(jmg3rd posted these shots at the Cohort)
(first posted 4/21/2013) 1955 marked the first year of Hudsons wearing Nash bodies after their merger, referred to as “Hashes”. It was a relatively much more successful mashup then the truly pathetic 1956-1957’s, the end of the road for Hudsons. (We did the full “Hash” story here). The short story is that this Wasp has a Nash114.3″ wb Nash Statesman body, but the 202 cu.in. little Hudson six engine, a highly undersquare design with a 3″ bore and 4.75″ stroke.
Hudson had no other choice: they squandered their last cash reserves on that ill-fated little toad of a compact, the Jet. George Mason, Nash’s visionary boss, scooped up the remnants of Hudson, and hoped to move on to the next step, merging with recently-merged Packard-Studebaker, to create a truly formidable Big Number Four.
The ’55 Hashes were palatable enough, but Ed Anderson, the rather uneven Design Chief at AMC, did a rather horrendous job on the ’56s, with what was called “V-Line Styling”.
I’d say it was more like “Joker” styling.
Nice,another one I never heard of!It looks a bit like the Standard car featured recently and that grille is very Chrysler 300ish.A pleasant looking car but there were some real beauties around in 1955 from the opposition.I love that salmon pink paint
That color was called “Palomino”. My Mother’s 1956 Hudson Rambler was this color.
I’d agree that Ed Anderson was an uneven designer. For example, the spanking new 1956 Rambler actually sold less than the dated 1955 partly due to Anderson’s odd design, with its inboard headlights.
To be fair, however, Richard Arbib was tapped to give the 1956 Hudson a facelift. AMC head George Romney thought the 1955 looked too similar to the Nash so sought a designer from outside the company.
How did such an abomination get into production? Mid-50s groupthink, perhaps. But I also wonder whether Romney wanted the Hudson and Nash brands to die off so he could concentrate on the Rambler.
Another possibility was studied before the meger with Nash is some updates of the step-down design for 1955. I saw a picture at http://wikicars.org/en/Image:1955stepdown.jpg
While the ’55 Hudson Hornet and Wasp are the most attractively styled iteration of the ’52 Nash Airflyte body, they suffer from the bloated surfaces which are difficult to mask. Of the ’56-’57 Hudsons, what can one say, that Richard Arbib was really having a BAD day.
In fairness, he accepted an assignment with the worst conditions a stylist can have imposed: change no major sheet metal stamping, just employ grilles and trim to impart a unique marque look so as not look like the other make with the same main body stampings. Whatever budget he was given, in the over-wrought styling tenor of the times, its not surprising out the V-Line styled Hudsons came out.
Aribib was also ginning up a series of wild, outlandish “Dream Cars” designs for Tidewater Oil Company advertisement some which have massive “V” features as part of their shocking design. He did a series of Benrus wrist watches which are now classic mid-century modern designs. He’s earlier styling position with Henney Motor Company designing their Packard-based commercial cars and proposing the design that became the Packard Pan Americans showed he did have automotive design talent when given a less restrictive assignment.
Personally, I like the ’55 Hudsons, particularly the Hornet, the longer front clip makes the car seem more like a real Hudson. And, because I like what old New Englanders would say in a thick accent “It’s an “aaahhditty
Now there’s a car with style, something sorely missing from the scene today
Ah, it all looks like a Mazda 3…Not my cup of tea, but at this point, anything from that era is rather cool, in a oddball kind of way…but then again, I have actually owned a Rambler…
Looks like a Mazda 3? From what direction?
What can I say? I like it, I’ve sometimes wondered how much of the independents issues would have been solved with modern engines/transmissions instead of dumping lots of money into styling and “revolutionary” cars like the Jet.
Well, Hudson and Nash were buying Hydra-Matic transmissions from GM, so in that respect they were doing okay. (They eventually switched to the Borg-Warner unit, probably because the later dual-coupling Hydra-Matic was too expensive.) Developing an automatic transmission from scratch was a very costly proposition, as Packard discovered. They definitely need a V-8, though.
The other problem the independents faced, as Studebaker found out the hard way, was that they were not really in a position to go head-to-head with GM and Ford on volume products. The economies of scale just weren’t there and the independents didn’t have the capital to do the kind of plant modernization and equipment upgrades that would have helped streamline production and bring down their unit costs. Even then, they faced a serious hammering from the bigger companies in terms of market penetration and dealer networks.
You’d think they would have learned that from the beating they took in ’53’s Chevy-Ford sales war. AMC caught a clue with the fifties Ramblers, then forgot it again in 1966 (CC here).
I think Dan hit on it. Something that wasn’t worn out at 100k miles will get you sales even if it’s ugly. The early beetles were worn out by then (pretty much engine only) and they sold like hotcakes despite being ugly. I sort of think some attempts to update and be practical and economical would have worked. IIRC Hudson was still putting out flathead sixes when they joined nash. Thats three years after Ford gave up and they lived and died with the flathead seemingly forever. An ohv four with an overdrive transmission might have been all it would take. Who knows?
I was thinking of the fact that so many independents got stuck with antiquated engines period. I was thinking a modern ohv V8 like Cadillac and Oldsmobile got first and which slowly replaced the flatheads.
Again, it really came down to money. In Hudson’s case, the cost of developing the Jet would have gotten them a V-8 (although I am still very dubious about the idea that they could have afforded both a V-8 and a new full-size body to replace the Step-Downs, both of which they desperately needed).
Kaiser did try to get Oldsmobile to sell them V-8s, but that deal fell through, allegedly (although this has the whiff of unfounded rumor) because Olds decided a Rocket-powered ’51-’52 Kaiser would have too much of a performance advantage.
Hudson plausibly could have afforded both a V8 and an updated body if it had cut deals with other independents to amortize the costs of the new engine.
In general, sharing major components was arguably a more viable direction for American independents than a massive merger. Indeed, Studebaker could have kept Kaiser and Hudson viable a few more years if it had made available at an affordable price its V8 and automatic transmission.
AMC did that, sort of, with Studebaker-Packard, paying some of the development costs of the Packard V-8 in exchange for technical data and an agreement to buy some engines, but that ended up being a stopgap until AMC’s own 327 (based, or so I keep hearing, on a design that originated at Kaiser) was ready.
In retrospect, it would have probably been beneficial if they’d all pooled their resources to create a PRV-style joint venture to design and manufacture modern V-8s that each could purchase at a discounted rate. However, I think that would have required a lot more cooperation than actually existed.
Aside from the competitiveness and friction between the parties, there might have been some reluctance to do such a thing because I think there was a certain Detroit prejudice about not making your own engines. Before the Depression, there were a lot of “assembled” cars where all the major components came from out-of-house. Of course, every automaker got a lot of major components from suppliers, but having your own engine separated the big players from cottage industry. I don’t know how much of a stigma there was about that in the U.S., but I wonder if that was a factor. Of course, pride goeth before a fall and all that…
Apart from the personality conflicts and company politics, I’m having visions of a Studebaker-powered Hudson, and having problems. That was one heavy engine, and in its 1952 state of tune would have been stomped on by a Hudson-powered Hornet. Maybe it could have been sold as a smooth, more upmarket successor to Hudson’s old straight eights, leaving the Hornet six to go after the sporty crowd?
Studebaker had a modern in-house ohv V8 in 1951, the same year as Chrysler, and right behind the 49 Cad and Olds. Also, Studebaker had a proprietary automatic tranny – the DG (co-developed by and built by Borg Warner) at the same time. These did not save Studebaker. They did, however, certainly prolong its viability.
The competition was very real. Ford approached Studebaker for a license to use the DG automatic in Fords. Studebaker refused, and Ford used another (cheaper) BW automatic. As Stude volumes fell, BW could no longer build the DG for a reasonable cost, and it disappeared after the 55 models. The 56 Stude used a version similar to the 1950s 3 speed Ford-O-Matic (not the 2 speed version used in the early 60s), which stayed around until the end.
Good point about Studebaker’s V8…
I haven’t studied the history of Nash and Hudson in-depth, but it seems like they were both doomed long before V8s became commonplace. Both of them had the Packard V8 – a modern and powerful engine – in 1955 (the same year V8s were first available in Chevrolet and Pontiac cars), and then the homegrown AMC V8 a year later, which was a real monster for the time… but neither seemed to make any difference in their plummeting sales figures. FWIW, the later versions of the Twin-H flathead were making 175HP which is crazy, and was pretty much on par with most of the low-mid price V8s from that era. People just weren’t buying it, for whatever reason.
Plus, all of that said, even though the Nash and Hudson names died shortly after the merger, the parent company was able to find success later on and ended up outliving all the other American independents by a large margin. They didn’t really “die”, they were just re-branded.
“People just weren’t buying it, for whatever reason.”
Eight is more than six. No mystery there, regardless of the horsepower, smoothness, economy or anything else, eight is more than six.
I work in the chip business, now it’s how many “cores” (CPUs) your phone or tablet has. Regardless of actual performance, etc., two cores are “better” than one, four are “better” than two.
The essentials never change.
So the “core” thing is often like the ridiculous small displacement V8s from the late 70s? My computer is well on it’s way to becoming a “Desktop Classic” – still chugging along with a circa-2003 Celeron processor and Windows XP. I really need to upgrade/replace it, but I’m clueless on hardware that’s any newer than this, so I keep putting it off.
The problem the Hudson six had was the same sort of thing Packard faced with its straight eight: It wasn’t that the engine wasn’t necessarily competitive in terms of power, but buyers looked at sixes or straight eights (even with overhead valves) as old-fashioned. It created sales resistance.
Hudson also suffered from the fact that the Step-Down body was looking very dated. It had practical advantages, certainly, but it was look old and there was only some much that could be done without a complete retooling.
The antiquated engines didn’t help, but these cars were hopelessly dated when it came to styling. Park a 1955-57 Hudson or a Nash next to a contemporary Buick Special, Oldsmobile 88, Chrysler Windsor or DeSoto Firedome – it’s no contest. The world’s best engine couldn’t compensate for the dumpy styling. Even the relatively clean styling of the 1955 Hudson simply was not competitive with its Big Three counterparts.
Call me crazy, but I really love the weirdo ’55-’57 Nash Hudsons/Hudson Nashes, especially the Joker Face Hornet. I wouldn’t call them attractive cars, but the far-out styling and wild black/pastel two-tone paintjobs really appeal to me. They look like cars from an alternate universe version of 1950s America, and I guess since so few were sold, they may as well have been.
This ’55 Wasp is one I’ve actually never seen before, but I like it. Aside from the roof, it’s disguised pretty well and comes off looking smaller and lower than the Statesman it’s based on. Most people would also likely say that this was a more attractive car than the Nash with its inboard headlights, certainly more conventional and mainstream. I doubt there were very many 2-door hardtop Wasps built in 1955, so this must be an extremely rare car these days. Maybe one of only a handful left?
Carnut’s ’50s Hudson Page says 7191 Wasps were built in ’55, 2519 in ’56. Here’s another ’55 from that page, it has a hood ornament.
PS: Wikipedia says ’56 Wasps were all 4-door sedans.
In 1955 I was seven years old. I didn’t know about sex but I did know about sexy. As far as I was concerned, nothing outside of the Big 3 was sexy, just pathetic attempts to fob off sinking ships to a public that wasn’t buying it. Sure, Hudson had won NASCAR championships in the early ’50s with Smokey Yunick’s creative “tuning”, but there was only so much you could do with flathead sixes in a world increasingly populated with Olds, Caddy, and Chrysler OVH V8s. By 1955, with the advent of the Small Block Chevy, the old world was effectively dead. Short stroke V8s and great styling meant that if you weren’t a member of the club, you were out. Nothing, save Rambler, had any sales appeal from Packard, Hudson, or Nash.
A lot of what has been said here is on point, but I say from experience the Hudson Hornet Six was competitive with about anything out there. By ’54 it was under 13 seconds to 60, It was mostly the fact the hype was all about the “hot” V8s.
Back in about 1958 I ran a ’55 Chevrolet power pack right into the ground on the interstate with my ’54 Hornet, and it didn’t even have Twin H-Power. Nonetheless, at 117 on my speedo, the Chevrolet was far, far behind . . . 🙂
One point not often enough made about that Hornet 6 was that it was absolutely huge. 308 cubic inches may not seem all that impressive today, but recall that the original 1949 Olds Rocket V8 was a 303. The 49-53 Ford V8 was a 239, as was the original 51 Studebaker V8. The 49 Cadillac and 51 Chrysler V8s were only 331 cubic inches. So, even though it was an obsolete flathead design, the old adage was as true then as now: there’s no replacement for displacement. Add the fact that the Hornet had such a low center of gravity and was quite aerodynamic, and its easy to see why they were the scourge of NASCAR tracks in the early 1950s.
It was huge and it had another advantage. That is twin H power. I had a friend who raced the half mile (normally) dirt tracks around Dodge City. They were allowed to run engines up to 48, I think. The fords were light and did well. Lots of them to tear up. Even though Olds, Caddie, and Studebaker all had ohv V8s they couldn’t run. The Fords did well till the Hudsons showed up. I don’t remember anything else as being competitive in that area. They were a bigger jalopy but they had the power to make up for it. Everything changed when the ohv V8’s became legal.
I ran across a batch of pictures on Google when I plugged in my friends name. This one is supposed to be Hudson powered. Because it’s stripped I can’t tell for sure if it’s a full body or a rail. Looks like a rail and the article said it won the race that night.
I can recall looking at big Nashes of 1954-57 and wondering if they might have done better had they been styled more conventionally. This car gives us the answer – a clear “NO”. It is not unattractive. But it is also not attractive.
Not hit on above, there was one insurmountable disadvantage shared by each of the independents: They could afford one or maybe two mis-reads of the market. Be it styling, size, powerplant, or whatever, everything can be humming right along and then it all comes crashing to the ground when a new model fails to be what the buying public wanted at the time. The Big 3 guessed wrong many times over the decades, but they had the volume and reach to ride it out. Not so with the little guys.
Really, it is amazing that Nash/AMC lasted as long as they did. It was the 1-2 punch of the Pacer and the Matador coupe that really did them in.
One wonders how AMC would have fared if, during the 1974-76 timeframe, it had given the Hornet the “Concord” treatment, made an extended-wheelbase version of the Hornet available as a “downsized” Ambassador, and brought out what became the Spirit as a 1975 Javelin. (The concept car that led to the Spirit – the Gremlin G-II – was shown in 1974.)
Then again, those moves probably would not have made much difference…the Chrysler Omni/Horizon, GM X-cars and Ford Escort would still have forced AMC to invest huge sums to produce all-new, clean-sheet vehicles. On top of that, the Japanese onslaught would have ultimately revealed the obsolete state of AMC’s production facilities.
The new car buyer in 1955 had the choice of the restyled Chevy with the new, excellent small block V8, the dramatic Forward Look Plymouth’s and Dodges, and the attractive restyled Ford. Who in the hell would ever buy this monstrosity? And the less said about the ‘56’s the better. Looks like something the Soviets would have come up with in the Kruschchev era. At this time economies of scale were becoming quite important in the auto industry and the big 3 had it – and the independents didn’t. Maybe if George Mason had lived to merge Packard, Hudson, Nash and Studebaker into a viable competitor to the big 3 it would have been different, but it was not to be. At this time who would have thought it would take another 15 years for any real threat to the Big 3 to develop and it would be the Japanese that would eventually offer the first real competition.
“Who would buy . . . ?” Well, let’s see–you would get unit construction, the best A/C at the lowest price; a 308 Hudson 6 w/ Twin-H or a Packard V-8; good build quality, brakes w/ the Safety Link, “Deep Coil Ride”, the widest seats and windshield, and a smooth design retaining some of the Hudson personality in the grille and the dashboard (for the Hudson loyalist). The handling should have been improved to follow the legacy of the Step-Downs.
Also, the Hudson version has fewer irritating features than the Nash. So if a buyer cared more about engineering than up-to-the-minute looks, I could see where this would appeal to some. Romney should have kept the Nash & Hudson names for the ’58&up Ambassadors (with a Hudson version). I think they would have sold better with established nameplates rather than as upscale Ramblers. It would have cost him little to nothing–he was building the cars anyway.
Can anyone say the car below is unattractive?
Thanks for the well-stated defense and multiple reasons one would buy a ’55 Hudson. Had they stayed with this clean, understated design theme throughout 1957, they might well have been continually good sellers. There were plenty of value shoppers then as now, packaging the most features for the price might well have attracted more to consider then purchase a Hudson.
AMC would have done better to promote the 1958 Ambassador as a ‘Hudson Ambassador’ than the idiotic “Ambassador by Rambler” Huh? Hudson was still perceived as an upper medium-priced marque, (Nash) Rambler a low-priced compact by a lower-medium priced make.
“Ambassador” was a name firmly identified with the Nash brand by 1957.
Perhaps AMC should have dubbed the larger Ramblers either the Hudson Commodore or Hornet, and then badged the “standard” Rambler and American as Nashes.
I was thinking of “Nash Ambassador” & “Hudson Hornet” versions for ’58, but each would have to be distinctive in its own way.
As pointed out in the recent Crosley post, brand names mean something to people. Today, Bell & Howell, Hamilton Beach, Sylvania, and other famous names are licensed for use on modern products, but they are now manufactured by Chinese factories and have no real connection to the original products and companies. But the brand name helps them to sell, and there’s value in that.
I can’t get up as much hostility toward the Hashes as many in the readership…even the 1957s. But then, I have never warmed to the contrived phony-Cadillac look, complete with tack-on fins, of the 1957 Chevrolet. Yeh, I know…heresy.
I agree about the ’57 Chevy. I love the lines of the ’55. Fins made everything look immature and stupid, in my not-so-humble opinion. I like Hudsons for the most part, though I have only seen a couple in real life. I did once sit in a Hornet, long ago. My son collects car emblems and was happy when he acquired a Hudson one from EBay.
I’ve never actually seen one but that ’56 Hash face reminds me of the gaping maw on the current Lexi crop. Yuk!
I like it. But I just looked at the Kia post again so anything is better. Even the ’57.
At night a candle is brighter than the sun.
V-Line styling makes a comeback!
2020 Acura TLX: