William Oliver has found something quite exceptional: a Wartburg Camping Limousine. A little worse for wear, but I suspect this is just awaiting its restoration. This is way too rare to be let go otherwise.
As you can see, its distinctive features are Vista Cruiser-like rear windows curving up into the roof, and a sunroof too, something the Vista never had. And of course it also had a smoky 900cc two-stroke triple up front, given its origins were pre-war DKWs.
Here it is from my 1961 Auto Parade Annual. It first appeared in 1959, and was replaced by the boxy 353. East Germans had Wanderlust just as much as West Germans; they just couldn’t go as far. But getting out anywhere into nature was the driving force, and the Camping was the way to get there, if you were one of the very few that had access to one. Otherwise it was a Trabant, and even that took years of waiting.
Here’s another shot of how it would have looked in its youthful glory. A portable tv even? Someone was well connected.
This one is showing its age, but it’s really not bad, considering. No obvious structural rust, except a bit around the rear side window. Pretty solid, generally.
There were two series of these; the 311 had a 901 cc triple, and the later 312 had a 992 cc version. Horsepower ratings seem to not fall readily to hand, but it was adequate. Highly abundant, actually, in the eyes of Trabant drivers.
Eisenach had a long history as an automaker, going back to the 1898 Wartburg. It later was reorganized as Dixi, which was taken over by BMW in 1928. The factory was mostly destroyed in the war, and rebuilt as the Sowjetische AG Maschinenbau Awtowelo, Werk BMW Eisenach (Soviet Awtowelo Co., Eisenach BMW Works). BMWs were built, until it had to change its name to EMW in 1951. But BMWs and EMWs were too expensive, so in 1956 the first Wartburg 311 rolled off the line, its mechanical basis being the very advanced DKW F9 from 1940. The factory finally closed in 1990.
Contrary to what one might assume, these had a separate frame and body. That was a bit old school, but it did make it easier to create numerous variations, including this Camping.
The sedan was of course the most common.
The Kombi was used most often as a light commercial vehicle.
As was of course the pickup.
If you thought it was hard getting a Wartburg sedan or Camping, the coupe was on a whole other level.
And then there was the Wartburg 311/1 Sportwagen. Better be real chummy with that Honecker fellow. Not bad looking; the East German 190SL.
Wow! That’s definitely unique, and a practical idea. If Studie had tried its Wagonaire in ’52, it would have looked like this.
The numberplates affixed to this car is East German so this car hasn’t been driven on the public road since the German reunification in 1990. The M-prefix denotes Magdeburg.
The popular East German crime series, Polizeiruf 110, often features those common and rare East German vehicles, including this Camping Limousine.
East Germans loved camping so much that they came up with clever contraption attaching to the roofs of Trabants and Wartburgs, looking like the photo.
Camping was one of the few ways that East Germans could “escape” from the limitations of their daily lives, and so yes, a popular pastime. East Germans camped along the Baltic and elsewhere in their nation; spots in hotels and the state trade union (‘FDGB”) holiday resorts and homes could be scarce to come by. Hungary was one of the few places GDR citizens could visit fairly freely, and in the summer Hungary’s Lake Balaton was swarmed with East Germans enjoying the relative “freedom” that Hungary offered; Bulgaria was also another camping destination for them. I just ran across an excellent three – part German ZDF Channel series that is set in a typical East German “campingplatz” c. 1986 on Lake Balaton, the type of tent above can be seen, along with Wartburgs and Trabants, and it is a good view of the 1980’s East German “camping culture”. This series is region – free, has English subtitles, and is available for free viewing until 31 March 2021:
‘For anyone interested in anything about East Germany, “Honey Women/Vacation in Paradise” on ZDF is about two East German girls who go on holiday to Lake Balaton in Hungary – one of the few places where East and West Germans “mix”. It’s rom-com meets political thriller. It has a fantastic cast, with people popping up from Deutschland 83’. Here is the link:
https://www.zdf.de/filme/herzkino/honigfrauen-100.html?fbclid=IwAR2GrtZdjgro6cnwBvpJ40Kq39nL0Q4Ub28dbaX5EiEjwbHkVAQMY0MySz8
I was traveling with a German friend and fellow gearhead, all over the old DDR, back in 1996. At that time, even 6 years after the reunification, there were abandoned older DDR vehicles to be found in the more rural areas.
We found a former scrapyard that closed about 5 years earlier. Scattered around the place were numerous Trabants & Wartburgs, most having been stripped of any useful parts. My friend struck up a conversation with the elderly couple who owned the place, and asked if it would be OK to buy some emblems from a couple of the cars. The old man said it was OK to take any parts off the cars, as long as the pieces were not steel or aluminum. He didn’t want any money, I assume because he felt they were worthless.
Well the place turned out to be a goldmine for us. Every emblem we found was plastic, even the Eisenach emblem you show here was plastic. The slightest prodding by a screwdriver would make the emblems pop off into our hands.
After we had grabbed every possible plastic emblem, ornament, even horn buttons, we brought our hoard up to the elderly couple and fanned them out for inspection. The old man still refused any money, even my US Dollars. The couple then began a serious conversation between each other, about something not to be shown. She said he should open the door, and he finally agreed, but admonished us there was to be no photographs.
We followed him to a side-hinged wooden garage door with a small entry door cut into it, about 2 feet by 4 feet in size. He unlocked the small door and stepped inside and we followed, ending up in a dark room. He turned the lights on, and to our surprise we saw:
A very nice original post-war Eisenach-built BMW, a big black 327 two-passenger coupe with a long trunk, a steel covered spare tire nestled in the back, almost horizontal. To the right of this big coupe, was an even more impressive . . .
EMW 327 convertible coupe, all black with black leather interior. And lastly, sitting cross wise in back of the first 2 cars, was . . .
An EMW 340 sedan, dark blue [almost black in the dim light].
All 3 cars were said to be in running condition, and while they were not perfect, he said these cars were all original, even the tires! But it was clear that while the cars were shiny and almost dust free, it had been a very long time since the cars had seen the light of day. My friend asked how he had come to have such cars. The man suggested he had been tasked with storing them for a senior DDR official who had died shortly after putting them in storage. It was then our host began to get more nervous about talking, and we realized it was time to thank him for showing us around, and for us to leave.
Before turning out the lights, the man gestured to the cars with a wave of his hand, and looking directly at me, he made a little “zipper” motion across his lips. We both promised we would not say anything about the cars to anyone, thanked him for the emblems, and continued on our way.
My friend went back a few years later and on driving by the scrapyard, he found the entire place was gone, nothing but a field of grass. He stopped at a local Gasthaus and asked what happened. He was told the elderly couple died and the government took everything. He got the impression the 3 EMW cars were kept by the government to be used in a planned EMW museum.
About 10 years later & during my annual AACA Hershey flea market sale, I had a display of older European car stuff as part of my 6 stalls & big tent. In one of my display cases I had a selection of the plastic emblems from that scrapyard, and a man, on seeing the Wartburg emblems, wanted to buy them, explaining that he had a Wartburg here in America, but it was missing all the emblems. He bought all the Wartburg pieces, walking away a very happy individual!
I still have one item from that place: A 1950s Trabant plastic fuel gauge. I have it mounted to a wooden display board, because the Trabant “fuel gauge” was simply a long plastic rod with graduated markings. Here’s a photo illustrating it’s use:
Great story. Thanks for sharing that!
> We both promised we would not say anything about the cars to anyone
You’re toast if he ever reads this!
la673,
Well, seeing that the place was bulldozed flat a few years later, and the guy didn’t speak a word of [or read] English, I think I’ll be ok.
And that was another thing I noticed about the difference between the DDR and West Germany; No one in the DDR spoke English in the mid 1990s, while probably 75% of the West German population was at least semi fluent in English, 20 years earlier.
Today, those 3 cars combined, would probably sell at auction in excess of 1 Million Euros, especially the EMW 327 cabriolet.
Almost everyone in the DDR was required to learn Russian at least to a minimal level. But at university level, more than a few folks learned English. One of my relatives taught English as well as the (mandatory) Russian, and related that Russian was learned reluctantly by most.
This reminds me of a line in a scene from an old, forgotten tv series called Paul Sand in Friends and Lovers when Steve Landesberg (most well-known for his role as Dietrich in Barney Miller) where they’re trying to find someone to speak to a Russian, and the lead character asks Landeserg to talk to him in German. Landesberg replies, “Never speak German to a Russian”.
Spud,
You’re welcome. It’s just another interesting day in a 50 year “life adventure” with old cars!
‘Wartburg’? Possibly the UGLIEST name an auto manufacturer ever hung on a car.
The alphabet soup they use now doesn’t inspire me either
Why? OK, it may sound a bit strange in English, but it’s just the name of the medieval castle towering above the city of Eisenach, where these cars were built.
Wikipedia:
Wartburg: The name of the castle is probably derived from German: Warte, a watchtower, in spite of a tradition which holds that the castle’s founder, on first laying eyes on the site, exclaimed, “Warte, Berg—du sollst mir eine Burg tragen!” (“Wait, mountain—you shall bear my castle!”). It is a German play on words for mountain (Berg) and fortress (Burg), coupled with a further play on “warte” = wait and “Warte” = watchtower.
Lutherans also know it as the place where Martin Luther was sheltered for his own safety after the Diet of Worms from May 1521-March 1522. This is speculation on my part, but it may have served as the inspiration for the classic hymn “A Mighty Fortress is Our God” (Ein feste Burg ist unser Gott).
Technically, a Vista Cruiser could have a factory sunroof. The colonnade generation of Vista Cruisers had a pop-up sunroof either standard or optional.
These are impressively stylish and not just for Eastern Bloc cars, you could have convinced me these are Western in origin.
In 1973 Oldsmobile did offer a sunroof in the Vista Cruiser, undoubtedly a nod to the prior windowed Vista roofs, but I suspect it was about as rare as finding a Wartburg in the US….
Edit: Scampman beat me to it!
The Vista Vent was standard on the colonnade Vista Cruiser for several years. Otherwise the VC was a Country Squire type woody wagon package. A plainer Cutlass Cruiser wagon was available.
These are nice looking little cars – but there’s something about their shape that makes them look like they’re drooping in the front and rear. To me the black and white sedan in particular evokes a warped Jo-Han promo model.
The last Wartburgs were technically GM cars since Automobilwerk Eisenach did a separate deal to be taken over by Opel rather than by VW like the rest of the DDR auto industry.
It makes me wonder if the Wartburg/AWE trademark rights passed on to PSA-now-Stellantis in the sale, or somehow remain with General Motors having been either intentionally kept or stayed behind by default having been overlooked.
It’s interesting the cars in the advertisement used one-piece curved side glass, while the featured car has (presumably cheaper) flat glass with a separate polycarbonate curved panel.
I recall even expensive American cars of the day limited their use of curved glass for cost reasons. Just as well they did, I’ve seen curved glass, when used, especially Ford’s (Carlite?) brand occasionally had waves and distortion.
To me, these Wartburg models look similar to the Borgward Isabella, shown in a recent article.
These always reminded me less of Vista Cruisers than of 1980s Ford Bronco II’s, which also had the distinctive rear side glass that rolled into the roof.
Sure hope it gets restored. While originality is nice, a modern inline 3 cylinder would make a very pleasant cruiser and conversation piece.
That kombi and the roadster are two of the best designs from either West or East Germany in the ’50s.
*VERY* cute and complete, too .
I hope this gets the full restoration it deserves .
Thanx for the history lessons too =8-) .
-Nate
Too bad the Doctors’ Plot wasn’t real and successful. DDR’s automotive industry–and people–would have been much better off had it been.
There is a model of this car 1/64 scale by a company called Greel I got mine via ebay