Bob Palma

Catalina,

Holiday,

Hollywood,

Panama…

even Willys

Bermuda:

such carefree

names!

Holidays and Hollywoods

How many prestigious, high-line hardtop body styles morphed into common, low-price trim levels after World War II… and into the 1970s? Consider the sales agreement for this 1957 Pontiac. It was my father’s Carib Coral (pink) and Chateau Gray demonstrator when he was sales manager at Widdis-Nielsen Pontiac in 1957. When he left, under pleasant terms, he bought his “demo” wholesale, using his residual dealer name and address. Hobbyists familiar with 1950s models might question the possibility of this car being a Super Chief anda Catalina anda sedan, but that is the correct nomenclature for a 1957 Super Chief four-door hardtop… and an example of a hardtop body style that became a trim level. That’s because Catalina denoted a two-door or four-door hardtop — a fixed steel roof with no B-pillar — from 1950 through 1958. Thus, one could order the car on this invoice, a Super Chief Catalina sedan. Catalina became so popular and positively associated with Pontiac that the division converted that body style’s name to a popular, low-price trim level for 1959 and forward. One could then own a two-door or four-door Catalina sedan with a fixed B-pillar, or even a Catalina convertible. General Motors launched that new hardtop body style, originally called “hardtop convertible, ” in 1949. With a fixed steel roof and no B-pillar, that configuration would dominate the industry by 1955. GM’s 1949 hardtop convertibles were Cadillac Coupe de Villes, Buick Roadmaster Rivieras, and Oldsmobile Ninety-Eight Holidays, names that denoted both a trim level anda body style. For 1950, GM offered the popular new body style in smaller bodies as Chevrolet Styleline DeLuxe Bel Airs and Pontiac Chieftain Catalinas, as well as Oldsmobile Seventy-Six and Eighty-Eight Holidays, and Buick Super Rivieras. Later, like Catalina, Bel-Air became a trim level. Oldsmobile used the Holiday name in one form or another as late as 1973 to denote true hardtop models, both two-door and fourdoor, regardless of trim level. As “no-B-pillar hardtops” succumbed to Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards in the mid 1970s, so did the Holiday moniker… only to be resurrected in 1978 as a special trim package for an Eighty-Eight two-door sedan with a fixed B-pillar!

From 1950 through 1956, Chrysler fielded Newport pillarless hardtops. Thus, a New Yorker Newport or a Saratoga Newport denoted those respective trim levels in a hardtop body style. For 1961, though, Newport was reincarnated as the lowest-price Chrysler trim level in various body styles, with and without B-pillars.

Plymouth Cranbrook Belvederes and Dodge Coronet Diplomats, both new 1951 models, are similar examples. Belvedere and Diplomat originally denoted top-line two-door hardtop body styles that morphed into trim levels and then, entire lines of cars.

Ford introduced the 1951 Custom Victoria as its two-door hardtop and used Victoria in that manner from 1951 forward. In 1956, Town Victoria denoted Ford’s new four-door hardtop. However, it did market two fixed B-pillar Victorias — the unique, top-shelf 1955 and ’56 Crown Victorias.

Ford used Victoria for pillarless hardtop models through 1964, an example of which would be a 1959 Galaxie Town Victoria. Ultimately, Ford demoted Crown Victoria to its final series of rear-wheel-drive cars, all of which had fixed B-pillars.

Some two-door hardtop names never became trim levels. Among the independents, for example, all 1951’57 Hudson Hollywoods were true two-door hardtops in various trim levels, as were all Nash and Nash Rambler Country Clubs and Packard Clipper Constellations and Panamas.

Studebaker never had a Starliner trim level but used Starliner to identify its two-door hardtops, either Commanders or Champions, in 1953 and ’54. Ford later used Starliner on a special two-door hardtop in 1960 and ’61… still a model, not a trim level.

Catalina, Holiday, Hollywood, Panama… even Willys Bermuda: such carefree names! Is it any wonder that today ’s ho-hum, nondescript XLR, ZTS, etc. model names will likely never engender the same warm, positive images?