadmaster a couple of weeks ago, and it was a huge, lavish car. It was superior to the model 61 Cadillac, and easily the equal to the 62s, maybe even the Fleetwoods. Buick had immense brand equity at this time and their OHV straight eight engines were preferred by many over the flathead Cadillac V8.
Great article, typically thorough. The “Dollar Grin” ’50 Buick…they should have sent that design to the orthodontist!
My major recollection of these era Buicks that were still running around when I became conscious of them in the mid-50s was that smooth Dynaflow straight eight sound, nothing else sounded anything like it! My friend Richie, son of a Dodge dealer, was really good at imitating it. You could differentiate many cars just by their sound back then.
The 1950 dark green Olds 98 4 dr sedan that we briefly had also had the longer GM B-body, adorned with the same C-pillar (aka sail panel) as the 1950 Model 41D Special Deluxe shown above, but with the new-for-’49 and far more advanced Olds Rocket 303 V8 under the hood, an engine so well conceived that the same basic engine design was in service from 1949 to 1990.
btw if anyone is looking for a 1950 Cad identical to the green model 62 shown above, there is one in near show condition for sale here in Central NY, I believe the asking price is around $22k, no personal connection. It is a beautiful original automobiIe and seems like a reasonable buy for such a nice car. I can furnish contact info to any interested parties.
The Special/short-wheelbase Super four-window body was shared with the Cadillac Series 61 as well as the Olds 98. The latter two were very close in size — same 122-inch wheelbase, the Cadillac was 2.88 inches longer overall — but the 98 was $2,414 in DeLuxe trim and the Series 61 was $2,866.
FWIW, the technical distinction between sail panel and C-pillar is that the pillar is the structural member and the sail panel is the sheet metal that goes over it.
My first car!
Glad you wrote an article on this car, Aaron. It is a very important historical car.
A friend of mine and I are finalizing an article for the Packard Cormorant that gets into Packard’s 1951 models and how this car and the Super hardtop were telegraphing what the market wanted in late 1949 when Packard still had time to pivot, had they paid attention to Buick’s early sales.
I’m going to whistle into the wind (again) with a query: Do we think (or know) that the nine teeth on that fierce frontal grin are identical ? If not, how many different parts had to be made to fulfill the designer’s order ? In Rich’s second photo, the “full frontal,” we see that the arch above the teeth is indeed slightly curved (as all arches should be) and the teeth seem to follow its shape perfectly. So that means that the first and ninth teeth are shorter than the fourth. Then, we find that the bumper is curved in plan, too, and the teeth are presumably bolted to it, but are apparently parallel to the long axis of the body—which implies that there are right-hand and left-hand teeth. So, did Fisher really have to make nine different teeth for this grille ? Or could a couple of them be used twice ? The difference between the tallest and shortest teeth can be no more (I would guess) than half or three-quarters of an inch. Hmm . . .
You have a good eye: Yes, the teeth are different — I think they’re all different, because of the left/right “handedness” issue, although someone who’s actually owned one of these cars could speak to that more authoritatively — which is also why this grille treatment ended up being a one-year design. Not only did this make the grille bars more expensive to manufacture, Buick determined to make the bars available individually for collision repair purposes, since customers were nervous that this design would make a minor fender-bender a very pricey proposition if they had to replace the entire grille to replace one or two damaged bars. That apparently made this a nightmare from a spares/parts-stocking standpoint, and I assume if you needed to replace damaged bars on a survivor today, it would be a lengthy scavenger hunt.
Fisher only built bodies, not the front sheetmetal.
My grandparents owned a’50 Riviera two door hardtop. It had Dynaflow and I do remember that deep hum it made.
My grandparents were both 55 that year so had been in their 30’s in the 1930’s raising a family, making do, going without. By 1950 they were both working, kids had lives of their own and life was pretty good. I remember my grandmother telling me, “When your grandfather pulled in the driveway with that new car I was the proudest woman on earth.”
They kept it until 1969 when they traded it in for a two door Electra.
Thank you for posting this well done piece. Such memories.
Buick was as high as the available GM range went in those days here and even then they were special order so not very many even arrived here new. so comparing models wasnt really possible.
Long hood short deck personified. Beauty car.
Harlow Curtice perfectly understood who his customers were and what combinations of size, features, power and price would tap a major wellspring of volume demand. In the late 1930’s, the low-priced Special developed it volume with shared B-Bodies with Oldsmobile through Cadillac 60. Roadmaster and Limited shared with Cadillac 70/80/90, though dramatic changes were in store there as well.
Settled on the 248 and 320 ohv engines, the concept of a crossover of small body/large engine arrived with the Century filling one lacking niche, a better performing smaller upmarket model. The opposite combination would have to wait for the arrival of the 1940 Fisher Torpedo C-Body which caused an industry sensation itself. Every GM division got a version except Chevrolet, Buick got two.
The revived Series 50 1940 Super was essentially a Cadillac-shared Torpedo C-Body with all the modern style and luxury cache that carried but powered by the try-and-true ‘economical’ 248 ci Special engine, all at a moderate medium-price. The public loved it, made the Super among Buick’s best sellers annually, thereafter, exceeded only by the Special.
Postwar, Curtice orchestrated a brilliant marketing move given limited materials and resources versus massive pent-up demand, the Special was assigned limited availability duty. All while Super, at moderate medium-prices, became the volume star basking in the Roadmaster luxury aura; sales burgeoned. The market ‘sweet spot’ had been discovered!
With the 1950 B & C-Body program, Special was back in its traditional volume role after it short hiatus, vigorous and ready. Super would share the necessary lower-volumes body styles and even a Model 51 sedan for the ‘frugal’. The volume star continued to be the Roadmaster/Cadillac-sharing C-Body Model 52. It offered sufficient performance plus the all the spaciousness without an excessive premium price. In the very stratified step-structure market established by the Sloan Ladder, the newly prosperous public understood exactly what the Super 52 embodied, enthusiastically voted with their dollars for it through the 1950’s.
Honestly, I think the split body program was really a big mess: confusing to buyers and unnecessarily cumbersome from a production standpoint. Applying the “Riviera” name to the long-wheelbase sedan bodies for 1951 was also a very bad idea.
Buick was in such a strong position at this point that it didn’t do them any great harm, but I think it was a mistake — the short-wheelbase Roadmaster more than the long-wheelbase Super, really. The Super was always sort of straddling the line between “fancier Special” and “less fancy Roadmaster,” so I guess letting it be both wasn’t the worst idea, but expecting buyers to sort out the distinction between the Super Model 52 and Roadmaster Model 71 strikes me as trouble no one needed.
By the annual sales volumes of the Super 52 sedans, Buick customers had no problem understanding content and value proposition being offered. All the interior space and impressive size of the more expensive Roadmaster 72 and Cadillac 62 and 60 Special without the premium prices. The latter two carried considerable luxury cache with the public, both could be considered pretentious and showy to one’s peers, though a Super 52 would be viewed as simply ‘enough’ Buick.
GM didn’t have any problem mixing and matching major components to field a broad selection of choices, even when some only generated modest sales. After sales demonstrated lower demand for some combinations, they were dismissed without any real notice. There were plenty of other desirable models to choose from and helpful salesmen to help one decide.
I didn’t say they did — I said that the offering the longer, but shorter-wheelbase, less-roomy version of the Roadmaster concurrently was a questionable choice. Buyers were obviously keen on the idea of a big roomy Super without the Roadmaster engine and trim, and the Roadmaster 130 offered a strong alternative to a Cadillac. It was the Model 71 Roadmaster where I think the merchandising concept got muddy.
Thanks for an excellent article. My 1950 Buick experience was memories of my friend’s Roadmaster Riviera hardtop that was rear-ended by a ‘58 Pontiac whose entire front end was demolished. The Buick suffered a jammed trunk lock.