Photos from the Cohort by Hyperpack.
It’s little secret that by 1968, Chrysler’s wishes for its Imperial were falling far short of its imperial ambitions. The marque’s high water point had been in ’57, early on the marque’s imperial quest. From then, as JPC’s post on a ’68 Imperial Convertible told, the whole saga was one of constant retreats until eventual capitulation.
And with ’67 being the year that the Imperial lost its stand-alone platform, one can see the non-empire was in trouble. Not that it was news by then.
If one is to look for imperial analogies for the ’68 Imperial, I could see the case for it being Portugal’s Prince Regent John in 1807; fleeing to Brazil to set up its court in that territory while Napoleon was taking over its kingdom. Or maybe the reign of Spain’s young Alfonso the XIII? Losing what little of the Spanish Empire was left to the Americans in the 1898 Spanish-American War.
I would think there are more appropriate examples, but those are the ones that first jump to mind.
However troubled the Imperial project might have been by ’68, that doesn’t take away that any surviving one isn’t worth our attention. And as the images show, today’s sample is indeed a rather troubled Imperial.
This one belongs, once more, to the multiple MoPar Cohort uploads by Hyperpack (slant six in the comments). And yes, it’s another of the vehicles lying in the surrounding grounds of GO Car Sales in West Mifflin, PA. Like many others there, I would think this one has been at this location for quite a while without use.
As told in previous posts, the ’68 Imperial was little changed from the previous year, except for styling updates to differentiate some more from the full-size Chryslers. In that update, the ’68 carried with even more severity the elegant rectilinearity promoted by Chrysler’s VP of styling Elwood Engel. The lineup included the top-of-the-line LeBaron, then the Crown in 2-door Coupe, 4-door hardtop, and convertible versions (the latter making its final appearance). And finally, the Imperial Sedan.
While since ’67 the Imperial shared Chrysler’s unibody full-size C-platform, the car wasn’t a mere badge job. For one, the Imperial had its own distinctive body and its wheelbase benefited from an additional 3″ (127″ vs. 124″). That translated to an extra 6″ inches in length, and an extra 1″ of width. The model also enjoyed multiple luxury options, from full instrumentation and outstanding cooling and heating to 6-way power seats and the then-novel Auto-Pilot (Cruise Control). That plus the rarely ordered Mobile Director chair, now a true collector’s item.
Carefully crafted and expensive-looking detailings accented all those luxury options. The nicely chiseled grille, for one, looks the part of the upper-class product the Imperial aimed to be.
Door-mounted toggle switches controlled a multitude of powered goodies. Interiors also offered a mix of fabric, wood paneling and leather to pick and choose from.
Period road tests attested that the Imperial was the best riding and handling of the Big 3 luxury offerings, with its suspension settings offering relaxed and sumptuous cruising for the 5000-plus pounds vehicle. Heft aside, the Imperial had a rather brisk performance thanks to the corporation’s mighty 440 CID V-8 mill offering 350hp at 4400 rpm. And as usual, the 3-speed Torqueflite automatic got plenty of praise in those reviews.
Those road tests confirmed that on paper, the Imperial was as good an offering as any of the Big-3’s competitors. Those same tests also told of the Imperial’s by-then-known troubles; mainly the nameplate’s lack of upscale cachet. An essential quality that the marque never quite cracked.
Then there were some new issues on top. Platform sharing certainly helped in the costs department, but it was getting mighty hard to tell an Imperial from a Chrysler product. Regardless of their different stylings, casual observers probably found it hard to tell them apart from the distance. Not good, for the style-conscious.
Also, and not new, Chrysler’s spotty quality record played against the models.
Now, Mr. Engel’s Chrysler styling reign has become known for its elegantly boxy offerings, but in a previous life, the man was as fond of the Space Age as anyone else in Detroit. A trait that occasionally made appearances later on, as in the ’68 Imperial’s Sci-Fi prop rear end. Is that a jet outlet back there? What about those thin side blades? A Star Trek ship of some kind?
Against the rest of the corporate’s lineup, the car’s most distinguishing view.
The dashboard panel is a mix of the future and the traditional; with a nifty chrome strip carrying the instruments, all accented by wood paneling. Sober, modern and traditional? What a mix. If only Infinity had heard of such an approach in ’89… (Oh wait, they’ve actually outlasted Imperial so far.)
Notice the Auto-Pilot controls, or Cruise Control on the lower left of the steering; still a novelty at the time. And then that hefty brake pedal with the Power Disc Brakes inscription.
Besides the Crown emblem, notice (on the left) the nifty and sculpted door handles that got a special mention on JPC’s ’68 Imperial Convertible post.
The renowned 440 up close, with new wiring and battery in place. I assume it runs?
Imperial’s empire never quite took hold, but that doesn’t take away that some lost soldiers occasionally appear in hopes of preserving the remnants of what could’ve been. Here’s one, in action behind the wheel.
Here our troubled Imperial is getting some more help. Going to a new home I would think?
Empires and imperial quests always leave plenty of questions to answer about what could have and might have been. And the Imperial saga is no different. And each find will probably just add more fodder to the matter as we ponder the multiple scenarios. Pointless? Perhaps. But rather entertaining.
Related CC reading:
Curbside Classic: 1968 Imperial Crown Convertible – Fall Back, Men, Fall Back!
Car Show Classic: 1967 Imperial Crown Coupe – For The Last Time, It’s Not A Chrysler!
The Incomparable Imperial! Unfortunately this one looks like the Empire struck back with the Return of the JEDI! Such a sad ending. Ultimate favorites were 61 LEBARON and final 61 DeSoto, now like others, GONE With the Wind!
The dashboard in this model unfortunately followed Caddy tradition. Simple straight-across line including all instruments, trying not to look like a dashboard. Simple linear steering wheel. Imperial’s own tradition was two huge elegant circles with an elegant leather pad to the right.
By the end of the first generation Imperial, the entire market had changed so rapidly and the corporate situation at Chrysler was so bad, if it wasn’t for the ugly Valiant the corporation would have to search for outside assistance to pull through the disasterous years of the early 1960s. I highly doubt that even the most dedicated staffer working for Imperial thought there was much hope for the brand. Had the 1957 investment in the brand hadn’t happened, and Chrysler needed some return on that money in the years to come, Imperial would have been euthanized along with DeSoto by 1961.
That first generation lasted far too long. It was eight years old by 1964 and when Chrysler finally fixed its corporate fiasco, redesigned the Valiant/Dart into dominating the compact car market, and released the brand new full sized cars in 1965, Imperial was just another problem to be fixed.
By 1966, it was just another brand in the Chrysler line up. There were no Imperial stand alone stores selling the brand separately as were its competitors, Cadillac, while Lincoln sold along Mercury. Imperial was just a tag along brand with both Plymouth and Chrysler – which isn’t prestigious.
When Imperial ended up on the Chysler body, it was pretty much just a fancy Chrysler. While it was not a badge-job, and it had its own uniqueness, it was only a matter of time that the Imperial name would be moth-balled. Imperial never justified the massive investment made in 1957. The brand was number two against Cadillac in the late 1950s, but it is rather easy to have beaten what Lincoln had to offer at that time. When the 1961 Continental stole the show, it was game over for the perpetual number three brand, Imperial.
Also, please remember that by the late 1960s, Cadillac had cheapened itself to a point where it was affordable as a family car. The exclusivity that was Cadillac was replaced by GM’s drive for sales numbers. The late 1960s weren’t great Cadillac years regarding quality or luxury – their interiors were plastic-fantastic. How could Imperial compete? Cadillac and Lincoln had all the bases covered and the resale value of an Imperial wasn’t worth the price of ownership in comparison.
If I was around in the industry in the early 1950s, I would have believed that my fellow marketing executives were correct that there would be large enough growth in the near luxury and luxury fields to justify the investment into Imperial. What destroyed this was the 1957-1958 recession, plus a noticable shift towards small, thrifty second family cars and imported brands.
That recession ended Hudson, Packard, Nash, Continental, DeSoto and nearly took Buick. Imperial survived because Chrysler spent too much money to kill it off with the others.
The 1957-66 Imperials were the second generation; the first was the ’55-56 which like the ’67-75 cars were slightly modified Chryslers. I think Imperial as a separate brand would have made more impact had Chrysler had waited until they had a truly unique car in 1957 to launch the new marque.
A frugal, but wise old boss of mine was an Imperial fancier through and through. He owned several, but never bought one new. He always bought a year old model, taking advantage of the huge depreciation dip. He said he saved thousands over a comparable Cadillac each time he bought one.
Despite it being so Chrysler based, I always thought this was a very elegant design.
I could easily tell it was not a typical Chrysler.
A friend here who was a former Mopar service mgr has a mint original 24k Imperial in gorgeous gold that was on the cover of Hemming Classic Car a few years ago. I’d submit it was a nicer luxury car than Cad or Lincoln that year, prestige notwithstanding. Wasn’t the dash appliqué copper, not wood?
Chrysler’s attitude about Imperial was schizophrenic. For example, the 1968 Imperial wasn’t just facelifted, it was cheapened in detail.
No matter how Chrysler changed the variables, the equation was unsolvable. It wasn’t cost-effective to make a car that was so much better and more desirable than a Cadillac that people would actually prefer it to a Cadillac and buy it. And the Cadillac badge had infinitely more power to sell a run of the mill generic GM car than the Imperial badge had to sell a Mopar.
Looks good to me, I hope it’s going to someone who’ll give it the love and care it needs .
Chryslers have always been a brand apart, quite apart from their engineering aspects, they always looked ‘different’ .
-Nate
Nice car. License plate sucks. N4ZY. Nazi? Really?
That’s actually a standard-issue Pennsylvania Antique plate sequence. Although since you pointed it out, it’s hard to un-see the connotation.
For quite a while, Pennsylvania has issued antique car plates with four digits, and this unusual sequencing pattern (letter, number, letter, letter) has been used for the last several years.
Incidentally, the plates starting with “N” are 2024 issues, which is interesting, considering this car’s condition. Quite possibly, someone may have bought it to rescue it from its current condition.
If that is a personalized license plate, then someone at PennDOT slipped up, as all personalized license plate applications are reviewed, and controversial or potentially obscene messages are automatically rejected.
Thank you for acknowledging that the 1967-1968 Imperial was not just a “fancy Chrysler.”
As far as anything you can see and feel, little beyond window cranks and minor switch gear are interchangeable with other Chrysler C bodies. Perhaps some of the greenhouse is common with some C bodies. This isn’t different from any postwar Cadillac.
Lincoln lost its exclusive engine after 1967, and its unshared (after 1966, previously shared with Thunderbird) platform in 1970.
The 1967-1968 Imperial is a very handsome car, and might have had some wow factor if it had been introduced in 1965 with the other C-bodies. While extremely handsome in my mind, it was likely the last car introduced with this boxy ’60s look, as other cars were moving on.
The 1964-1966 Imperial was probably a mistake. One look at the 1964 Cadillac, and you realize there was little reason not to drag the 1963 Imperial into 1964. Some bucks could have been saved and the Imperial could have ridden the hot 1965 market and a new wave of popularity for Chrysler’s large cars.
Interestingly, Chrysler called the 1967 imperial “the Newest Prestige Car in a Decade.” A bit dismissive of Chrysler’s own 300 and New Yorker, not to mention the 1959 and 1965 Cadillacs, the 1961 Lincoln, and various Mercuries, Buicks and Oldsmobiles.
But, no denying, it was the newest Imperial in a decade, and a pretty sharp one at that!
As interesting as these cars are, and the 65-68 Mopar products, across the board, are all IMHO the best MoPars ever made, they are not distinctive enough to answer the biggest question: Why this car and not a Chrysler? This was always Chrysler’s biggest problem with Imperial.
In a sense, the problem is that they are too elegant and restrained, probably having something to do with Elwood Engel styling it. So, the styling is more appropriate for something like a Buick, as opposed to a Cadillac. But Chrysler itself was supposed to be something like a Buick, or maybe an Oldsmobile, or maybe both. So now you have two Buicks in the showroom, but one is $$ cheaper. Hard sell.
It was accepted industry mantra that for a corporation to be taken seriously as one of the “Big Three” it had to have a luxury car nameplate at the top of its product offerings. Walter Chrysler recognized this fact in the 1920’s as he built his version of the Sloan Ladder, included a Crown Imperial sedan right from the start. He developed it into the finest flowering of the concept in the 1931-’33 Custom Imperial CG and CL.
Depression realities settled the Custom Imperial into a role of variously a lwb premium version of the eight-cylinder line. The Imperial name even got attached to upper-medium-priced line for 1937-1939 to compete with Packard 120/Eight, mid-range Buicks et al. Until the serious effort began with 1951 to define Imperial as a comparable competitor for Cadillac, Lincoln and Packard, Imperials were nearly invisible to the public, the quantities sold were so miniscule.
Other than the afore-mentioned CG and CL, every Imperial shared heavily with other Chrysler models. The 1957 Imperial line was a bold effort but likely doomed to fail even with the massive, upfront investment, there was no rising sales momentum for the make beforehand.
So, that turned Imperial into a top management vanity project. As long as plenty of Plymouths, Valiants, Dodges and Darts sold in large quantities, they could afford to subsidize the money-pit Imperial. No self-respecting Chrysler executive wanted to show up at the DAC or his country club in only a Chrysler New Yorker!
But again, reality hit by the mid-’60’s, the BoF Imperial platform was too long-in-the-tooth and unsuccessful in its mission. Fortunately, the unibodied C-Body cars were popular so reskining the shell, stretching the dash-to-front-axle plane would provide a platform the upper management could proudly present as their best. The fusilage cars would reprise the program until finally corporate finances force the issues, the charade was up for 1975. Of course, two more zombie Imperial efforts would be mounted before the final stake was driven into its heart…
In the Chrysler ad, why are there seats on the rocks and a person standing there? I guess the ad worked as it got my attention.
My favorite Imperial was the one Milburn Drysdale drive the first season of the Hillbillies.
The ’68 Imperial appearing in this post was bought by Dad in early 2000’s, possibly as late as ~2005. I do not seem to remember that car being around when I worked there as a kid or teenager from 1989-2001 I also did not ever have photos of the car from 2000-2003 so it is likley that it arrived after I started my job or bought my house.
Anyway, I remember the car arriving and then like other vehicles that had been sitting around before it arrived at the car lot, it needed a gas tank refresh or replacement. after the gas tank was dropped and assessed it seems that work never progressed much past that point.
The imperial has rested in the same spot for about 20 years, and obviously, the weather took its toll on the vinyl top and created a patina on the once nice dark green metallic paint.
Fortunately, this car was interesting enough and intact enough for a local collector from the Pittsburgh area to rescue it. I believe they will get it running and driving again. It will need the typical things that a car that has been resting in the same place for 20 years will need such as fuel and brake lines sorted, the engine to be carefully turned over, new tires, ignition system/points check, and a carb rebuild. I just am happy that someone out there will get this Imperial back on the road having it running and driving, instead of sitting out in the elements.
My dad had a run of terrible T-Birds, and in ’68, switched to an Imperial. I wanted him to buy a Charger, but it was “too flashy” or some other nonsense, he said. It got “hopped up” as almost all his cars did, and with those skinny tires, it was a burnout champ. It didn’t sound like the neighbor’s Imp at all. A cam will do that. Ours was in an awful (IMHO) bronze, with the seemingly required vinyl top. It had black leather interior, which I totally approved of. At least it wasn’t sickly green as the next car’s interior would be. It got like 6MPG in town, but at least part of that was due to how he drove it. It had problems with electrical stuff from day one, and several times during the two summers we had it, the A/C would get stuck on Max,and it got chilly in there. Not good after swimming at all. A trip to Chicago in the spring of ’69 had my mother so frazzled by the speed my dad was going, I saw 90 quite a bit from the back seat, by the time we got there, she chewed out my dad and his “driving like a maniac all the way from Toledo!” and refused to go out to dinner. We ended up bringing her back Chinese food. The trip back took much longer than going, as he kept it at about 75. Even my sister thought we were going too slow.
At the end of the summer of ’69, he sold it to the guy who bought all his cars, and bought a BS green (Why was that a popular color?) Lincoln MKIII, which lasted two weeks before he traded it to his brother for a ’69 Caddy Sedan De Ville, also in BS green. He said he never hated a car as much as he hated the MKIII, so when my uncle proposed the trade, my dad jumped on it. The Caddy got hopped up as usual, about 2 weeks after he got it, and it was about as traction limited as the Imp was. It didn’t sound near as good as the Imp did, but it was hard to tell just how quick it was, it had no problem blowing the tires off, and running up freeway entrance ramps. We saw the Imp a few times over the next couple of years, and then it was passed down to another owner.
An elderly neighbor had a 67 Crown Coupe. I’ll bet I could have bought it if I had been smart enough to make the attempt.
That’s a darn nice example worth saving. Looks very solid. Actually, the Engel Chryslers/Imperials from the 1965-1968 cycle were very good quality cars. I hope someone saves this one.
The comments regarding Imperial’s history are really fascinating for me to read. I was well aware of the political upheaval in Chrysler’s ranks, on the heels of the quality-control fiasco that turned their whirlwind success in ’57 into near-fatal disaster in ’58, which they never fully recovered from. But details on how it affected their upstart-luxury marque were hard for me to come by. I do also know, however, that they were always struggling to establish Imperial as a separate luxury marque in league with Caddy, Lincoln, Rolls-Royce, and Mercedes-Benz. Even in the 1962 movie “It’s A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World” where one was shown early on, it was still referred to as a “Chrysler Imperial.”
But I digress. I thought the ’67 model looked much better than the ’68; the prow treatment for ’68 just looked too pointy, too Chrysler-like, unlike the ’67 prow which looked elegant and rather Lincoln-like (actually, the template for that look was originally a proposed facelift for the early-’60s Lincolns that was never adopted). I’d like to know whether a few creature-comforts that Lincoln offered as standard or optional equipment were ever made available for the Imps of ’67/8–namely, powered triangles (which by then became extra-cost options), a power bypass for the window system, and an inside hood release (both standard-issue). Caddy also offered the first two–the first an extra-cost option and the second standard-issue–but not the third. The pictures of the dormant example for this article are not high-res enough for me to see if that car had those features (well, the coffee-cranks gave away the triangle operation, but that was all I could determine).
One of my uncles who lived in Wichita, Ks, was a surgeon. Every other year he purchased a new Imperial, beginning in’57. When we would visit him and his family, I would look at the Imperial and think , “Oh, why can’t we have an Imperial?” Not at all realizing just how much more expensive they were compared to my Dad’s new ‘56 Ford Fairlane.
If memory serves, Mrs. Drysdale on the Beverly Hillbillies drove a Crown coupe (I thought the off-set license plate looked good. As opposed to the off-set plate on the Edsel I used to own. On the Edsel it just looked lopsided).