(first posted 11/21/2015; expanded 11/20/2021) I happened to notice bucket seats in the 1960 Bonneville rendering that was at the top of the Art Fitzpatrick post the other day, which got me thinking: just what was the first post-war American production car (other than the sports-luxury Thunderbird) to sport bucket seats? The bench seat was universal, until it was slowly and steadily replaced by the bucket/individual front seats. And here’s where it started: in the 1958 Pontiac Bonneville convertible, as an option. But they’re hardly very bucket-like, with their utterly flat cushions, looking more like something out of a Jeep or truck. Well, it was a modest start, but it took root and eventually killed the bench seat.
The Bonneville was a key part of Bunkie Knudsen’s makeover of Pontiac, and first appeared in 1957 as a very high-trim and high-performance limited production convertible. In 1958, the range was expanded to include a coupe, but only the convertible offered something new to the typical big American car: optional front bucket seats.
Here’s a closer look at the brochure rendering. Obviously, a console was not yet part of the equation, never mind an actual floor shift.
What’s particularly noticeable about these seats are their narrowness; one could walk through the aisle to the back, especially with the top down. And of course the very flat cushions, which of course negates the whole purpose of bucket seats. Oh well.
Pontiac must have gotten some feedback on that issue, as the 1959 versions have drastically re-contoured bottom cushion, to help keep those folks in their seats as the plumb the limits of Pontiac’s Wide Track handling. It looks like the same basic seat shell though, otherwise. But it does rather predict the shape that would grace so many GM cars within a few years. Still no console though.
In 1959, Chrysler upped the ante with swiveling bucket seats, which included a short console and flip-up padded center armrest.
In 1960, the Chrysler 300F included this very fine full-length console, which extended through to the rear bucket seats. It also had a floor shifter for the rare optional 4-speed.
The 1960.5 Corvair Monzawas the breakthrough car, as it was the first to offer buckets and a sporty ambiance (never mind the actual sporty handling) accessible in a low-price car. By 1961, the Monza with its standard buckets and floor shift (four speed optional) was a hot item. Its success directly led to the birth of the Mustang, as Lee Iaccoca has stated quite clearly. Extremely influential, in terms of what it led to: millions of popular-priced cars with bucket seats, floor shift, and consoles. I called it the most influential car of the decade, but now that I think about how bucket seats and floor shift have become utterly universal, perhaps I was too modest. The most influential car of the post war era?
The 1961 Studebaker Hawk offered front bucket seats and an optional 4-speed with a floor shifter. By 1962, these were available on the Lark too. Obviously, their numbers were rather modest.
The 1961 Olds Starfire convertible seems to have had the first console and floor shift (with automatic transmission). In that regard, it even beats the Thunderbird for those honors, which never did have a floor shifter after it moved to four seats in 1958, until…1983?
Of course we need to pay tribute to the 1958 Thunderbird, which had both buckets and a console, and pioneered the sporty-luxury personal four-seat car.
Somewhat oddly, the two-seat ’55-’57 T-Bird had a bench seat, along with a floor shift, so the ’58 changed that up, in more ways than one.
That’s something the original Corvette from 1953 got right, although the lack of a manual transmission was a sad omission. The stick was for the Powerglide automatic, and was oddly positioned, as it just hung off the side of the box where its shift linkage was located. A properly located shifter for the Powerglide would have to wait until 1956.
I’m deviating, but this gives me a chance to show you some shots I’ve been saving for years, about the changing Corvette PG shift pattern. I was going to do a post on that subject alone, but I may never get to it, so here’s Chapter 2 of the Bucket Seat Chronicles. Here’s the original one from 1953-1955. Yes, it’s reversed from one would expect, and as later used, but that’s because it’s just a lever attached to the side of the box, and this is the sequence that the normal sedan column shift levers worked.
Even when the Corvette’s shifter for the PG was moved to the center of the tunnel in 1956, that same reversed pattern was still there.
Like this.
In 1958, when the Powerglide adopted the new safer and PRNDL pattern on its passenger cars, the Corvette’s PG quadrant was still reversed.
Not until 1962 was the pattern reversed to make it correspond to the column shift cars. Why in 1962? Was it a safety issue?
Or because Chevy was planning to make offer floor console shifters for the 1963 Impala SS and Nova SS (shown), and knew that offering those mainstream models would require a “normal” shift pattern.
The adoption of the front bucket seat into low-end mainstream cars was quick; it was less than three years from the expensive ’58 Bonneville to the 1960.5 Monza, and within a couple more years they were sprouting in the front seats everywhere, like this ’62 Chevy Nova SS.
And the last “bench seat” on an American sedan? The 2012 Chevrolet Impala. Not exactly a true bench seat, but one that could still be used by a middle passenger. And just what car had the last genuine bench seat, with a continuous seat and seat back? Your turn.
You can call it over-styled, but the bronze-white-brown-chrome interior in that ’59 Pontiac looks like such a happy place to be! Unlike the drab interiors of modern cars.
It is nice. I’d go for the turquoise version though, particularly in a hardtop with matching headliner, for the swimming-pool effect of it reflecting off itself.
Good observation. Today yes the inside of today’s cars are somewhat lacking in visual appeal. But the worst part of the cars of today is the over styled exterior
. Every maker seems to want their look to be uglier than the competition. Huge air vents in front that serve no purpose but to look stupid. When I get out in the morning for the commute the preference would be that i like the look of my vehicle rather than wishing that we can do better than the craptastic thing waiting there. Sorry, end of rant.
This is because the general external envelope is almost identical due to a number of factors (aerodynamics, regulation) so that the only areas left for showing some individualism are the front/rear.
I do miss the days when mainstream cars had nice loop carpet, not the felt crap that passes for carpet in new cars. The decline in quality and durability of the carpet, and factory floor mats, between an early 90s Honda Accord, and a new one, is staggering.
FWIW ;
Loop carpets are the cheap stuff , cut pile is the shiznit .
Agreed , that weird felt stuff these days is too thin and looks / feels cheaper than contact paper .
Most of the newer one fade really fast too ~ in the late 1970’s I remember thicker felt carpets that never faded . still too damn cheap but at least it lasted and was washable .
-Nate
My DTS Platinum has “premium” floor mats, and they’re cheap-looking looped like every car had until the 70’s. Perhaps they hold up better.
@ Ralph ;
Nope ~ loop carpets are the cheapo crap and they hold crud more than cut pile does .
I use and love , Lloyd drop in mats in my oldies but this year they stopped having the easy to use website, I need to contact them, hopefully they’ll still have the 38 year old patters .
-Nate
I don’t mind bench seating if there’s plenty of room for the centre passenger between the driver and the side passenger. There also needs to be plenty of padding for the centre passenger.
Agreed. Modern cars are too narrow to house three adults across comfortably (75″ is about the limit). Now if you want to haul 6 adults, you don’t go 3 wide on 2 rows, you go 2 wide on 3 rows in a full-size CUV or minivan (which I would prefer to do anyway).
I think you’ve got a good point, as cars got narrower the practicality of 3 across seating (especially for wide people) went away, but also I think passenger seating is a lot lower (maybe for fuel economy reasons). I even noticed this when I went from my ’86 GTI to my 2000 Golf (VW’s “A” platform) the seating of the 2000 is noticeably lower. I have to sit “down” into the car, rather than just “slide” across to sit in it…Maybe with the lower seating position the “tunnel” (where the exhaust usually is routed in FWD cars, but driveshaft in RWD) is more “in the way” of seating, making bench seating less practical (or the middle position would have less padding).
When I was younger I was more of a fan of bucket seats, but as I’ve gotten older, I appreciate the bench for several reasons (mostly to do with getting older):
– You can usually get out on either side of the car. This is not just an issue to avoid getting out on the driver’s (traffic) side of the car, but also when you return to your parking spot and find some bozo has parked too close to your driver’s door and you have trouble having enough room to get in on the driver’s side…you have another option to get in on the passenger side (though most cars have eliminated the passenger door lock cylinder, I guess because most cars have keyless entry now).
-My father who is disabled needs help getting into the car (both entering it and moving in enough to close the door….fortunately he has a 2006 Impala with a split-bench seat…we put a towel on the seat bottom and pull him into the car (once he is seated but not all the way in). This would be harder to do with a console (especially with armrest in the way).
One comment about armrests…my 1986 GTI didn’t have a center armrest, and I remember looking for an aftermarket one for it, but never got one..my 2000 Golf has one, and I now mostly drive with it pushed away (out of use)…I guess I ended up not being the armrest “type” , I’d rather have no console in the way (just have “hump” with carpeting covering it). Maybe people think this looks cheaper or unfinished, but I find I like this better than having a console, especially the massive ones now in vogue.
I’ll also add that I don’t like the closeness of the dash to my knees (my 1986 had LOTS more space to get in…I know some of that is for anti-submarine to keep you in place for collision, but I miss the openness of older cars…I feel like I’m getting into the batmobile)…yes, the contour of the seats keeps you in place, but I don’t drive like Mario Andretti most of the time, and don’t really need tightly contoured seating.
Maybe because I order cloth rather than leather seats, where the seat friction is greater on the former than the latter..maybe it is the much more common availability of leather seats that makes the contoured buckets more common now (yes, I do remember the vinyl bench seats of the late 50’s to early 70’s , sliding around on those was pretty common, maybe that’s part of the reason we have bucket seats now.
I drive a 2010 Chevy HHR which has “captain’s chair” buckets with armrests that fold down from the seat itself (on the right for the driver’s seat, on the left for the passenger’s seat). I am tallish, and I find myself using the passenger’s seat armrest to rest my arm on instead of the armrest on the driver’s seat. The car is very comfortable, by the way. I’ve driven some cars (~2003 Mustang, ~2005 Grand Marquis) that had incredibly uncomfortable seats that made me bum hurt after driving for an hour or an hour and a half. I can drive the HHR for several hours without stopping with no pain.
Until you are a passenger sitting in the front seat and the driver is five feet tall.
From a perspective of a European who grew up in 80s, I was totally puzzled by the references to ‘bucket seats’ when I started reading American car blogs. First I thought they were Recaros and only slowly realised they are just regular seats and there is also a concept of bench front seat. How strange.
Some models of Citroen 2CV had a bench seat in front, but they were effectively 2 individual seats joined together. You could not reasonably fit more than 2 because of the width, but also because there was a steel support for the springs up the middle. It must have saved a couple of francs.
Just love the Starfire and T bird interior. Speaking of T birds, the Bullet Birds of the early ’60’s had buckets in the back, too. Can’t think of a better interior anywhere. However, no console shifter until the restyle for 1977, when it came with the now optional bucket seats.
Well, not really. The back and lower cushion on the Bullet Birds were one piece, but the lower seat cushion did have a hump in the middle that restricted its use to two people.
Very interesting, I had never paid attention to the 58 Bonneville’s interior. Those seats are almost set up like some minivans. 🙂
A couple of additions: 1959 Chrysler products offered swivel buckets that had a stationary padded center section. The 1960 300F had proper buckets with a console. The shifter was on the floor for the few ordered with a 4 speed. But there was no column shift, as all the rest shifted via Chrysler’s pushbuttons.
There was also the 1961 Studebaker Hawk (below) which offered buckets and a 4 speed stick on the floor. The Corvair might have beat it as the first 4 place car with buckets and a 4 speed, but not by much. All 62 Hawks had buckets with a mini console, which were offered on Larks as well. Though the 4 speed stick was offered with all Hawks and Larks in 62, I don’t think a floor-mounted automatic came to Stude till 63.
Thanks for the additions. This was a quick pre-bedtime idea that I didn’t research properly, knowing that I was skipping over the Chrysler and Studebaker bucket brigade.
Unfortunately, the Hawk (and Lark) were pretty much out of the mainstream by then, and not exactly influential, like the Corvair Monza.
Earlier.
The Lark had RECLINING buckets starting in ’59 (…”if you like that sort of thing” went the radio advert”), the Hawks maybe had them even earlier, I think, but can’t put a finger on photo evidence
What about the Nash “fold-flat” seats? Were they just a bench with a divided
upper?
Without resorting to old brochures, perhaps the ’90 Caprice? I think the standard full-width bench in the late 80s did have a fold down armrest, but it was imbedded in a higher seatback; in other words the armrest was not the central seat back.
I remember dad’s ’92 Caprice having a “true” (seat cushion was one piece, the driver’s adjustment was also the front seat passenger’s) bench seat with a center arm rest. Whether or not that seat back was one or two pieces has faded, unfortunately.
I remember that my mother’s ’89 Plymouth Reliant had a single-piece backrest and no armrest (and a center seatbelt); not sure whether the Acclaim/Spirit had the same setup as a carryover in their base versions. The one I had for driver’s ed at least had a center fold-down armrest.
Does anyone know whether you could ever get true bucket seats in the LeSabre, post-1990?
I think the full-width bench in the ’91 to ’94 Caprices had a split back, with an independent armrest. Not sure, as I’ve been trying without success to find pictures of this setup.
First American car the family owned with bucket seats was out ’62 Mercury Monterey, complete with center console and floor shifter for the automatic. As far as the last Amercian car with a one piece bench seat that put the tall passenger’s nose to the windshield if riding with a short driver, that is a good question. The ’91 Ford LTD?
I dont like bench seats and usually swap them out for buckets from a similar model as the mounting points are usually there, however one of my cars has had the bench type swapped back in but it has the fold down centre armrest that actually holds you in position if corners are taken too fast which I do because Ive set the rest of the car up that way.
I think one factor that helped the move toward bucket seats, with which Americans had become familiar in the 50’s through imported cars such as the VW bug, was adding second and third cars to the household. Before that, the family car had to hold more people and have maximum seating capacity. Also, things began to change rapidly in the late ’50s/early 60’s as more women began to work, individual jobs and activities spread out family activities and schedules, and you saw fewer cars full of passengers on the road. When bucket seats became available in traditional economy cars such as the 61 Falcon Futura, they really arrived. Our first car with bucket seats was a 64 Fairlane Sports Coupe that my dad factory ordered. By the time Mustang arrived the following year, the deal with bucket seats was sealed.
My parents’ “traveling car” had a bench seat all the way up to the mid-80s when the kids started going away to college and they could get by with a smaller car…the 82 Cutlass with bench was replaced with an 86 Jetta with 5 speed and buckets.
I never cease to be amazed at how different American cars were from most of the rest of the world, post-WWII…and how similar they have become in recent years. In the mid 60s, I have to imagine the average European car was 1.5L, 4 cylinder, manual transmission, and the average American car had a V8 in excess of 5L, automatic trans, and was much larger…
This piece nicely illustrates the migration of bucket seats from full size cars to sporty compacts and intermediates. Seems buckets disappeared from full size American cars sometime in the late ’60s. You couldn’t get a bucket seat DeVille in 1969 but you could in 1962, as evidenced by my ’62 Cadillac convertible project pictured below. Although they were an unpopular option considering the low numbers produced. I guess the intended demographic for full size cars would prefer to have seating for six rather than pay money for an option that reduces seating to five. What full size American cars were available with a console after the Marauder in the early ’70s?
Olds curiously tried to revive the full-sized sport concept in ’78 with the Delta Holiday, offered up to ’81. Pontiac also offered a Bonneville with buckets in 1980.
The Bonneville.
The Bonneville offered buckets from 1979-81, in non-Brougham coupes only.
I can’t answer the “what car” question, but the last pickup with a true one-piece-no-fold-down-armrest Bench was the XL (base model) Super Duty in 2010, and only on the vinyl seat. The cloth XL seat had a fold down mini-armrest. The same is also true of the F-150, except swap out “2003” for “2010.” The last half-ton pickup to have a solid bench was the 2006 Toyota Tundra.
Because of the modular nature of all Ford Super Duty interiors, you could easily buy a brand-new 2016 model and swap in a bench from any year since 1999, although I don’t know why you’d want to.
The true bench in the f150 held out into 2004 on the heritage model. I have one with a cloth bench from that year.
Of course, forgot about that for some reason. A 40/20/40 “bench” seat (two buckets and a flip-down console in between) is the most useful configuration IMO, especially since there’s fewer occasions when you need to fit three people across.
So we’ve looked at when the console entered the picture, which leads me to wonder:
Which car had the first console that could be used comfortably as a center armrest?
Most of the early ones were too low. A minor nitpick of mine, but I find it uncomfortable on long drives if the console’s center armrest doesn’t match the height of the one on the door. As easy as it would seem to be to design the interior this way, you’d be surprised at how often the heights don’t match up.
Good question. Our 64 Fairlane’s low console had no armrest feature. Our 65 Thunderbird’s console storage compartment lid doubled as an armrest (example below). Looking at pics, the 61-63 T-Bird’s console was too low for this functionality.
My guess goes to the 1968 Pontiac intermediate as having the first center console that was high enough to double as an armrest.
The 1971 Mustang center console was tall enough to be used for that purpose, as too might have been the 1970 GM F-body.
Last place goes to Chrysler. It took them a ‘long’ time to get on board with the idea that a center console could be used as an armrest, too. In fact, I think the first K-car Lebarons might have had a center armrest but it was fixed and didn’t open up like a console!
The 1960 Chrysler 300F had a very nice center console armrest – both front and back.
Was the 300F’s center armrest fixed or did it open?
No idea. I had remembered that the 300F had buckets and a console, but didn’t know or recall the front or back armrests until I went looking for a picture.
I didn’t realize the 300s had rear console armrests; I thought the 66 Charger was the first Mopar with rear buckets and console
And Luminescent Dash,the coolest steering wheel and HP!
HP?
I find it’s not just a problem of height, but of how far forward or back the armrest is positioned. In my car, the armrest is a flip-up thing with a storage box under it, so it’s pretty high, but it’s so far back that the only way I could actually rest my elbow on it would be to crank my arm back at the shoulder, which is obviously not very restful.
My CTS’s door arm rest and the center console are the same height. With my hands on the lower part of the steering wheel my elbows rest on them.
The facts in this article are incomplete.
The 2012 Impala is not the last bench seat. The Impala shares that honor with one other 2012 car
2012 Ford Crown Vic
However, for the 2012 model year, the Crown Vic was only sold to fleet customers (police, taxis, rental cars, and to foreign markets) but you can still buy a very nice used 2012 Crown Vic rental car with a bench seat. The Crown Vic also claims the title of last full size rear drive American sedan.
I liked this article BTW, and I have some other ideas:
1. the last American car to have all-metal push-on hubcaps
2. ” ” sealed beam headlamps
3. ” ” loop-pile carpet
4. ” ” manual crank windows
5. ” ” not have the interior one finger door open latch
6. ” ” floor mounted dimmer switch
7. ” ” dashboard mounted pull-on headlight switch
8. ” ” old style two-knob radio
9. ” ” old slider lever, vacuum operated, heater controls
To answer number 4, according to this recent article “crank windows come in models like the Ford Fiesta S, Nissan Versa S, Chevrolet Sonic LS and Kia Rio LX.”
https://www.cars.com/articles/yes-you-can-still-buy-a-new-car-with-manual-windows-1420682584259/
Let’s add the 1st gen. Miata for crank windows. Got em on my 1990.
However, John noted “last American car”….
Not to be argumentative but the Dodge Charger and the Chrysler 300 are both rear wheel drive, and you can buy a new one today if you wish. I would consider them to be full-sized, not sure how they are classified by the powers that be.
Regarding your list of automotive anachronisms, the radio in our 2009 Highlander is essentially an updated version of the two knob radios of yore. There are other controls for sure but the radio part of the equation can be operated and tuned using only the two knobs.
Most of those things in the list I don’t miss at all; the last car I drove with crank windows was an early oughts Pontiac Sunkist I was given as a loaner while my Grand Prix was being repaired (again).
I miss loop pile carpet, full sized door opener handles, column shifters, fresh air vents down by the floor, horn rings, and the pull-knob to turn on headlights.
MY2011 was the last of the Panthers.
incorrect
*in the US and Canada.
Why are there used 2012 crown vics advertized for sale then? I think they were still making them for sale to fleets in North America for the 2012 model year.
“All Crown Victorias built after August 31, 2011 are 2012 model year cars. For the 2012 model year the US government required that electronic stability control be fitted on all new cars.[35] Ford did not add this feature to the Crown Victoria, so the 2012 model was not sold in the United States and Canada.”
“Despite their age, and more modern competition from General Motors, sales of the Ford Panther platform remained strong, especially in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. As stability control was not required for export for this region, the Middle East was the sole region the 2012 Crown Victoria was legal for sale; the final models were all produced for export to this region.”
You may be thinking of Police Interceptors, which are considered distinct models by Ford but often not by private sellers.
Nearly 4500 Crown Vics were sold in 2012, but that does not necessarily mean they are 2012 models.
All Crown Victorias built after August 31, 2011 are 2012 model year cars.
Which meant the 2012s were only made for two weeks. St. Thomas built its last car September 15, 2011.
1. All-metal push-on hubcaps
–Oldsmobile Custom Cruiser maybe? ’92 was the last year.
2. Sealed-beam headlamps
–C5 Corvette still had them in pop-ups until ’04. Exposed sealed-beam..’92 Tercel?
5. Define “one finger door open latch”
My sister’s old ’97 Plymouth Neon had a pull switch that operated the headlights.
My HHR has a knob to control the volume and one to change the station, but it has many other buttons and a USB slot so it really shouldn’t count.
It also has pull up inside door locks just like a ’50s-’60s car, although it does have power locks.
What was the last car to have a column shifted manual transmission? I read that the ’87 Chevy 1/2 ton pickup truck was. My dad had an ’83 Ford F100 with a six and a 3 on the tree. It was quite peppy and fun to drive. The 300 six matches very well with a manual transmission. The automatic emasculates the torquey inline 6 and sucks up most of the power.
Here in Australia the Ford Falcon commercials could be had with a 3 on the tree manual, full bench, vinyl upholstery, and a carby fed OHV six until 1993.
First bucket seat car in the Paczolt family was dad’s ’62 Impala SS. Buckets, a console with storage between the seats, but only as long and high as the seat cushions. As dad invariably went for Powerglide, that meant a column shifter which really looked wrong to this 11 year old when it arrived.
Sorry, I couldn’t get past that Sexy dashboard in the first photo, I didn’t even read the article!
Bench seats never did much for me, but neither do center consoles. I’m quite fond of the bucket and no console combo of the Bonneville and Vette, I just love having that lower carpeted open space to my side, tunnel or not. Those cars give me the illusion of space more than the flat floors of FWD or tall roofs of S/CUV and vans do.
I also do not care for the center console. Never have. I like to be able to move from driver’s seat to passenger’s seat without getting out of the car. A bench seat is a little better for this, but a large vehicle with a large space between the bucket seats allows you to go from driver’s seat to back seat without getting out of the car.
I tend to miss consoles when I’ve not had them — modern cars do tend to spoil us as regards oddments space. However, a lot of them definitely have a lot more intrusive, mostly decorative plastic than useful features.
XR7Matt: You are so right. The consoles in modern cars have gotten so wide and tall they’ve become obnoxious, space eating monsters. And dirt and debris traps.
I wish at least one manufacturer would offer a “console delete” option. I’ll take it with crank windows and a two knob radio as well.
Some assclown boxed the drivers side of my Cruze in one time-I weigh 200. Guess what I had to do?
I much prefer buckets over a bench. I want my seat to be comfy, give my back lots of support and hold me in place in curves. Although I do remember the split benches with armrests in both my ’84 Pontiac 6000 wagon and ’84 Dodge Aries wagon were better than most. The problem I find with most new vehicles is that the seats are way too hard. For example, my friend’s 2015 Hyundai Santa Fe, which has seats that are so hard they are like sitting on concrete. Not enjoyable to ride in at all.
Personally I’m a big fan of the split bench-.semibucket seat for driver, fold down armrest/occasional centre seat and a broad passenger seat.
If you have an automatic why not have a column shift, or even push buttons tucked up out of the way?
I wonder if the decline of the bench seat was linked to the decrease in family sizes from the sixties on?
I imagine it was partly the latter and partly the rise of seatbelt and later airbag regulations. Bench seats made sense for family cars when seats were treated like benches — i.e., shove in as many people as space, decorum, and interpersonal combativeness would allow. Once everyone had to be belted in (or in a child seat) and once automakers had to start thinking about airbag deployment zones, that no longer made sense.
my 96 Falcon EFII (Olympic Classic no less) wagon had a contiguous bench seat with a split backrest and fold down middle backrest/armrest. That was a pretty nice car, if plain.
what car had the last genuine bench seat, with a continuous seat and seat back?
I remember seeing a 1991 or ’92 Chevy Caprice with a full (not notchback or split) bench seat a number of years ago in a parking lot near my home. I have to say I was surprised at the time because I had assumed that they did away with full benches with the 1991 redesign. BTW, this wasn’t a police or taxi car.
Perhaps the front bench will return with the rise of truly autonomous vehicles? I imagine that these cars would have a front bench that faces the interior of the car.
Which would be terrible for those who suffer from motion sickness and must look forward at all times to keep from ralphing all over the car. I can’t even sit in the back seat of a car looking forward and sometimes I can’t even handle riding shotgun if the driver makes any sudden, unexpected movements. Pointing the front seat towards the rear of the car is a horrible idea.
Of course VW had nothing but buckets ever and the first Beetles got here in 1949.
FWIW, Wikipedia says the 2013 Impala had an optional front bench–as does cars.com and also Chevy’s brochure (below). I had no idea of the etymology of the word–going back to 1940 and earlier (I was sure it was coined in the 1950s.)
I’m fairly certain that the last car with a true bench seat is the 1994 Caprice. That is as Paul specified, a traditional, non split bench with a continuous back. They did have a fold down armrest built into the seat back, but it wasn’t a notchback, so I think it still qualifies. The 95 and 96 models came with a notch back, split bench standard. I owned a 94 with the standard bench. It was actually fairly comfortable and supportive, only sucked on road trips if my wife drove a leg and I was in the passenger side with no leg room!
only sucked on road trips if my wife drove a leg and I was in the passenger side with no leg room!
That might have something to do with the rise of buckets and split benches.
Actually the last car with a bench seat was the 2013 Impala. it was a $195 option. The 2014 Impala dropped that configuration option.
The only vehicles with a bench seat are pickup trucks and SUV’s with the console delete
And even then, I think the only SUV with a front bench option anymore is the Tahoe/Suburban/Yukon. Expeditions haven’t had a bench seat option since 2006, and Sequoias and Armadas have never had a front bench. I don’t think it would be all that hard to swap out a bench from the respective manufacturer’s pickup.
You can still get them in Australia …
http://www.caradvice.com.au/12528/2008-ford-fg-falcon-ute/photos/
News of the bench seat’s demise is a bit premature. It is still an option on the fleet-only Impala Limited (the previous gen Impala) which will be discontinued after 2016….
http://www.gmfleet.com/chevrolet/impala-limited-full-size-car/features-specs/standard-optional-equipment.html#fs_opt_Interior
My first car, a ’64 Corvair 500 coupe, had a split back bench. It had the 2 speed automatic, which was a polite little toggle switch on the dash. Following that was a ’65 Sport Fury, with true buckets and a full console with the 3 speed automatic shift lever. Next came a ’69 Road Runner with the optimal arrangement: a split back bench and a 4 speed manual. The armrest was her thigh.
I’ve done a bit of sleuthing, and I while I have not found the exact answer to Paul’s question, I found enough to narrow things down a bit.
In terms of American cars that had a full-width front bench with continuous seatback, (i.e. no fold-down armrest), the last hold-outs appear to be the following:
Ford: 1983 Fairmont/Zephyr
Chrysler: 90% certain it was the ’89 Aries/Reliant. I was able to find a brochure from ’86, and it did show that a full-width bench was available on the base K’s, while the bench in the SE and LE trim levels had a fold-down armrest.
GM: This is where I lost the plot. I’ve confirmed that a full-width bench was standard on the Impala as late as ’82, but don’t know if this setup continued until the Impala’s demise in ’85.
If someone knows the answer to this riddle, please post it…
The 1983 Chevy Malibu had a full width bench without center armrest as std equipment. I have seen full width bench seats all the way up to 1988 on the Monte Carlo but could swear those had a fold down armrest by that point. Also base Caprice Classics were full width benches right up until 1990 in the box style B-body but again need to look up if they had a center armrest by that point.
Moms 2008 Impala has the bench seats up front. It made for a very refreshing change after driving my buddies 2014 Taurus with it’s massive intrusive space wasting center console.
When I define bench, I mean a church pew. Solid cushion, solid back. A lot of people erroneously refer to a 2-door with a church pew as a “split bench”. It’s not. Of course a 2 door needs 2 independent upper parts for rear seat entry, it’s still a church pew.
One step above that is a church pew with a center folding armrest. Still a church pew.
Now if each side is totally independent, and moves fore and aft as such, then it’s no longer a true bench in my book, THAT is what I define as a split bench.
I had an ’81 Skylark with a solid bench, a folding armrest and a center plastic nicknak
tray. Still a church pew in my book, just a fancy one.
Just so Roger ;
Split benches can be nice , many 1980 ~ 1990 vintage GM trucks came with a standard 60/40 % split bench .
My self , I like the solid bench seat in my 1969 Chevy C/10 Shop Truck ~ I found one with a folding back rest and had it custom upholstered with lumbar support and a rock hard bottom cushion so my broken back/neck don’t get pinched / beat up when I spend all day in it .
Many fond memories of my 1949 B1B Dodge pickup truck’s narrow bench seat ~ that truck has a three on the tree manual transmission and a torque converter (” Fluid Drive “) so my girlfriend would cuddle up next to me as we crusied around town….
Good times .
This whole discussion reminds me of the song “Stick Shifts and Safety Belts” by the band Cake, released sometime in the late 90’s on their excellent album “Fashion Nugget”:
Stick shifts and safety belts, bucket seats have all got to go
when I’m riding in my car, they make my baby seem so far
I need you here with me, not way over in a bucket seat. (2x)
But when I’m riding in my Malibu, it’s easy to get right next to you
I say, baby, scoot over please, and then she’s right here next to me
…
My personal favorite buckets were from the early-60s GM era.
I like a little “cush underneath my tush”, especially on treks more
than one hour each way in duration. I compare modern bucket
seats to “church pews” – even if they do hold me in place when
whipping a ’08 Kia or Toyota around suburban blocks.
Not that they offered any serious support – especially in hard
cornering – but that’s where the contemporary lap-only belts
came in handy! And if you happened to weigh anymore than
1501b or were at all over 5’9″, you’d sink right down to the frame
of the buckets in that ’64 Skylark or ’62 Corvair! LOL
But for long four-six lane trips, these seats were the best.
Interesting conversation. I especially enjoy the fact we can talk about all brands without bashing each other! Refreshing!
I still like my 68 mustang bucket without consul without consul design. I upgraded the seats but never wanted a consul in it. To me it depends on the car entirely. I first saw the 68 charger with 4 buckets and full running consul and I loved it. In fact my next car build brought me to this sight. Thinking on a 60ish merc 2 door with 4 buckets and full consul.
Cars are so great! So many choices and designs over the years it makes your head spin. And no matter what brand, along comes a design or feature you like and encorporate into your own build.
Thanks for starting this thread and all the contributors!
The one flaw of the true bench seat was the fact that if the driver were short, they would push the seat all the way forward. If the passenger(s) were tall, it could make sitting in the front seat painful if not downright impossible. Our ’85 Impala had a “true” bench seat. My ’80 Cougar had a “split bench” seat which was great because it was really two really wide buckets with armrests in between. That car was very comfortable.
Lex:
I recall, as a kid in the mid-1970s, riding in the back of a rather large sedan with a ‘pure’ bench front seat, where the left half of the seat back was closer to me than the right. The vinyl upholstery that front bench was wrapped in displayed the creases and strain lines of being in that configuration!
Was it possible that a car was available with such an option – a full front bench that could be adjusted individually by driver or passenger?
Oh, I feel you on this one.
I’m 10″ taller than my wife. One bench seat car I had when we were first together she never needed to drive with me in it. Another (truck) we both drove a fair amount with the other riding shotgun.
As for the shift pattern, they probably changed it back because it was the standard way that Studebaker had the shift pattern and the big three use to ridicule Studebaker for doing such, The advantage to reverse and low next to each other was to rock a car out of place if it got stuck.
GM were the primary pusher of the P—N-D-L-R quadrant, a booby-trap design which caused crashes, injuries, and deaths. Read this book, by this man, who has a legitimate claim to the title of “Father of the Automatic Transmission”. He tirelessly railed—with rigourous data on his side—against automatic shift quadrants with adjacent reverse and forward drive positions. For it, he got mocked and scorned by officials, and shunned by SAE.
In the absence of Federal vehicle safety standards, the General Services Administration drew up their own list of standard equipment required on cars purchased by the government starting with the 1966 models. The list included front and rear seatbelts, nonglare windshield wiper arms, windshield washers, a driver’s sideview mirror, reversing lamps, and automatic transmission controls with no forward and reverse position immediately adjacent. The GSA requirements had the effect of making those items standard equipment even for cars not bought by the government (automakers weren’t about to make government and non-government versions of their cars), which is why things like backup lights and sideview mirrors and screenwashers moved off many models’ option list for ’66 and became basic equipment. GM, having previously issued smug dictates on the subject—they were the market leader, so the rest of the industry was just going to have to go along with the GM way—were forced to adopt the safer P—R-N-D-L. When Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard № 102 then came in for ’68 or ’69, it stipulated that a neutral position shall be located between forward drive and reverse drive positions, re-sealing the fate of GM’s unsafe design.
Studebaker’s last few ’66s kept the P—N-D-L-R quadrant, because no money to change it and no reason to do so; they weren’t selling any to the government.
For the last eight or so years, I’ve had a problem, one of annoyance, with floor mount automatic transmission selectors:
Always ending up in frickn NEUTRAL when I needed to be in Reverse or in Drive! This has happened with both straight line automatics and later ‘zig-zag’ patterns.
All my driving life, my eyes have been where they’re supposed to be while driving – looking around out the car windows. So quite seldom have I ever had reason to look down between the front seats, or at my instrument cluster, while shifting into a gear.
Now that I’m in my fifties, I feel like I need one of those cars where reverse and a forward gear were next to each other, and neutral was off to one end of the band.
I’ve been on the brakes while shifting since getting in the Drivers Ed Olds back in ’86, so no worries about ‘clashing gears’ with me.
PRDL1L2’N’!
How about it, folks?
GM wasn’t even consistent from division to division; back when each division had their own automatic transmission design, the shift quadrants could be different.
At one point circa 1957 Buick’s Twin and Triple Turbine Drive transmissions had different shift quadrants. Imagine having two cars in the same household with different quadrants, reverse in a different position. Could make for trouble backing out of the garage if you switched cars and forgot the difference.
I like a bench seat with a folding center armrest, and the seat all the way back. Nothing like a hands out , stretch your legs ,comfortable driving position.
What was the first 4 door with bucket seats?
The center armrest on a bench is usually much more useful than a console’s, and you can manspread.
Good question. The earliest that comes to my mind is the 1964 Galaxie 500 XL that offered the buckets and console on a 4 door hardtop. I am not sure if there was a 4 door XL in 1965, though my memory says there was not.
I was thinking the ’62 Corvair Monza 4 door, bucket seats were optional. Sometime later bucket seats were standard in Corvair Monza 4 doors. Manual transmissions in Corvairs all had floor mounted shifters.
It appears you could get buckets in the 1963 Galaxie 500XL four door hardtop as well. I seem to recall seeing a few when new (but with automatics unlike the one below).
https://topclassiccarsforsale.com/ford/344853-1963-ford-galaxie-xl-500-real-factory-4-speed-390-4door-hardtop-rare.html
I submit ’59 Imperial.
I`ve seen a `61 Buick Invictia station wagon, with them. Also 63 and 64 Wildcats and Electras. `62, 63, and 64 Cadillac Sedan De Villes.
1963 Ford Falcon wagons, `63 and 64 Galaxie 500 XLs’
1963 ,1964 non-letter Chrysler 300s. AND `62 Rambler Classics with Corvair-like close together bucket seats, and `63 Rambler Classic sedans and wagons with bucket seats and consoles Also, the `64 Continental had a Chrysler style seperate bucket seat setup with a center cushion and a folding armrest.
I was going to bring up Detroit’s tying of bucket seats/consoles to coupes (particularly in the 1970s) whereas the rest of the world was fine putting them in all body styles. There were some exceptions, like Ford offering buckets/console/floor shift in the Granada, but GM and Chrysler in that era seemed to think bucket seats were only for coupes.
Remember when Honda showed a concept car in 2017 showing a bench seat?
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/uncategorized/curbside-concepts-honda-urban-ev-are-bench-seats-coming-back/
I wonder if Honda had tested the water for a return of the bench seat? 😉
One of the things that makes me happy about my still-new-to-me 2002 Silverado is the big bench seat. Another is the big honkin’ column-shift lever. It’s like driving a car 30 years older, but with FI, ABS, and overdrive automatic.
I don’t know if you count the Crosley as a production car, but it always had bucket seats from ’39 to ’52.
That raises the whole issue of bench seats in small/tiny cars. And the question of Why? If there’s no way to fit three across, what’s the point?
But outside the US, column shifts and bench seats seem to have often been adopted as ‘modern’ without regard to practicality. A friend had a Mazda 800 with a tiny bench seat in its cramped little body. Think it had four on the column too. Two strapping Aussie teenagers on that bench and we were just about shoulder to shoulder.
I’ve been watching a lot of film noir and old TV shows like Perry Mason during the COVID year+ and noting how many times drivers park at the curb and slide over to exit the passenger door to avoid opening the driver’s door in traffic. That was a convenience and safety feature of bench seats that is mostly forgotten today.
^^This.
I’ll add that independent of the width of a car, there are times you still might want to enter the car from the opposite door…like getting hemmed in at a parking lot, side collision where door is jammed, etc. Bucket seats are OK with no console, but how often do you see that configuration?
My Mother has my Dad’s last car (2006 Impala) with the split bench seat. He’s gone now, but in his last years he had mobility problems getting into the car. He was in a wheelchair, we had a transfer board, and put a towel under his behind so he could more easily be “pulled” into the passenger seat. The car has cloth seats, imagine it would have been easier with leather (or vinyl). But I was glad he had bench seats, wouldn’t want to have to fight with a console trying to get him into the car.
Yes, bucket seats are more form fitting, keep you in place, but do many people drive such that a bucket seat would be needed for the purpose? If so, could we have bucket seats without the console, so we at least have a chance of changing seats? Is it because we always have to have phones/other paraphernalia handy at all times when driving?
’57 Nash Ambassador had split front seats available. Pretty comfy as I had a pair that replaced the sorry bench in my ’60 Lark.
I had lots of cars with buckets and consoles, and mini vans with captain’s chairs without a console, but my favorite was the Strato bench seats in my ’66 Riviera. It looked like buckets from outside, but instead of a console the driver got a very comfortable fold down arm rest. I had a similar Riv with the actual buckets and console which was not as nice. My ’07 F150 has a split bench with a big arm rest, there’s a fixed narrow middle cushion. You can’t fit three comfortably across with that set up, but it’s perfect for me and my Wife.
Here’s a similar truck set up. It reminds me of my ’70 Coupe de Ville.
Oh wow, I didn’t realize the base XL 40/20/40 benches back then didn’t even have a console or cupholder in the center armrest. Seems pretty silly not to make that standard like nicer XLs, XLTs, and Lariats.
With full-size pickups being 80″ wide, it seems the limiting factor in passenger comfort isn’t hip room, but the floor hump. I’d love to see a flat-floored EV adopt a 3-passenger bench.
Thinking about early-1960s Fords, the Falcon Sprint and Galaxie 500 XL come to mind—but then I see there was the 1962 Fairlane Sport Coupe:
Now I’m not saying every bucket or even split bench or whatever was remotely comfortable, but I can say with certainty that every bench seat I ever drove or rode in was miserably uncomfortable. They weren’t all the same though, some were instantaneous and others took 10 or 15 minutes. But every last one was uncomfortable, I like low back support, almost at my waist, and just below my shoulder blades. So far as I’m concerned, good riddance to bad rubbish.
An aside, I crisscrossed US 66/I 40 across Az and NM back in the early 70s a few times. I was always struck for some reason by all the Native Americans 4 abreast in pickup trucks, and many years later wondering how they adapted to the mandatory seat belt laws. Now they were shoulder to shoulder and not particularly comfortable I’m sure, but doing what they had to do for transportation, which I’m sure was much better than back in the bed of the pickup, before that was made illegal.