https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vml6vq3X-Js
This looks like a new addition to YouTube, and it’s better than average. I spotted just a couple of 1964 Model year cars, so it must be the winter of ’63-’64.
Vintage Film: San Francisco Cable Car Rides, 1963-1964 — Some Fine Car Spotting, Including An Amphicar
– Posted on November 26, 2021
Niedermobile in the first second! Amphicar at 3:30.
Was that Melanie Daniels crossing the street in her Aston Martin DB2??
Love the 61 Fury taxis!
Just because people are wearing heavy coats, it doesn’t mean it isn’t summer in San Francisco.
Why isn’t there a turkey Rice a Roni?
I’m guessing you’re not familiar with SF weather. Yes, when the summer fog is in, it’s a bit cool (around 60 degrees), and it can be windy too. But perfectly clear days like this are a hallmark of the winter season in SF. As does the presence of several bare deciduous trees.
The fact that there are just a couple of ’64 MY cars to be seen seals the deal.
Wasn’t expecting that Amphicar at the end!
I so associate Checker cabs with my teenage years that my first thought when I saw one at 1:24 was “hey what’s a ’70s car doing in this 1963-ish footage?”
Near-collision at 2:15.
My favorite is that pug-nosed pre-chicken tax VW panel van with the small back window that darts around the block.
“…Near-collision at 2:15…”
After just missing hitting the Pontiac, it looked like he was thinking about taking on the cable car but thought better of it. Might have realized the cable car would have reduced his car to crumpled nothingness with him inside.
Some driver’s are impatient and don’t want to follow a cable car at 9 mph, plus stops for passengers (illegal to pass a stopped cable car).
Quite a lot of ’61 Plymouth yellow taxicabs.
Yes Daniel, and they are all Plaza model, not Fury as earlier reported. Fury was only a Premium 2door Hardtop at that time.
lots of corvairs too
Refreshing!
That is the San Francisco where I grew up (I lived there until 1974).
Today, The City (capitalization mandatory for old San Franciscans) is a much different place. Big Eastern cities have been referred to as “rat-infested.” Today’s San Francisco is a bit different: just plain “infested.” Don’t take your CC there unless you know you can source new window glass…smash-and-grabs are common even when there isn’t anything visible to steal, and the stuff that does get stolen is fenced and thus converted to drugs.
I am glad that my highs come from polishing my cars and seeing them gleam.
Biggest surprises for me are how lightly trafficked these roads are for a big city, and how few imports there are. I’d thought that S.F. was one of the places in the U.S. where “foreign cars” first took root in a big way.
Not one, but two Jaguar XKE roadsters!
Both with whitewalls! My Dad’s pal inherited one in the 80s that had been parked for 15+ years. It had wide whites, which everyone made fun of, it’s fun to see them in period. This was a thing!
We only got to see one ’59 Cadillac rocket fin, then Fin!
Lots of Beetles, Thunderbirds, an Austin Healey and an XKE, a Breezeway window Continental, a beautiful 1963 Cadillac coupe, great stuff. City looks so clean.
MG 1100 at 1:04.
What a funny coincidence, I just saw this video on YouTube the other day! Very enjoyable.
Nice video, interesting to see what were popular for private cars at that time. Love those big American Pontiacs.
I have been to San Francisco a few times over the years and surprisingly picked out some locations I remember from the last trip there in 2019.I have to assume with the high cost of real estate in that city buildings don’t get torn down much.
Lots of 1963 models (but no Pontiacs with stacked headlights). There’s a 1964 Ford wagon near the beginning, Three ’61 Oldsmobiles, including a wagon.
The Checker cabs look the same as the ones a decade newer (until they got the 5 mph bumpers).
Not [i]quite[/i] the same; the big round side marker lights that arrived for ’68 aren’t present!
*Inserts useless granular detail here* -The big round side marker lights showed up for 1970. They are the same lamps used on the rear of 1970 Buick Electras and Rivieras, but without the printed script or crest in the middle… and rendered in Guide Fade-O-Matic amber up front. These carried through through the end in 1982. 1968 and 69 Checkers used cheesy round reflectors attached with a single screw through the middle, looking much like what was used on 68-69 Dodge pickups.
I knew those ’70 (thank you) to ’82 Checker side markers were from Guide, but didn’t know they’re ’70 Buick items minus the filligrees. Love it! And yeah, how many gazillion front side markers did Guide make for GM, Checker, and perhaps other automakers in that plastic that remains amber only briefly? Probably at least one gazillion more than Koito made taillights and rear side markers for Toyota in that plastic that remains red only briefly.
Like…how is this difficult? Sheesh.
Odd how for ’73-only Eldorado too picked up that incongruous afterthought looking round marker.
Another spotting! I don’t think it looks all that badly outta place on the ’73 Eldo, but since you put it that way, I’m kind of surprised they didnt’ slap ’em on the ’74-5-6 Cadillacs…everything else about those cars looked thoughtlessly thrown together, possibly by an entire company full of people working on creating or getting over a severe hangover.
But wait, there’s more!
The Eldorado used round rear side marker lights from 1968-70, too. It is odd that they went away for two years, then appeared again for just 1973. I actually like the look of the round ones… Almost seems like a deliberate styling choice, as the default side marker shape tends toward 31 flavors of rectangular.
Here’s a picture of the one used on 1969-70 Eldos- I believe 1968 was slightly smaller and sans reflector:
I spotted the DKW but could not think of its name.Borgward?. No !.
How about a Renault Floride coupe and the VW Transporter van. MG1100 at the road side?. A new red MGA hardtop…
I’m surprised at how many base-model cars we’re seeing here—by my count at least 6 or 7 Biscaynes, for example. I would have thought in big city California in the early ’60s there’d be more higher-end model cars in the mix. This is almost like Canada, where folks at that time at least traditionally gravitated to cheaper, less showy cars.
Thanx for this wonderful movie ! .
@ Bruce; at that time S.F. was full of cheap places to live, along with dirty Hippies everywhere .
I remember when you could hail a 1/3 full cable car most anywhere, now the tourists jam them full at either end so locals can’t/don’t use them for cheap transport .
The Amphicar is closely followed by a traffic cop on a Harley-Davidson “Servi-Car”with all steel body and a FlatHead 45C.I. putt-putt engine, no helmet in those days . after that comes a Chevy Biscayne (?) Metro Police car, prolly a 235 engine .
-Nate
And a Volvo 444 @ 3:13.
There’s a couple of 444’s/544’s. But I didn’t see any 122’s. I thought I saw a DKW early on, but no one’s mentioned it. And a small van that doesn’t seem to be Econoline or VW … maybe Ford Thames. All in all, this looks about like the SF of my childhood (I grew up across the Bay, but we went to the City quite often).
Was it the red and white window van next to the Breezeway Lincoln? That was a Chevy Corvair Greenbrier van.
Not a whole lot of A-body Mopars. I see a white ’61 Valiant at 1:14 and a white ’63 Valiant at 1:20, and I think that might be a black ’64 Valiant at 2:37. I don’t see any Darts or Lancers.
There’s a ’63 or ’64 Chrysler at 1:40, but that’s not an A-body, obvs.
There’s another ’64 Valiant (wagon) at 2:41, right after the black one.
The lack of any Darts is a bit surprising.
Ah, so there is. So that’ll be three white Valiants and one black one. No Darts, and no ’62 Mopars at all. This is nothing at all like what I was led to believe San Francisco was like, Valiantwise. Or maybe something happened between ’61 and when this present movie was filmed, and that’s why we see the few Valiants travelling in packs…!
There’s a Renault Caravelle at 2:28, and Simca hardtop at 0:25. And a Studebaker taxi @ 2:55.
So that is a Simca? That was my first thought, then decided it was an Auto Union 1000 SP (I mistakenly wrote DKW above) since I wasn’t sure there was any 2 door Simca coupe sold here, only a convertible.
EDIT: Never mind, I watched it again, no tail fins, so not an Auto Union, definitely Simca. I knew I shouldn’t second guess you!
Morris 1100, and I recognise the Chancellor Hotel up from Union Square. Stayed there in in 2018, and recommend it. Thanks for the memories.
Yes Simca Aronde, REnault Carravelle, I saw one recently being driven in traffic quite rare cars here, Thats probably a MG 1100,
Was that John Anglin driving by?
Who were the two guys with him?
Excellent footage. Like in Bullitt, a VW Bug keeps appearing over and over again. They were that popular.
Came to say the same! That is one the things I enjoy when watching “Bullitt”, seeing the number of cars that, back then were just ordinary, parked along the streets; those same cars today are worth $$$$, and many are only moved via trailer! 🙂
I presume most of the cars had manual transmissions back then.
Doubt todays generation could handle such hills with a stick shift.