Michigan’s Historical Museum, although it hasn’t been updated in about 25 years, has a cool “1957 Detroit Auto Show” section, where this ’57 Fury is perched high overhead at a dramatic angle. From underneath, observers may notice that this Fury wears a pair of cherry bombs. That old Poly 318 (dual carbs, most likely) would likely emit some mellifluous tones through those twice pipes. It’s too bad that it’s perpetually silent in its educational setting. Nevertheless, it makes for a dramatic photograph.
This car can be considered Christine’s cousin, I presume.
She’d be proud.
Beautiful car. The ’57-’58 Fury is probably one of my favorite ’50s designs, but they rust extremely easy & have their usual Chrysler Co. quirks that you wouldn’t see in the GM or Ford cars.
If you’re going to recreate an auto show, MY 1957 is a great choice. It was a turning point year in many ways. Chevrolet offered the last of the tri-fives, with their tidy dimensions falling out of favor. Ford outsold Chevy for the first time in a couple of decades by giving buyers the bloatmobiles they craved. And the Suddently It’s 1960 styling of the full line of Chrysler cars kicked off the era of fins. It was a start of an explosion of creativity that we will never see again.
Look at the dramatic evolution in styling that occurred between 1956 and 1961. Then compare it to the most recent five model years of 2010 to 2015.
If wikipedia is right Ford and Chevy trade places a number of times for #1 in sales from the mid thirties to 1957 (link)
If those figures are accurate (I’m not convinced they are, at least not all of them), Ford led consistently until the late 1920s, Chevrolet and Ford seesawed back and forth for about the next ten years after that, then Chevy became dominant, with Ford poking through to #1 exactly two years in each decade from the 1940s to the 1970s.
It also depends on whether you’re talking model year or calendar year. IIRC, Ford led ’57 in MY but Chevy led in CY; 1959 was the opposite.
Accepting those Wikipedia numbers at face value, Plymouth’s relationship to Ford and Chevy is interesting. Plymouth went from a startup brand in 1928 to almost 300K in 1933, in the middle of the Depression, when almost everyone else’s sales were dropping. At that point, the notion that Plymouth could catch Ford and Chevrolet must have seemed very realistic. Over the next few years, however, even though Plymouth’s sales kept rising, Ford and Chevy pulled away a bit. But Plymouth got pretty close to Ford while Ford was struggling during the 1939-42 era, and hung relatively close to both Ford and Chevrolet during the first few years of the postwar period (1946-48).
1949 is where things fall apart for Plymouth. Each of the Big Three released their first all-new postwar cars that model year, but Chrysler didn’t get its new cars out until mid-model year, and when they did, they came across as old-fashioned and stodgy. Ford and Chevrolet peeled away from Plymouth, and Plymouth never came close to them again. Within a few years after that, Plymouth was fighting with Buick to hang onto third place, forget about challenging for the top two.
Perhaps I should point out that it is production, not sales that Wiki has. But I don’t know if it is model year or calendar year. I would guess that they are consistent.
When every new manufacturer introduced new models in the fall of the year, a calendar year encompassed two model years.
The challenges in judging the success of different models started when a brand experienced dramatically different levels of success from one year to the next. An example would be the 1962 and 1963 Plymouth. If you want to get a clear idea of how the division’s offerings really fared during those years, it’s better to look at the sales and production figures for the model year, not the calendar year.
Plymouth sales took off once the 1963 models were introduced, after a disastrous 1962 model year. (It was the same with Dodge during those two years.) If you look at the calendar year figures for 1962, however, you’ll get at least two months of sales for the much more successful 1963 models.
Today manufacturers introduce models throughout the calendar year, and they don’t adhere to the same schedule for new model rollouts. It therefore makes more sense to use the sales figures for the calendar year.
The sign really should read Anodized Aluminum Dreams. For just a few years that gold-toned material was the unquestionable symbol of Special Edition. Even Rambler used it on the Rebel.
Then it disappeared as all of Detroit “dried out” from the binge of overdecoration.
Unavoidable puns: Ex-addicts. Friends of Bill M. From AA to AA.
Anodized aluminum was the plastic body cladding of the era.
I never noticed how bulky the rear bumper corners were on these. But a stunning design, particularly in the fall of 1956. Another car not helped by fender skirts.
All of the 1957 Mopars looked much better without fender skirts (or continental kits).
Weren’t the “outriggers” on the rear bumper optional?
Yes, they were. They’re much sought after by restorers of 1957/1958 Plymouths, who refer to them as wing tips. I sold a set of them (for both bumpers) that needed replating for over $1000 several years ago on ebay. I didn’t want to use them on my convertible because they required holes to be drilled in the bumper for cars that weren’t originally equipped with wing tips.
Wasn’t one of Exners styling cues the open wheel wells? I agree the skirts don’t do this Plymouth justice.
I think this was Exner’s best design, putting the Fairlane and even the ’57 Chevy to shame. This one is definitely in my dream garage.
I know Ford and Chevy outsold these Plymouths, but you’d think they would still be more abundant than they are today. I mean, I see 3 times as many Edsels around. The last ’57 coupe I saw up close was a Belvedere or Savoy parked rusting with a Truly Nolen decal on it when I was a kid in about 1990. Rust? Too many demolished in the making of Christine?
Rust and overall poor quality. The ’57 Mopars were rushed into production before all of their numerous bugs were worked out. The situation was compounded by the fact that they were such hot sellers that the factories were running at capacity and then some. Chrysler’s reputation for quality went first to worst almost overnight and some would argue they’ve never completely recovered.
Nice, although I’m not a fan of the Fury’s bumpers. Dad’s 58 Plymouth was so bad he didn’t own another Chrysler product till 1991, so maybe this one is best looked at.
Interesting, Minnesota salt/rust issues aside,Dad’s 58 Plymouth Suburban wagon was one of the better cars he owned.
I take it that this isn’t the one from the time capsule in Tulsa ! 🙂
That thing looked like it had been sitting at the bottom of the ocean for 50 years.
That’s currently sitting miles away from me in the Ultra 1 warehouse in a state of half-assed preservation efforts.
I believe they’re afraid to move it because one wrong move & it will split in half.
I guess I am sometimes too tolerant as I don’t feel there are many 50s/early 60s designs made worse by fender skirts….with the possible exception of Nashs, the “bathtub” Packhards, and some (most?) Ramblers.
My sister totalled her fiancee’s 68 Sport Fury convertible and it was replaced by a 12 year old 1957 Belvedere 4 door sedan. What a sad example of a car brand I have a soft spot for. After Christmas dinner, when they went to go home, my sis and future BIL were “hung up” by an automatic that would not respond to button pushing. They nearly had to dismantle the dashboard to afford a temporary fix.
They went about it ass-backwards then. The pushbutton shift works on the same principle as other automatic transmission shifters, with the cable length adjustment where the cable goes into the transmission.
I like these but not as much as the 55 & 56 Mopars.They look much more modern than the Ford & GM cars.Definitely a place for one in my lottery winning garage.
Foxcraft fender skirts no less ! .
Nice looking car , I’d love to hear it roar .
Not only did these rust like Vegas , they also suffered incredibly poor build quality and so had rattles , leaks & squeaks beyond imagination .
Nevertheless , I loved my ’59 Plymouth Plaza stripper two door .
-Nate
The 1957 and 1958 Plymouths certainly did have their faults. I saw more than one of them that had rusted-out areas before it was two years old. On my car, the insides of the fins were not painted at all. Also, there were no baffles to stop mud or water from flying up into the area behind the headlights where a low spot would allow it to accumulate. I learned to clean out that area periodically.
But like any other car it’s possible to keep one up and running if one simply takes care of it. The enclosed photos of my former 1958 convertible were taken in the mid- to late 1990’s. Although the seats had been recovered with original materials at that point, the paint and all the exterior trim except for the rear bumper were original. We owned the car from 1966 to 1998.
I wonder if the damage from lack of paint and baffles could be partially prevented by undercoating. Ziebart® and companies as such drilled holes on many odd parts to apply coating, probably they figured that from cars like Fury.
I might add that I owned a 1957 Fury for a short time in the late 1960’s. It was a factory three-speed car that had been painted bright metallic blue, but it still had its original factory Fury trim, of which there was quite a bit. The gold anodized aluminum side trim and grille bars were of course the main things that differentiated the Fury from other 1957 Plymouths, but the front fender ornaments and the wheel covers were also different. In addition, everything in the interior was some shade of cream or brown…seat and door upholstery, steering wheel, instrument panel, headliner, and carpets. The upper interior door and quarter window moldings and windshield frame were also chromed instead of painted. It also had the 150-mph speedometer and the dual 4-barrel carburetors on the 318 cubic inch engine.
While this is not my favorite vintage car, at least it has style, something totally missing from modern cars. This style of car came and went fairly fast. I’m wondering if the jelly bean look will ever go away. The automakers need to hire some stylists, with orders to design something, anything, to get away from that look. It can be done. The 2011-2014 Dodge Charger almost pulls it off. Even with 4 doors.
All indications are that the only thing that rivaled the impact the Forward Look had on the automotive industry in 1957 was how poorly they were built. A good analogy might be one of the most beautiful domestic cars ever built, Raymond Lowey’s 1953 Studebaker Starliner coupe, that was actually designed to flex and had the same kind of reputation as the Chryslers. It’s a huge pity since both cars (but especially the Studebaker) were real stunners.
In fact, if someone could somehow keep the proportions correct, a ’53 Starliner coupe would be a great retro-mobile to be produced even today. Unfortunately, it would probably end up being a bloated, fat-mobile like all the rest of today’s so-called retro designs.
Being bloated has quite something to do with high belt lines. Dodge Charger fixed the problem partially by lowing the belt lines over the ’06-’10 model. Cadillac XTS has the problem very seriously, and they quickly lowered belt lines on newer models.
Driving a ’53 Starliner in the mid ’70s is similar to driving a ’94 Lincoln Mark VIII nowadays. I recall there is such an owner of the Starliner recalled it was a very distinctive looking car in the ’70s, for the futurist look. But it was extremely rust-prone ( even living in Dixie ) . Quite true for Mark VIII also.
Yeah, and those current high beltlines aren’t all due to styling. From what I can gather, raising the beltline strengthens the car’s integrity enough that metal can be removed from the bottom of the vehicle, with the idea being that less metal is needed, overall, which, in turn, increases profit.
The roofline on these hardtops is exquisite.
Here’s a ’58, at the 1958 McKeesport, PA Auto Show. Just digitized a bunch of my dad’s Kodachromes.
Oops! Robert, I accidentally deleted your cool post with the auto show picture! Darn it, I was just going to comment on how great the picture was….argh!
Here you go – 1958 Auto Show, McKeesport, PA