American's finest? Or Satan's Chariot?
In 1956 You could get a Chrysler Imperial, Lincoln Premier, Cadillac Fleetwood - or a Packard.
American luxury meant something in those days. Cadillac was "The Standard of the World"
These were the cars of plutocrats, potentates, captains of Industry, Diplomats, the Mega rich, and American cars ruled supreme, and these were the best.
"Ask the Man Who Owns One" - that was the slogan.
A "baby boomer" friend of mine had to, just had to, relive his past, which was
a 1956 Packard 400 coupe his father had bought new long ago.
He finally found an original, a San Francisco bay area, local, lifetime car, from the same family as new, that had bought it brand new from the Packard dealer in Berkeley, Webb Motors, back in 1956. It had plenty of provenance, including the original yellow and black 1956 California license plates, books, , manuals and accessory brochures, and about 90,000 miles on it.
I would have called it Satan's Chariot, though, because the complex Ultramatic transmission kept breaking over and over, and it was practically impossible to get parts for it, and it had to be shipped to Los Angeles.
At ome point they found someone in LA who said they could mate the indestructible Chrysler Torqueflite transmissiom to it, but then it wouldn't be original any more.
It had the famous self-leveling suspension that was awfully unreliable, too.
Not being a gearhead, and he would have been committing a felony if he picked up a wrench, so he was over $20,000 in repairs to it, before he knew it!
That car OWNED HIM!!! And that was before the interior, chrome, glass, and paint were even touched!!!. But it's getting there, back to its days of glory.
But talk about a tank! A huge stately dignified thing that drew gasps everywhere! Sitting inside of it made you feel you would hear the announcement of the Russian Sputnik launch from 1957 over the AM radio at any minute.
Mad you wann shout: "I like IKE!!!" Maybe screetch the tires a couple of times in honor of good American ingenuity.
He's had it for about 15 years now, and is deep into the Packard Club, and writes articles for their club newspaper and goes on tours with it.
I saw it a cople of weeks ago, along with the other cars in his stable: a 1989 Rolls Royce Silver Spur, 2003 BMW 330i and 2003 BMW 525i (and wife's Honda Accord).
He told me that one of the cars had to go, the Insurance is getting bothersome, and he tried to convince me I'd like that little cobalt blue BMW 3er.
But, he is gonna keep that Packard. What a time machine. I wish I had a link of a picture of it to post up.
But -:
It looks just like this, though it really does:
http://exotic.collectorcartrader.com/details.php?adId=adcache.exotic.collectorcartraderonline.com/ad-cache/10/exotic/3/9/86534939.htm