General Motors' Early-1960s Transition to Nested Trunk Lids

One design detail Bill Mitchell instituted after becoming General Motors' design vice president at the end of 1958 was trunk lids nested by the upper edges of rear fenders.  It took a few model years for that to happen.

This was not a major styling thing -- just an example of changing details to make a design seem "fresh" compared to previous designs.

Until around the mid-1950s, aft ends of cars were taller than rear fenders.  Then trunk lids were at fender-level or lower on some designs.  The tail fin era of the later '50s necessarily had them nested.  When the reaction to tail fins began setting in, some cars' aft ends became pretty flat.

Based on the images below, it seems that Mitchell decided that a nice styling theme would be flat-topped trunk lids slightly nested by narrow rear fenders.  Let's take a look.

Unless noted, cars pictured below were listed for sale on the Internet.

Gallery

1960 Pontiac Bonneville
A Pontiac shorn of its 1959 model year fins.

1961 Pontiac Bonneville
Next year we see Mitchell's nested trunk lid concept in action.

1962 Pontiac Catalina - Mecum Auctions photo
Tail lights creep onto the fender aft ends.

1963 Pontiac Catalina - Mecum
Now they are narrow, like the restyled fender tops.  This is Mitchell's concept in pure form.

1960 Oldsmobile Super 88
Now Oldsmobile.  The aft of this post-fin facelift is quite flat.

1961 Oldsmobile Super 88
A new rear end theme.  Still nearly flat.

1962 Oldsmobile Super 88
This facelift has new aft end fender shaping.

1963 Oldsmobile Super 88
But serious nesting isn't in play until '63.  Oddly, the fender tops are mini tail fins.

1961 Buick Electra 225
Buick aft ends were flat for 1961.

1962 Buick Electra 225
Restyled, and still pretty flat.  But some relief in the form of a central sculpted element echoing the nearby fender tops.

1963 Buick Electra 225
Finally, strong nesting between sharp fenders,  Not as attractive as for 1962, I think.

General Motors 1968 A-Body Hardtop Coupés

The 1960s decade was a good one, so far as General Motors styling is concerned.  Bill Mitchell, who took over design leadership from the legendary Harley Earl in 1958, was able to control designs for all those model years starting 1961 when he was at the peak of his abilities.  (By the mid-1970s Mitchell, like Earl in the mid-1950s, began to lose his touch.)

General Motors' redesigned model year 1968 A-body 2-door line was based on a reasonable (for America) 112-inch (2845 mm) wheelbase carried over from its initial 1961 "compact car" line.  Styling was pleasant, professionally done.  In those days, GM was prosperous and could afford to pay tooling costs for numerous brand-specific and even model-specific details.

The Gallery below presents comparative images of one hardtop coupé model from each of the brands using A-bodies for '68.  They are ordered in ascending price-prestige brand rank: Chevrolet, Pontiac, Oldsmobile and Buick.

Gallery

1968 Chevrolet Malibu (Chevelle) - car-for-sale photos
A particularly fancy Chevrolet version.  Of course, each brand's design had its own front end features.  That stripe flowing in front of the hood opening, then along the front fender leading edge, finally above the rocker panel, is interesting.  Might even be unique.

1968 Pontiac Tempest Custom - car-for-sale photos
Pontiacs had to have two-section grilles that, for 1968, were framed by bumper elements.  The more upscale GTO version had cladding over the chromed area shown here.

1968 Oldsmobile Cutlass - car-for-sale photos
Again, different hood, front fender leading edge and "facial" tooling used here.

1968 Buick Skylark Custom - car-for-sale photos
Like the Olds, front bumper protection is sketchy.

Side views are more interesting because brand identification is minimal or absent.  What matters for today's post are the shapes of window framing and the tooling expenses General Motors made to create not-absolutely-necessary-brand-variation when viewed from this perspective.  Here we see a strong aft convergence to a fairly sharply rounded point.

Window profile abaft of the B-pillar is squared off.  Pontiac A-body coupes had minimal side ornamentation and subtle side sculpting.

Rear side window framing is similar to the Chevy's, but more rounded.  Clean sides and no obvious rear fender treatment -- like Pontiac.

The side window converges to a sharp point.  The side sculpting echoes Buick's SweepSpear chrome trim that first appeared on some 1949 models.

All four cars had short rear fender area tops that nested the trunk lids.

They were blended into tiny sail panels framing backlight windows.

Here the sail panels transition to crisp framing atop the backlight.

The Buick's rear is more unique than the others.  The basic theme is a wedge shape.

1948 Oldsmobile Convertibles: 68 and 98 Compared

General Motors' model year 1948 Oldsmobile brand is interesting because its various model lines each used one of GM's three basic body platforms.  Entry level Olds 60-series cars were on A-bodies (aside perhaps from fastbacks), 70-series cars used B-bodies, and line-topping Ninety-Eights got GM's redesigned for '48 C-bodies that 1948 Cadillacs also used.

Oldsmobile styling for 1948 was attractively restrained.  In my post "General Motors' Best-Looking 1948 Car," the winner was the 1948 Olds 98 convertible coupe.

Just for fun, today's post compares that C-body convertible to Oldsmobile's 68 A-body convertible that used a design dating from 1940 and massively facelifted for 1941.  Given that the 68 had a pre- World War 2 design and the 98 was a new design, I suppose the greatest styling interest in such a comparison is how the designers dealt with visual brand identity.

Gallery

1948 Oldsmobile 68 Convertible Coupe - BaT Auctions photos
My post "Oldsmobile Grille Evolution: 1946-1957" shows that the grille design seen here first appeared in model year 1946.  The style of upper grille framing continued through 1954.  This was in contrast to the elaborate 1942 grille.  Headlights placed inboard from fender outer edges was an Oldsmobile-only feature for General Motors over much of the 1940s.

1948 Oldsmobile 98 Convertible Coupe - Mecum Auctions photos
Besides the grille theme, similarities with the 68 car include the crest and word "OLDSMOBILE" on the front of the hood.

Side view comparison.

Wheelbase is 125 inches (3175 mm), 6 inches (152 mm) longer than the 68's.  This car is lower than the 68, part of an industry trend.  Both cars have bold chrome strips abaft of the front wheel openings and rock guards on the lower forward faces of the rear fenders.  The larger rear wheel opening on the 68 made a horizontal chrome strip on its rear fender impractical.

Rear quarter perspective.

Tail light assemblies seem to be the same despite the different bodies.  Rear ends of cars in those days were still simple, decorations given little attention by stylists.  That changed during the 1950s and later.

The 68s dashboard was largely the same as those on 1941 Oldsmobiles.

A new design with a new dashboard.

First-Generation American Panoramic Windshields

General Motors usually set the styling theme pace for American carmakers from the late 1920s through the 1960s.  Of course there were exceptions.  Other firms sometimes introduced features before GM -- an example is placing headlights in front fenders.  And GM sometimes designed cars that didn't sell well -- the late 1950s, for example.

One styling feature that briefly dominated American design was the panoramic (or "wraparound" as we usually termed it in those days) windshield.  It was a pet project of GM's design supremo Harley Earl.  They first appeared 1950-51 on the LeSabre and XP-300 "dream cars."  Model year 1953 saw them on Cadillac Eldorado and Oldsmobile Fiesta convertibles.  And for 1954, Oldsmobiles, Buicks and Cadillacs were redesigned with panoramic windshields.

Model year 1955 saw most models from the other carmakers sporting such windshields, although it took until 1956 for a few other brands to catch up.  Some models such as Studebaker coupes and Nash Metropolitans never went panoramic.

Not all brands from each manufacturer are shown below.  Only examples of each new windshield design are presented in the interest of keeping this post from becoming too long.  The only major omission is the 1956 Lincoln whose windshield was similar to other vertical A-pillar designs.

Gallery

1954 Cadillac Coupe de Ville - BaT Auctions photos
Here is GM's C-body version.

Windshield is tall and framed by A-pillars that are essentially vertical.

1954 Oldsmobile Super 88 - RM Sotheby's photos
GM B-body windshield.

Also tall, but the A-pillar slants forward.

1955 Chevrolet Bel Air - car-for-sale photos
C-body cars were redesigned for 1955.

A-pillars are essentially vertical, a common solution.

1955 Ford Customline - car-for-sale photos
Fords were massively facelifted for 1955.  Roofs were flatter and windshields became panoramic, but not as high as the GM versions.

Again, a vertical A-pillar.

1957 Continental Mark II - car-for-sale photos
The Mark II appeared for model year 1956.  Its panoramic windshield is unlike the others shown here.  It does not intrude into the roofline.

A-pillars slant to the rear.

1955 DeSoto Firedome - Barrett-Jackson photos
Windshields used for Chryslers and DeSotos.  Not as tall as General Motor's versions.

The main difference was the aft-slanting A-pillar.  Same sort of pillar as before, but anchored farther aft.  This gave Chrysler cars a more conventional appearance and seems to have reduced or eliminated the distortion found on GM cars.  In 1956 my father test-drove Oldsmobiles and Chevrolets, experiencing annoying distortion.  So he bought a DeSoto instead.

1955 Dodge Coronet - GAA Auction photos
The panoramic on CHhysler Corporation's entry brands.  Its upper frame is aligned with the upper side window framing.

Another aft-slanting A-pillar.

1955 Packard 400 - Daniel Schmitt photos
Packard's strong '55 facelift included a panoramic windshield.

It's pretty much like the GM vertical A-pillar designs.

1955 Studebaker Champion - car-for-sale photos
Studebaker added panoramics partway in to the 1955 model year.

Similar to Chrysler's solution.

1955 Nash Ambassador - photo via Hemmings
Another facelift, but not as strong as Ford's or Packard's -- changes were at the front end, plus the windshield.

1955 Nash Ambassador - car-for-sale photo
Again, a largely vertical A-pillar

1956 Nash Rambler - car-for-sale photos
Rambler was redesigned for 1956, so its panoramic windshield was probably intrinsic to the styling.

From this photo, the pillar is vertical.  But back in the day, I always felt that the A-pillar tilted slightly aft.