I was elated to find this little gem on the dark side of a Tokyo street recently. You don’t run into a 1st generation Corolla everyday, even in Japan. But it led me to thinking about why Toyota took so long to field a capable small family car – a Beetle-fighter, if you will – and conquer the world with it.
Toyota really did things a little ass-backwards. If you look at the way they developed their ranges in the ‘50s and ‘60s, Japanese carmakers usually followed a similar pattern: start with a small economy car – or a kei, or even a trike – then aim higher with each successive new model. That’s pretty much how Daihatsu, Hino, Honda, Mazda, Mitsubishi, Nissan and Subaru did it. Toyota did the opposite. Worked out pretty well for them, too. (Certainly better than it did for the other two that bucked the trend – Isuzu and Prince.)
The first modern Toyota was the 1955 Crown, a 1.5 litre “big” car. They followed it with the 1957 Corona, initially a 1-litre. But it moved up to the 1.5 litre mid-range spot when the Crown went up to 2 litres in 1960. In 1962, the Publica was launched as the small economy model, with a 700cc twin. They then followed that up with a range-topping V8, the 1964 Crown Eight. So in the mid-60s, there was a big compact family car-sized gap in the middle of Toyota’s range. Almost everyone else was at it, from Datsun to Subaru, but Toyota took their time – it was important to get it right. And then they hit with the E10 Corolla in late 1966.
The two-door sedans arrived first, soon followed by the Sprinter coupé. The engine was an all-new OHV 4-cyl. with a displacement of either 1.1 or 1.2 litres – slightly larger than initially planned to give the model an edge over the competition. By mid-1967, the four-door had arrived, as did the two-door wagon.
It was just too dark to take an interior shot, so here’s one from a Toyota brochure instead…
Sure, the Corolla was a conservative little car with drum brakes, a live rear axle and cart springs, but it also had modern MacPherson struts up front, a peppy 60 hp engine and a 4-speed manual on the floor. That last feature was something of a gamble by Toyota: Japanese customers associated floor shifters with trucks and three speeds were still thought to be sufficient – might the presence of a 4th gear belie the fact that the engine lacked torque? The gamble paid off. Highway driving was just becoming a thing and the 4th gear proved nicely suited to it, and the floor change’s sportier feel gave the Corolla a edgier vibe. The optional 2-speed Toyoglide was also floor-mounted, but that was more for US exports anyway. This was all packaged within a nicely designed body that wouldn’t have looked out of place on a contemporary European car.
The E10 Corolla’s modern and neutral look was probably the key to its success. One could mentally replace the Toyota badges with Ford or Opel ones, and most people wouldn’t have known any better. You couldn’t really do that with the Publica or the early Coronas, or indeed with most of the Corolla’s rivals. The Corolla was a sign that Toyota had become a true global player, with enough confidence to take on the likes of BMC, Fiat, Renault or VW on emerging markets and soon on their domestic ones, competing in every segment.
It all started with this. Well, not this one exactly, as it has had more than a few modifications. Thankfully, the lack of lighting prevented me from seeing their full extent. At least, the polished brightwork and general shape looked legit enough. Few 50-year old Corollas would still be on the street without a few ameliorations, anyway.
I have vivid memories of my mother’s 1980 Corolla wagon, which she bought second hand in 1987 and drove my brother and me to school with for three years. It had five gears, quad headlamps, rubber bumpers, rear doors and plastic wood on the sides, but still was pretty closely related to this original version. The older car looks better of course, with all those ‘60s chrome touches, but three-door wagons are just plain impractical. That Sprinter coupé, on the other hand…
Related posts:
Coastside Classic Outtake: 1969 Toyota Corolla Wagon – Home Away From…No Home, by PN
Vintage Review: 1968 – 1970 Toyota Corolla – Smaller Bug Killer, by GN
Love it! This really was an attractive little car, styled just right for its times.
I also really miss those long, thin stick shifts coming from way up ahead on the floor. With everything being FWD now I guess they can poke the stick up through the floor wherever they want to (and, of course, surround it with acres of plastic console).
I saw this little Corolla’s great-great-great… grandchild in a parking lot yesterday. I was in Albuquerque for training and during one of the breaks I was walking laps in the hotel parking lot (I hate being stuck sitting for hours on end.) I also enjoy scoping out the employees cars in the back parking lot, always an interesting mix. There was a nearly perfect Jag X-type 3.0 as an example.
At any rate there was a Matrix XSR parked out there. I eyeballed it for the 6 speed manual to see if it was the real deal, a 170 hp turbo high performance “Corolla wagon”. Which it was. The thing that stuck out to me was how far forward the shifter was and the acres of plastic around it.
A few reviewers of current manual transmission cars have commented that the today’s cars don’t often seem from an ergonomic standpoint to have been designed with the manual trans in mind.
At a speedy internet glance, “corolla” refers to flower petals which enclose the reproductive organs (for sure, like those elsewhere, the petals have other functions which, unlike those elsewhere, include looking good) and boy oh boy, did they conceal some fertile ones for Toyota, so they damn sure got the nomenclature spot-on. (Perhaps, alternatively, it could be said that the model was named from a visionary certainty that as a corollary of its excellence it would effect a non-productive reproductive action upon all competition to this very day?)
In any event, that is some find there, even though it is a three door wagon which many of us – well, me – know are silly as wagons but the very best for longroof aesthetics.
We got them here before any other country, and many forgotten moons ago, I went for a ride in surely the oldest here, an actual ’66 imported model. Naturally, then it was just an old car, albeit one with a strange young passenger who found the I.D. tag exciting. Ahem.
Shortly after ’66, they began assembly here in Melbourne, and folk just loved them, as they looked quite pretty and moreso when it turned out that they could be cruised as fast as any wheezy-lunged Holden, but never, ever broke until rust did them part 40years later – unlike the aforementioned local hero. It’s perennially No. 1, or thereabouts enough.
(Btw, Corolla Toyoglides here were never on the column, and we’re RHD too).
Goodness gracious, I believe you’re completely correct about the Toyoglide’s placement! Bad info somewheres on the web (or bad translation). Photographic proof sought, found and text amended. Arigato, Justy-sensei.
Why, much obligato to you too, Tatra-teacher.
In all fairness, having driven a second-gen Corolla mit Toyogloop, I should add that any sensible buyer shouldn’t have cared less where the shifter might be as long as the Toyoglacial was not fitted anywhere in the car, because it didn’t glide or Toyo or do anything much but sit there and moan loudly whilst exciting the engine and draining the fuel tank and providing a new and very extended meaning to the words “speed” and “increments”, and frankly, if they’d fitted the shifter upside down on the roof it could have mattered less, so worry ye not.
EX GFhad one in the late 90s still rust free Tassie cars are like that it was Aussie built in 68 but rebuilt some time later with 4K engine disc brakes wider rims stiffer suspension roll bar etc fun car to drive too fast for the conditions especially on gravell, noisy to ride in the induction roar from the webber drowned out any speaking, she bought it to commute up and down the 110 hairpin bends of Gormanston hill leading in and out of Queenstown, now thats a commute I could live with.
It was about this time that the Datsun Bluebird/510 progressively went to floor shifts starting with the SSS and export markets. They were discovering that Americans considered four-on-the-floor sporty and upscale of the dowdy three-on-the-tree, while Europeans simply expected a shift lever between the seats meaning the overall message was not to bother engineering a left-hand-drive manual column shift. Clearly with the Corolla Toyota decided to try not doing one at all, and it worked.
Toyota dropped the ball there and fitted column change to NZ Coronas but my Aussie built one had a slick floor change and AC/engine brake
Great looking wagon. We had a new ’69 Corolla 2 door with Toyoglide, dark blue and white walls! I think Dad got a few dollars off because the ’70 model with headrests was just arriving. Shifter was definitely on the floor. (Maybe wagons were different?)
This is quite the survivor.
2dr wagons were extremely practical. Just like 2dr cars back in the day that was seen as the safest option if you had young kids. Before car seats and common use of seat belts kids were allowed to roam the back seat and being a 2dr there was no door they could accidentally fall out of, a real and true concern for some.
In the Republic of Ireland , the key to the E10 Corollas’ success had nothing to do with the “modern and neutral look” – in fact I remember these as being much brasher than contemporary Opels or Fords. In the 60’s and even in the 70’s buying a brand new car was a bit like buying a brand new house. You’d need to make a “snag list” of the things that needed putting right. Depending on the competence of your main dealer and his staff, you might be waiting a very long time. Corollas were right when they came from the factory, no need for a spanner-man to go near them until it was time for servicing.
What a great find! I can relate as my brother had a 70 Sprinter coupe, 1200 3K-C engine and 4 speed. It was fairly fun to drive
These wagons were all over California in the early 1970’s, particularly the choice of young families.
Regarding Toyota’s approach here, I think it’s important to note that Japan had really only had a mass market for private sale passenger cars for a few years when development of the E10 Corolla began. Until the end of the ’50s, TOTAL passenger car sales in Japan had yet to hit 100,000 units. Cars like the earliest Crown were originally aimed largely at commercial buyers like taxi companies or government departments because that was who had the money to buy an automobile.
In the mid-50s, the Ministry of International Trade and Industry (MITI) decided it should be a priority to get Japan motorized, since that was deemed a sign of progress. MITI’s ideas about that centered on developing low-cost “people’s cars” that would be small, cheap, and economical. Toyota dutifully did that, with the original two-cylinder P10 Publica. They even launched a separate dealer chain to sell it.
However, the Publica was kind of a damp squib commercially because it suffered a bad case of the Kaiser Henry J problem — it was obviously a cheap car for people who couldn’t afford better, and its relationship to the Corona and Crown was marginal. Toyota tried to jazz it up a bit, which didn’t help much.
Development of the Corolla began not long after it became apparent the Publica wasn’t going over well and reflected Toyota developing a product to suit their assessment of the market rather than satisfying MITI’s directives.
There was really not a huge gap between the Datsun Sunny and the Toyota Corolla. The Sunny launched six or seven months earlier, and Toyota’s delay gave them the chance to make some last-minute adjustments that let them claim an edge over the Sunny in a couple of areas (like having a 1,077cc engine rather than 988cc).
The Publica also continued, its later iterations eventually becoming the Toyota Starlet.
This was a really great car.
It was meant for a family, but in the US, became the perfect second car.
It was far superior to what Detroit was producing in that price range regarding ownership, practicality, quality and design.
It was roomy, simple and dependable.
It was one of the best Pre-Civic Japanese cars.