(first posted 11/15/2011) From today’s perspective, Rancheros – and their El Camino counterparts – are just cool, funky, fun and desirable, because of their unique configuration and, well; because they’re cool, funky and and fun. What else is needed? They long ago achieved cult status, and one can never go wrong showing up in one, regardless of whether that’s in Beverly Hills or Lubbock. And for anyone under the age of fifty or so, the reasons for their existence are self-evident: another opportunity for guys to express their disdain for sedans, and all the implications of domesticity they imply. The Anti-Paternity Mobile, as I tagged the 1969 Ranchero we did a while back. In today’s time frame, the dozen years between 1957 and 1969 may not seem like much, but back then, well; how old is rap? Think kids in 1969 were listening to Pat Boone?
So to try to understand why Ford decided to build the first Ranchero in 1957, we need to make a huge jump, culturally speaking. And it involves this: in 1957, trucks were madly uncool. Nobody ever took a girl out in a truck in 1957, period. They’d beg, steal or borrow anything else; whatever it took. Trucks were nasty, dirty and as un-sexy as it got; might as well take a tractor to the prom. Enter the Ranchero.
You probably can’t make out the text, but here’s the key lines from this ad:
Because Ranchero, with its crisp modern lines, has a wonderful way of saying nice things about your company. Nice things like “progressive”…”up-to-date”…”good to deal with”. That’s why the Ranchero is excellent for any business – large or small – where customer impressions count.
Does that implicate genuine trucks adequately enough? As in, you’re going to be seen as a crude, dirty, untrustworthy hick if you show up to fix Mrs. Smiths’ sink in a Ford F-100. Like I said, 1957 was a long time ago, and America’s embrace of the truck as the family truckster was as unimaginable as gay marriage.
In that context, the Ranchero was as obvious as, and analogous to Ford’s 1958 Thunderbird: time to step up your game, dude!
Imagine driving around your suburban neighborhood, and not seeing a genuine pickup truck, anywhere. To the best of my memory, that was the case when I arrived in Iowa City in 1960, and I was pretty observant. The first one appeared in 1964, a big Dodge double cab with a giant cab-over camper; the forerunner of the RV. And then our neighbors bought a new 1965 Chevy C10, because they were building a house in the country to move to. And of course, those were strictly second vehicles. And of course, there were exceptions, somewhere.
Drive out of town, and every farm had a pickup. But there was always a sedan too. And you know which one got driven to church, game or the the dance. All which explains the divergent evolution of automobilus ute; as in Australian ute, or utility coupe, from the American counterpart. Even the lowliest of American farmers could afford a sedan, even if it meant driving a ten year old pickup.
Not so in Australia. The ute was a necessary compromise of coupe and truck, because folks needed one vehicle to haul the barbed wire as well as to drive to church on Sunday. The Ranchero was never conceived of in the same vein, and American “utes” and Ozzie utes are as different in their genealogy as coyotes and kangaroos. They both have tails, but that’s about the extent of it.
And for what it’s worth, the Ranchero was hardly a brilliant idea, or sales success. Until the mid-late sixties, when Chevy’s El Camino became “cool”, an “individualistic” alternative to a Malibu coupe, the category’s sales were somewhere between modest and mediocre. Not that it probably hurt Ford any; the Ranchero shared a whole lot of body parts with its aptly-named stable-mate, the two-door Ranch Wagon.
Even the tailgate was re-used. And presumably, Ford’s legendarily mediocre build quality for that year.
Our example has been “improved” a bit, but was a regular driver parked downtown on and off for a couple of years. I’m particularly fond of its caramel paint job. Yumm! Whether the machinery in the engine compartment has been improved is unknown. Ford’s 226 six and the 272 and 292 Y-blocks were the choices, then.
Even though Ford may not have made a lot of hay with the early Rancheros, it was another example of their willingness to blaze new market niches. That would serve Ford well, mostly. It may not have turned out to be another T-Bird, but it wasn’t an Edsel either. Development costs were undoubtedly peanuts, and the tooling didn’t take much to pay off. A risk worth taking, even if earlier attempts at a similar concept, like the Hudson car-based pickups a decade earlier flopped.
The Ranchero cost a not-insubstantial amount more than a dirty F-100, which undoubtedly held back its appeal. But someone has to be the trailblazer, and the Ranchero paved the way for a raft of smaller and more civilized trucks of all sorts. Before we knew it, trucks became respectable; maybe too much so.
This is one model unseen in Australia Paul crazy eh Ford could have for once spent nothing tooling up for the 57 ute but no they kept building the 56. New Zealand got 57 Fords but not the Ranchero not new anyway in fact a 2door Wagon was used as a hearse in my hometown for many years I remember seeing it repainted Blue/white in 81 it had 4500 miles on it. Nice find, Oh its coupe utility not tother way round
Remember, Bryce, we never got the ’57-’58 US Fords in Australia (unlike NZ) , so it wouldn’t have made sense to sell the Ranchero here with no parts backup. They could have sent you guys some though.
Judging from the Longhorn badge on the back, wouldn’t the color be called burnt orange? Cool looking machine, even if it would look better in crimson.
I think the marketing line of respectability is a pretty good match for the Australian ute’s position. Would your observation of the farmer’s financial position have been the same in the Depression era? At that time the banks would finance a working vehicle but not a family sedan so you were likely to see the reverse position – new truck and old sedan. And of course back in those days nobody bothered about people riding in the bed of a ute, and travel speeds were low enough and traffic sparse enough that it wasn’t ridiculously dangerous. A lot changed by the 1950’s.
Bryce – don’t overlook the rear overhang, and long cab pushing back your load’s centre of gravity, I’d expect the spare is mounted behind the seat. Two factors that make it a less practical load carrier than the ’56 Mainline ute. Probably less ground clearance too. There would still have been tooling costs of course for another set of stamping dies if they had gotten into local production of the ’57s.
Certainly an interesting find Paul! In 1957 I can imagine this would be a lot more comfortable to drive than a pickup especially if you had a lot of miles to cover.
Judging by the later model pedals in there, I’d say it had both a dual-master cylinder and/or disc brake swap and a swap to a 289 or 302.
Man, I really miss that 1950’s & 1960’s art! It was a time when people looked ahead and the future was bright! Could use some of that now. geozinger could make it happen!
I became a fan of the El Camino when I saw my first 1968 SS 396! In green mist, of course. After that, I was hooked on the Malibu-based models and the early Rancheros. The bloated ’70’s Rancheros that had the hood as long as the bed were plum awful.
The 1957 model above is simply grand, and I’d love to own it! The 1957 Fords were beautiful in themselves in spite of the Chevys’ enduring popularity that year.
Wait? What am I supposed to be doing???
Ha ha! Designing graphics like those seen in the optimistic 1950’s and 1960’s ads! In other words, it’s up to you to save the world!
Oh, now I get it! (I’m a little slow on the uptake today…)
I’d better start channeling the spirits of Van and Fitz…
Otherwise the future will look like another Consolidated Industries Annual Report (bor-ing!)…
What, these trucklets are now cool again? Back when I last lived on the Left Coast, 17 years ago, these things – although relatively prevalent – identified one as indigent, Hispanic or culturally tone-deaf. They were UN-hip; OUT; a social blunder.
That said…I’ve always liked them. I liked the more-stylish of them…the Falcon Ranchero was a dud. The later Torino/LTDII Ranchero looked spiffy; but that was too much mass in all the wrong places. The Malibu-based El-Camino from 1979 passed muster, but its odd box-size worked against it. And the 1973-77 version was gauche and useless.
That leaves only a few. I liked the bat-wing 1959-60 El Caminos (“bat-wing” refers to the rear treatment, not the doors) but they’re priced out of reach. But this one…the 1957 Ford, car-guys tend to forget, was to have been the Chevy-killer; and if it was put together right, it might have been. But the horrific build quality; the factory head-start corrosion treatment, and the thirsty, lame Y-Block engines…left all those swoopy lines and doglegged front-door treatments to eat Chevrolet’s dust.
For all of that, I love it. The 1957 figures in my own personal history…a Country Sedan was my ride home from the hospital; and it was the first car I trashed with my toddler’s capacity for mischief, when left alone in it for a few minutes. For years afterward, my mother used to relate how she hated it – “Drove like a lumber truck” was how she put it.
Like non-domesticated males of years back, I eschew sedans. But to have a truck that doesn’t ride like it’s supposed to be hauling concrete sacks…PERFECT! And to have such a door to history, America’s and my own…better than good.
Only…give me that Edsel owner’s number. We gonna have to do a little power-swapping on this thing…
As Suzulight pointed out below Ford left Chevy in the dust for 57, OK maybe not in the dust but Ford was the sales leader for that year.
You mean Ford outsold Chevy…not exactly the same thing.
Which was, in the end, a terrible disaster for Ford. Because every 1957 Ford sold, was a rolling advertisement for its competitors. Build quality that year was atrocious – in public demonstrations advance men had to tie the rear doors of four-door hardtops together inside, to keep body flex from popping them open. The cars leaked, they rusted, they flexed, they fell apart…my old man’s 1957 was shot by early 1962. And that was a bitter pill for an immigrant’s son who revered Ford and Fords; whose first car, in (GI Bill) college was a Model A.
Ford won that battle…the yearly race to sell; but it cost them the war; the loss of consumer confidence was tragic. Up until very recently Ford was basically peeking around GM’s ample shadow.
Ford had won that battle…with a little help of Chrysler when they introduced Exner’s 2nd-gen “Forward look” for Plymouth, Dodge, DeSoto, Chrysler and Imperial (1957 was the only year when Imperial outsold Lincoln) with early ads saying “Suddenly it’s 1960”. Chevrolet who used an updated ’55 body got an hefty competition that year.
But like Ford, the “’57 Forward look” was hit by quality problems as well.
http://www.allpar.com/history/plymouth/1946-1959/cars-1957.html
Ford had something going for it that ChryCo did not.
The Ford mystique The legend; the man, the company that bore his name. Up until 1956, Ford Motor was a PRIVATELY HELD corporation…Old Henry owned it outright up to his demise; and estate taxes required some sort of sale. The Ford heirs decided on an IPO…and the whole world was afire with excitement, at the chance to be PART OWNER of THE FORD COMPANY!!
But the Ford name, right up until the 1970s, was magic; and as such, Ford would be forgiven blunders that would have been more costly done by other companies.
Example: Both Ford and MoPar had build and quality issues in the late 1950s. Ford mostly bounced back, in spite of only partially addressing them up until the 1980s. Chrysler, meantime, was driven nearly to bankruptcy in 1964; and again in 1978.
My own father’s example stands out: burned by the 1957, he returned as a customer for a 1968, which was better but not remarkably so; and then a 1973 and 1974 (two cars). On the other hand, one experience with an AMC product, one with a Kaiser/Jeep product, and one with a Chevrolet company car were enough for him.
Ford did engender loyalty not totally traceable directly to product.
So true, easy to forget in this day of faceless mega-corporations.
Wikipedia says when Henry Ford died in 1947, “20,000 people stood outside St. Paul’s Cathedral in the rain with 600 inside, while the funeral attracted national attention as an estimated seven million people mourned his passing.”
Ford outsold Chevy again in ’59. Back then it wasn’t uncommon for people to trade up every 2-3 years. In addition, the build quality of the new Chrysler line was even worse and GM had all sorts of problems launching the new ’58s.
There’s a brilliant red Falcon Ranchero around the corner from us, with a matching bed cover. Sure looks sharp! It’s usually in the garage of the mid-century-modern ranch house that suits the Ranchero perfectly. Sooner or later I’ll catch it out at curbside with my camera.
To me, 1957 marks the time that Ford stopped trying to take on GM in a full frontal assault and started guerilla warfare. Ford became the place where new things were tried, this Ranchero being one of the first. Also, the long-wheelbase Fairlane 500.
Execution was often spotty, but Ford’s market-savvy was more often than not (Edsel and Mercury excluded) spot-on. The 58 T-Bird, the Falcon (including the Falcon Ranchero), the Fairlane midsize, the Mustang, the LTD, and so on. Starting in the mid 60s, GM would spend much of its effort launching vehicles into niches that Ford identified first.
I have always liked these. I remember seeing one of them as a daily driver up in Fort Wayne, Indiana back in the 70s – a long life for one of these in road-salt country. I cannot tell you when I have seen another, other than at old car shows.
Yes and no. Remember the Edsel that was clearly aimed right at GM and the Sloan hierarchy. So I’d say 60 was the year and the decade that Ford led the way in identifying new niches or at least getting their before Chevy in the case of the Bronco. Unfortunately they also sort of got too hung up on those successes and tried to apply them to the mainstream models with varying degrees of success. Spreading the “T-bird” roof throughout the line likely took a little shine off the ‘bird. The redesign of the Falcon was too influenced by the success of the Mustang and it ape’ed the long hood short deck style that killed much of the practicality of the original version. Later the Elite took more shine off of the ‘bird. Of course GM entering those markets or at least putting a competent main stream competitor into the fray in the case of the Chevy II/Nova didn’t help matters.
Robert McNamara, guerrilla warfare – how ironic is that?
Build quality of everything in ’57 was crap, and a lot of people to this day still don’t realize Ford outsold Chevy that year.
I seem to remember that if you’re talking calendar year, it went one way; if you’re talking model year, it went the other. Can’t remember which was which for that year. ’59 was a more clear cut Ford victory, I believe.
In 1957, Ford won outright, the first time since 1935. In 1959, it was a split decision, with one winning calendar year and the other winning model year, I cannot recall. Ford did not outsell Chevy again until 1970, the year of the big GM strike.
If I recall correctly, there was a strike (I believe among steel companies) in late 1959, or during the 1960 model year. GM and Chrysler were affected, but since Ford had its own source of steel, it wasn’t affected (or not as much as the other two).
Chevrolet outsold Ford during the 1959 model year, but if the Galaxie had been available from the beginning of the new model year, it may very well have been a dead heat. Many customers were somewhat put off by the radical batwing Chevrolet, but the Galaxie really goosed Ford’s sales that year.
I’m pretty sure that Ford won everything in 1957. It was also very close in 1954, as that year’s Chevrolet looked very old compared to the Ford.
As for build quality in 1957 – Chevrolet was definitely above Plymouth and Ford that year. Chevrolet was on the third year of its basic body shell, so GM had two years to get the bugs out of it. That year’s Fords and Mopars were rust buckets, and suffered very sloppy workmanship because they were all-new and pushed out of the factories as fast as possible.
Chrysler, for example, captured thousands of conquest customers with its sleek 1957s – and promptly lost them when the cars started falling apart. I remember reading that a survey was conducted among Chrysler owners who had switched from other brands in 1957, and only 10 percent would buy another Chrysler product!
Ford spent the next two years improving build quality and workmanship, to good effect, only to undo that effort with the rushed 1960 model. Ford seemed to recover faster than Plymouth from its fumble in 1957.
Back in the late 50’s in Southeastern MA, there was a guy who had a slightly tricked out, super clean, black 57 Ranchero. It looked great then as this one does now. New car “rides” were unusual then, so it seems that he had a very good eye and made a nice choice.
Very incisive observation! In other words, Ranchero and El Camino were Detroit’s gateway drugs that led to the SUV.
That last photo, the way the windshield of the car behind it is lined up, makes the Ranchero look like it’s got a Crown Victoria roof. But shorter, for a two-seater. Which raises an unrelated question: Why didn’t the first T-Bird have the Crown Vic roof? What if it had?
Hmmm…I wonder what year or model of pickup changed the “pickup is dirty” mindset?
My father used a ’62 Rambler Station wagon for his commercial painting duties. So we always had to haul groceries in the back seat–because the cargo area was always full of paint buckets and tarps. Then one day, my dad came home with a baby-poop yellow ’52 chevrolet pickup, I seem to remember my parents arguing, and then the pickup was gone. Apparently the Rambler–our only car–would do for now.
Now that is an interesting question. A gradual process, if you ask me. I’d say the trucks that really started the whole thing were the mid-1955 Chevy “Task Force” trucks. They were still very plain inside, but they had somewhat car-like styling. Good-looking trucks, and available with that new V-8!
I think the Ranchero is the link from the late 50’s to todays car market. Everyone, and especially Ford were trying to find new niches to fill, just like many carmakers do today. (BMW anyone?) I think one of the things that killed off the Ranchero (and El Camino) was that is was never a real truck, just a flashy chopped stationwagon/delivery, and when the Bronco and Blazer appeared there was a real utility vehicle to fill the niche Ford had tried to create in 1957.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but aren’t the Bronco & Blazer roof off or on propositions, no scope for closed cab & open bed? I know you could have that with an IH Scout so I imagine the aftermarket had that covered if the OEM’s did not.
I’m of the belief that their popularity was secondary to the options available on these car based vehicles vs their P/U truck counterparts. Go back to the days of the Ranchero’s & El Camino’s gestations and niceties like A/C & pwr windows etc. were not even available on mainstream P/Us. These vehicles gave the comsumer a chance to get the luxuries we now take for granted as standard in most any P/U, in a P/U @ all. I see the decline of their popularity coinciding with the spread of such accoutrements into the P/U world.
I would go further. For anyone who has ever driven a pickup made before, say, the late 60s, there was no comparison with a car. Pickups were hard riding, noisy, hard to steer, hard to park. Manual steering and brakes, I beam axles and zero sound insulation made them unpleasant places to spend a lot of time. I owned a 63 F-100 with the single I beam axle. It was fun to drive for about the first 20 minutes, then I became really happy that it was a plaything that I could park and not have to get into for awhile. I have driven few vehicles that required more steering effort, and the car would just wear me out. Even in the 1950s, a passenger car was relatively quiet, comfortable and easy to drive.
I don’t know if this is an urban legend or not, but I remember back in the early 70’s, hearing that some truck plant built an optioned to the max pickup truck allegedly ordered by a customer. When the customer came to collect the truck, he saw the sticker price and refused it.
Then, the dealership managed to sell it to another person who paid full price for it. Apparently, this dealership started ordering many more trucks this way and was making a killing, for a while at least.
I really don’t know if that story is true or not. What I do remember is when people started modding trucks in the mid-70’s, and then older ones got the full hot rod treatment, too. Our neighborhood gas station had a 55 Chevy racer they campaigned at all of the local tracks. It was a metal flake root beer brown with Cragar mags on it. The tow vehicle was a 59 Elky, painted the same way with similar Cragars on it. The whole rig was way more popular than the race car…
I’m sure it’s legend; or an oversimplification of a trend that maybe a dealer or several dealers noticed and capitalized on.
Flashy heavily-optioned trucks started appearing in the mid-1960s, a result of the camping boom and the new slide-in pickup campers. Chevrolet and GMC came out with units dolled up in chrome grilles, as opposed to the white painted of the time; with full-width back windows; even automatic transmissions and air conditioning.
Even before that…Kaiser Jeep had what was probably THE most civilized pickup truck that was a truck, the Gladiator. Compare the interior of the Jeep truck of the time, with the silver-painted-metal of the GM products, or the spartan one-round-dial Ford trucks…Jeep was on to something. In any event, product-planners sensed it, too; and the 1967 GM truck line was remarkably carlike. Ford followed; Dodge did as soon as they could, which wasn’t until five years later. And International found itself unable to keep up and eventually dropped out.
What happened? Success feeds on itself. When the pickup-truck was a low-volume, low-profit niche item, there was no pressing need to keep it up-to-date. Changes came as suspension and body parts or manufacturing techniques could be borrowed from car lines. But with added demand, as more people came to accept the truck’s compromises for its versatility…with increased production volume…it made SENSE to actually bring in modern styling; to work on suspension geometry; to put in sound deadening and comfortable seats.
With only businesses and eccentrics buying them, there was no need to keep appearances modern. No need for independent front suspension and ball joints. No need for styled pickup boxes. But when customers WANTED trucks, and preferred those features, and were willing to pay for them…the race was ON!
I have to disagree that IH was behind the times in making trucks more car like. They were the leaders. The Scout marks the first time a truck is sold as a suitable alternative to a car. In the ads they touted that it was a practical small car that was suitable for the wife to use to do her shopping, and/or going to the Country Club Sat night. Then in 61 they introduced a second 1/2 model the 100/1000/1010 series with its torsion bar IFS and significantly lowered ride height compared to the I beam equipped 110/1100/1110 series trucks.
In the early 60’s they had PS, PB, AT, and AC on the options list. They were running ads specfically touting its car like ride, handling and “luxury car” options. Here is one from 61 http://www.oldcaradvertising.com/IHC%20Ads/1961/1961%20International%20Truck%20Ad-01.html
Here is one of my favorites, one of the “Is she a truck driver?” series. http://www.oldcaradvertising.com/IHC%20Ads/1969/1969%20International%20Ad-03.html
The first instance of ASB (Anti-Skid Braking) on a truck was on 72 1/2 ton 2wd IH’s while at the big three it was only available on their luxury cars. It was rear wheel only and lasted until the end of production on the Travelall, being dropped from the pickups for the final year, it was a $220 option. To put that in perspective power steering was $171 the AT set you back $287 and the Custom exterior package with the shiny trim and woodgrain $299-$318 depending on how long the cab and/or bed was.
Sorry. I was around in that era; and our Boy Scout troop bought a mid-sixties enclosed-back toolbox IH one-ton. It was a TRUCK – ad copy notwithstanding.
Compare the styling, the ride height, the interior appointments of the 1969 Chevrolet and International trucks.
Now in 1970, IHC tried valiantly to update and keep up with the trend…with some success. Some. Ergonomics were lousy – I worked with one of those trucks, and it was IMPOSSIBLE for me to get in and out without cracking my 20-year-old skull. I grew to dread the days they’d assign me that truck. Styling was acceptable but very, very bland; and build quality iffy. And rust…those things were an oxidation magnet. They made Fords of the era look rust-resistant.
The 1973 we had…fell apart in four years. FELL APART. The city DPW wasn’t going to put a flatbed on such a new truck, so the shop simply welded the tailgate on…to keep the sides of the bed from just flopping off.
No…we all have our favorite marques; and everyone loves an underdawg. But the IH truck offering, in that time when the market was shifting…didn’t keep up.
Yes I’m a IH fan but that has nothing to do with the fact that IH identified the future of trucks as a respectable family vehicle, built and marketed for that purpose.
The first ad I posted the link to was from 1961 where they were clearly selling it as an alternative to a standard car based station wagon. A big part of that was the torsion bar IFS introduced that year. It was originally designed by TRW and pitched to the other automakers for their cars. There were no takers at the big 2 so IH picked it up and added it as the basis for a 2nd 1/2 ton offering aimed directly at the personal use market. They didn’t want to alienate their traditional base so they kept the cheaper straight axle model to sell to commercial users.
Fact is IH identified many niches and brought them to market before the big 3 and many times well before the public was ready for them so they were often not able to capitalize on them. I’m not saying that they always delivered on them either just that they were the first to identify and market to them.
Look at some common trucks and their configuration and equipment today.
F150 super crew, IH had a basic equivalent of a short short bed 1/2 ton crew cab, though 3dr in 1959.
Ford switching to a separate 1/2 ton and super duty line is similar to IH’s 2 1/2 ton offerings from 61-73. One aimed at the personal use market and one aimed at the commercial user. Never mind that the personal user often picks the “commercial” version, when Ford conceived the 97 F150 and the split into 2 separate lines that is what they intended.
Chevy Avalanche IH did that with the Wagon Master in 1973.
Don’t even get me started with Scouts as I’ve seen internal company documents from the Scout Business Unit where they predict the SUV boom we experienced. They actually underestimated just how big it would get by 1990 by about 10% but still not a bad prediction for over 10 years out.
Going back I can’t think of many trucks around my neighborhoods.
Where I lived in DE when I first really started noticing cars, I remember there was one pickup owned by a family in the Cul-de-sac. It was the 3rd vehicle carrying a large camper and used to tow the boat. I remember being amazed by the fact that he had a hitch on the front of the truck too, Used to get the boat parked back in the back yard. Then it would be un-hitched and the truck turned around to sit in the back yard too. So out of 30ish houses only 1 had a truck.
I saw a lot more trucks around small town 1970’s KS but in the nicer neighborhoods again the truck was likely carrying a large camper and was often a 3rd vehicle. Over in the poorer neighborhoods you’d occasionally see older trucks that were daily drivers for a “blue collar” dad. However most trucks you’d see in town were farm trucks coming in for supplies.
In the 80’s there were some faimiles in the WA neighborhood where dad’s commuter was a pickup usually with a canopy but that was probably less than 10%.
Hmm. I think you’re on to something with the respectability angle. I can remember in the late 60’s, our neighbors and good friends got a Chevy C-10 interspersed between their parade of Oldsmobiles. For awhile the rumor was they were on hard times, as it turned out, the husband wanted a truck for his woodworking and hunting hobbies.
While the Ranchero and Elky are significant, in a way we’re forgetting about what proceeded them. In the mid 50’s Chevy produced the Cameo pickup, which was as dolled up as a truck could get at the time. Not too long after Dodge had the pickup with the station wagon fenders welded on to the bed (I forget the name of it). Ford never had something like those two, but the 53-56 is still largely considered the best looking of the 50’s pickups.
Ford may have been good at identifying niches, but they weren’t the only ones who could. I don’t think either the Chevy or the Dodge did any kind of real business and only the Cameo has any kind of following. IMO the Cameo laid down the foundation for the Ranchero and Elky. Too bad Dodge never had a contender in the Ranchero/Elky arena. I can only imagine what a Forward Look (or even post-Forward Look) Dodge Ranchero-style vehicle would look like…
It was the 1957 Dodge Sweptside. Pretty sick.
http://www.allpar.com/trucks/dodge/sweptside.html
Thanks! I’m in the middle of a PITA roofing supplies catalog and I’m entertaining myself reading CC while files process. Unfortunately, I have a tough time remembering stuff like that when my pre-frontal cortex is taken up with rage at the machine that is taking forever to PROCESS MY FILES! AAAARGH!
sorry.
Supposedly Dodge simply grafted the rear fenders of the station wagon to the pick-up to create the Sweptside. It doesn’t look too bad from the side, but the tailgate just ruins it completely.
It looks pretty weird from the side to me. Look at the cab, then the tail, then the cab…it’s a train wreck. What fun!
The Sweptside, now that is a cool truck! It’s funny that Chrysler responded to the Cameo, but not the Ranchero. Although with all the quality issues Mopar had in 1957, they probably had enough on their plate. The full size wagon-utes didn’t last long anyway, with the Ford lasting from 1957-59 and the Chevy from 1959-60. It was the compact ’60 Falcon Ranchero that really regenerated interest. And if the Falcon hadn’t taken off, we probably wouldn’t have gotten the Malibu-based El Camino in ’64.
Yup. There just wasn’t really that much of a market for such rigs.
The E-C and Ranchero struggled for years, neither setting production records…and finally disappeared. The VW truck, like the Studebaker Champ before it…car-based pickups both, but without the glamor and glitter…both flailed in the water for a few years. Different circumstances killed both; but neither were winners.
The Dodge Rampage was MoPar’s answer to these things…done twenty years later…it, TOO, failed in the market. People just apparently don’t want these things! At least, not when they’re new. As historic artifacts…people want old 1960s Studebakers, too…
Wasn’t the Studebaker Champ basically a pickup with a section of sedan body as the cab?
Yep. The Champ is not car-based, it’s a car cab on the truck chassis.
Wikipedia says the Lark front end fit the truck chassis really well: “The chassis and cargo box of the Champ were basically the same as what had been used for Studebaker’s ½ and ¾-ton trucks since 1949, but the cab section was very different.
“An entirely new cab was out of the question because of cost considerations, but the new Lark compact car’s body proved to be just the right size and shape to suit the purpose. The engineering staff took a four-door sedan, cut it in half behind the front doors and modified the front half slightly to fit the truck chassis. The only new sheetmetal stamping that was required was the back wall of the new cab. Minor modifications for mounting of the cab to the 1949-vintage truck frame were also made.”
You got me.
I knew that (see my comments on the Champ CC section) but a little pretense makes for better illustration in my above comments.
It doesn’t change your point one bit. No Stude succeeded.
A car-based Studebaker pickup could have been like that Studemino below, with the Hawk fins!
What if Ford or Chevy had put car cabs onto truck frames and beds? Would people have wanted that? It would have looked pretty strange. The Lark already looked kinda like a truck anyway.
“What if Ford or Chevy had put car cabs onto truck frames and beds? Would people have wanted that? It would have looked pretty strange. The Lark already looked kinda like a truck anyway”
Well…it was four years after the Champ, but Willys Motors, about to become Kaiser Jeep, sorta did that.
The original Wagoneer…based on the Gladiator pickup, right? Not so fast…the Wagoneer was two years out before the Gladiator came to be. And there was no indication that that was the original plan – the Basket-Weave Jeep truck and utility wagon continued; the Wagoneer was to enter new markets, not replace existing lines.
So…it was, sort of, a car front made into a pickup cab….
That’s interesting. I’m no Jeep expert, on the contrary, but apparently Gladiator and Wagoneer both came out in ’62?
What’s interesting is the Gladiator appears to be built like a truck with a separate bed, but the bed is styled just like a car-based bed would be.
Looks like I’m turning this post into a slideshow 🙂
The first I’d heard that they both came out in 1962 was here; and (you probably saw it) on Wikipedia.
Now, 1962 was a bit before my time – I was four years old, and more interested in my father’s stunts in fixing his Rambler. But…first, ads for the Wagoneer started appearing in 1962, along with a write-up in Popular Science. The Gladiator didn’t appear in advertising until 1964. Of course, that doesn’t mean anything definitive; and Willys/Kaiser/Jeep was cagey in those times about model years.
But one definitive history I’d read, I don’t have a link for it, stated unequivocally that the Gladiator FOLLOWED the Wagoneer. Which would also make sense, as Brook Stevens designed the Wagoneer – not the truck, which was an afterthought; but designed the wagon to compete with other carlike wagons.
Throughout the Kaiser and AMC years, the Gladiator trailed the Wagoneer in styling touches. The Wagoneer got a chrome full-width grill in 1966, while the pickup kept the pentagonal insert-grille. In 1970, AMC gave the Waggy a new busy egg-crate grille, and put the old barred one on the by-then-unnamed pickup. And so on…the pickup was abandoned by engineering and marketing after 1980, and died from lack of sales in 1988.
From Wiki: “The Jeep Gladiator (or Jeep Pickup) is a full-size pickup truck based on the large SJ (Jeep Wagoneer) platform that was built under varying marques from 1962 to 1988.”
“The new 1963(ERROR) Wagoneer, like its long-lived predecessor (which would, in fact, be sold alongside its replacement in the U.S. until 1965), was designed by industrial designer Brooks Stevens. Willys’ engineering staff, under the direction of A.C. Sampietro, handled the technical development. The cost of development was around US$20 million.[7]”
Not definitive; but the emphasis was in Stevens’ designing the WAGON – not adapting it from the truck version.
A little late to this party, but I’d like to point out the Champ was not Studebaker’s first foray into a car/truck mash-up. The ’37-’39 Coupe Express was a lovely melding of sedan clip, cab, and pickup box. Not a huge production item, but a huge number of those built have survived.
And the Coupe Express looks darn good in bright yellow.
Here’s one for the Argentine collection.
http://bringatrailer.com/2011/04/29/fangios-parts-runner-1959-siam-di-tella-argenta/
Cool! BMC never did that for Australia.
Cadamino!
Found on Jalopnik of all places!
Studemino!
http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?p=4571441
1957 Rancheros (and ’59’s) should be red and white, with the V8, overdrive, and loud dual pipes. Now a ’58, you could paint that copper or black….
My grandparents out on the farm had a ’67 Ranchero which my grandfather took out maybe once a week. They had a Pontiac Lemans sedan which saw grocery and church duty. The Ranchero was replaced with a ’73 Chevy C20, which only got driven occasionally, even out on the farm.
When our family inherited the Chevy about 20 years ago, it had less than 20K original miles on it and still had the new-car smell inside (having been garaged its entire life). Still not a very good vehicle – the smogged, low-compression 454 4bbl can’t break one tire loose even when in perfect tune and gets terrible gas mileage. We did upgrade the ignition to an HEI which helped it to start faster. My dad still uses it for dump runs.
So yes, pickups were not considered daily drivers and even when I grew up in the 70s, the only people I knew who had them used them for hauling campers around. Oh how things have changed!
For contrast, my mother (approaching 80) grew up on a farm in the 30s and 40s. Her father never did own a truck. The family’s 35 Ford sedan and a Ford tractor did everything that needed done. They had an assortment of trailers that they would haul behind the V8 sedan which lasted until it was replaced by a 51 Kaiser DeLuxe. Then the Kaiser pulled the trailers and wagons. My grandfather died in 1957, so perhaps he might have eventually gotten a pickup. But as it was, he never did.
Ok, this time the picture posted.
I’m laughing out loud!
…a pickup for the kind of cowboy they’d want to lynch in Texas….
” I dunno , probably for one of those ‘ Drug Store Cowboys ‘ we see when we’re in town ” .
-Nate
We are happy that you are here, and certainly do not want anyone to feel like a second-class citizen. In fact, we consider each of our commentators to be a first-class citizen, and presume that each will strive to live up to the role in his or her postings.
Each of us has occasionally had a lapse of one sort or another, perhaps an intended joke that did not come off so well. But all of us has also inhabited sites where the commentariat is not so, well, moderate. I have been guilty of such myself, even here. I appreciate that my fellow CC readers have been generous enough to let me off the hook when I have not been as well modulated as is our custom.
What I also recall was how strange and rare it was to see a 4 door truck, I grew up in the suburbs and I recall the first time I saw the strange combination of a truck with 4 doors….what was that? I remember peeking into the rear windows and seeing a back seat…in a truck? Just like a car….it even had cranks for the rear windows to roll down in….just like a car too!
Nowadays 4 door trucks are a common as conventional sedans.
Well a truck was a great thing to have for a dd…..if you were a sailor who really used his bike for that. I don’t think I remember when I didn’t think trucks made cars unnecessary for bachelors but it’s all over now. My s10 is here for hauling feed and if I didn’t do that I probably wouldn’t have one.
It all depends. Right now my DD is a car; and I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve had anyone in any of the other seats.
A truck would do me fine as a DD; except that I wanted maximum fuel economy and a relatively low purchase price. On a new vehicle; one that would last a decade.
Those pretty much ruled out trucks. But my situation’s different from most, as I have no family.
I always picture Fred Mertz driving one of these with Ethel in the Passenger seat waving. The Ricardos had two different Country Squires when in their “Country home” First a 56, then a 57, which was in the Statue episode, the last of the I Love Lucy episodes.
I Love the 59’s ! PiePlate taillts…. smiling front fascia…but NOT the 58Felix the cat, or 60 Edsel face…would make an interesting collection.
The styling of two out of the 1957 “Low-Priced Three” captured my imagination. They were the 1957 “Forward Look” Plymouth and the 1957 Ford. The third-year recycled-body 1957 Chevrolet looked positively frumpy.
So what did our family get? A 1957 Chevrolet Two-Ten four-door six passenger wagon, in Surf Green over Highland Green. My dad traded our 1954 Plymouth Savoy (another Curbside Classic) toward it. The Chevrolet lasted until 1964 when the left rear door rusted out, an uncommon happening in California. Maybe the factory worker forgot to paint the inside of that door with primer or whatever.
We never had a 1957 Plymouth but we did get a 1957 Ford. After a cross-country trip in 1958, where we flew to Philadelphia for a relative’s graduation (during which we stayed in a hot and miserable little apartment in a hot and miserable neighborhood on the way to becoming a ghetto, during a hot and miserable June, all of which made Philadelphia one of my least-favorite places on Earth for decades), we needed a way back. Dad, who had done well in 1954 buying our Plymouth Savoy from a taxicab company, decided to buy some old beater but late-model car and drive it home, recondition it, and sell it. New York taxicabs were just too battered (New York City is a far cry from Portland, OR where he’d bought the Plymouth). Instead, he bought a 1957 Ford station wagon from the Port Authority…a retired police car. At the time the Port Authority Police cars were yellow with big POLICE lettering on the doors and the deck lid (in this case, on the tailgate). The Port Authority shops had removed the police equipment except for the spotlight, and painted over the POLICE letters.
We used the yellow 1957 Ford while touring the area, which several times brought us to driving on the streets of Manhattan. What other very common late-model cars in Manhattan are yellow? Yup. TAXICABS! We’d drive past Times Square and dozens of New Yorkers, desperate to get where they absolutely, positively had to go by fifteen minutes ago, would try to hail us down. We kids in the back (who needs a third seat, anyway, and SEATBELTS? Fugettaboutit!) would laugh and make faces at them. Were we to do that in New York City today, considering what has happened to the place, somebody would probably whip out a gun and shoot us.
That Ford got us across the country. It only broke down once, in Lovelock NV where it crushed a right front wheel bearing. We stayed a day in Lovelock until the mechanic could get a new bearing from Ford’s parts warehouse in California. It came overnight by Railway Express on the Southern Pacific’s San Francisco Overland.
The Curbside Classic 1957 Ranchero is missing its FORD lettering above the grille. Our 1957 Ford wagon was partway there because part of the letter “R” had broken off, making it a “FOPD.” After we got home, Dad sold the car to a used car dealer for a bit of a profit (West Coast used car prices have always been higher than East Coast because of the rust cancer problem; who was to know this Ford, already rust-prone from the factory, had spent a year in the East Coast Winter Salt?). The dealer painted it a nice two-tone light yellow and white, a common color for 1957 Fords. But nobody fixed the lettering on the front. That car probably went to its grave as a “FOPD.”
I’d have told this story as a comment to a proper 1957 Ford article in Curbside Classics, if indeed there were one. Apparently there isn’t, so the 1957 Ranchero column will have to do, And yes…it looks just as attractive now as the 1957 Fords did to me, back in 1957.
Love Rancheros, loved the article and forum. Thought that everyone would enjoy a picture of my SchizoFord (multiple personalities) pick-up. It, just like the Ranchero, began life as a Ranch Wagon. The base for this one was a 1955 and after that it was off to the races. 1955, 56, 57, 61, 63……. (Shades of Johnny Cash!) Add a warmed over 1998 302 Cobra and can anyone say, “fun, fun, fun? (In this case, “Daddy took the T-Bird away” for parts.)
Enjoy.
Love all of them. Utes make me wish I were rich enough to import from Australia.
There’s a ’53 body based Plymouth ute in coffee color that shows up at meets in the Northeast. The nice thing about the Aussie trucks is how nicely the cabs are finished off, without looking like a band saw was used.
Our best version is one I’m shocked a pic hasn’t been posted of yet: The ’37 Stude Coupe Express. Gorgeous from any angle; even the bed sides are carefully styled.
Pic from conceptcarz
PS: the short diversion into social commentary in this thread almost looks quaint from here. Change comes with no concern for anyone’s personal opinion.
I’ve always liked these car-based trucks. It’s an unforgivable shame that neither the Ranchero, nor the El Camino, ever survived the 80s.
I have always loved the Rancheros. However, I would have liked them to have been based on the larger and more stylish Fairlane 500 body. Nicer and taller curved tail fin, chrome around the windshield and windows, tail lights, and larger rear bumper, etc. Here is sort of what one would have looked like.
Purty!!!
There’s an interesting article to be written about the current rise of the pickup as family vehicle. There’s a 1970’s condo complex here that forbids pickups to be parked on strata property, a holdover from their days as utility vehicles.
A quick story showing the attitudes and mores of suburban life in the late 1950’s:
When close friends of my Mother and Father moved from Oklahoma to New Orleans in 1957; they drove down in a near new, reliable “Shivvy” (as a Chevrolet was often called in the mid-west) pick up truck; a departing gift from her proud parents.
They then purchased a brand new house in the suburbs 8 miles to the west (“HOW can you live SO FAR from the city?” people said) of New Orleans, down the street from my parents (and my) house a few years’ later.
Between the Act Of Sale and before they moved into their “Dick Van Dyke Show” styled new suburban house, the wife insisted that the truck be traded in on a Chevrolet Bel Air 2 door. The husband put up little resistance.
Pick up trucks and the suburbs were an unwelcome mix wayyyyyy back then. NOBODY wanted a truck parked in the carport/driveway or out in front of their new house! It just wasn’t “done” then! A pick up truck for your daily transportation marked you as low income, low class, a “rube” “out of touch” with modern life.
If I had to pick a truck that was the turning point from a truck being a real truck to a truck being a cross over between a truck and a car, it would be the 1969 GMC Sierra Grande.
Other trucks that came before where nice but still a truck. The Cameo was a very very sharp looking truck with some upgrades to the interior, but it was a solid truck – sound of doors closing, ride, and all. Some top of the line trucks in the 1960s were also nicer than their lower priced brothers, but still just trucks.
A few years after high school, my best friend bought a new 1969 GMC Sierra Grande, having traded in a very nice 1965 Pontiac Grand Prix. I will never forget how really nice it was. Almost car like styling, quality sounding closing doors, quiet and up scale interior. It seemed to be as much a car as a truck. A/C, power steering and brakes, power door locks and windows, carpet, headliner, wood trim – it was nice! It was still a solid truck, but looked and rode like a car. I think that is part of the reason that these trucks became collectable in short order.
Of course as time went on, trucks basically became large cars. There are still many many Americans who still want a large car – but not only are they not being built anymore, but they are politically incorrect. Somehow trucks are still excepted as being OK to be large (very large in fact), so since they are now really just large cars – they are very popular and very accepted. A friend of mine has a new Chevy 4 door truck (Texas edition), and no one every asks her what the gas mileage is! But I am always asked that if one of my antique cars (such as my 1961 Lincoln, 1972 Lincoln, 1966 Mercury, etc.). When in fact some of my old cars get as good of gas mileage as her new truck. Large trucks are accepted, but large cars are not – but the demand for a large vehicle is still alive.
I’ve always loved this generation GMC pickup truck. My uncle Mike had one like this, except his wasn’t this nice. 🙂
In 1976 or so we got one of these in ,m it had a Thunderbird 312 engine in it , a 4 BBL carby and a Mallory dual point dizzy ~ it flat flew , tqwo speed Ford-O-Matic Slushbox and all .
We re sprayed it medium blue and my Father In Law happened by , (He was Hispanic) fell in love with it and bought it , kept and loved it for several years .
He was a tiny little guy , about 110 # soaking wet but he drove like a mad man and fried the tranny in a year , we went to Pick-A-Part and bought the three speed automatic out of a V-8 ’58 Ford Sedan , it bolted right up , only the ” PRNDL ” wasn’t happy but he didn’t much care .
For some years there was a two tone ’57 Ranchero with ” Vistamares ” or something like that chrome script on both rear fenders ~ anyone ever hear of it ? .
A Ford guy I knew back then said it was some sort of Special .
-Nate
Always loved early Rancheros. Give me one with an Edsel clip and batwing taillights 😀 !
Slow day at work, so I re-read this article and the postings. In the discussion of “when did trucks start to become cars?” I’m amazed that nobody has mentioned the predecessor to the ’57 Ranchero.
The 1955 Chevrolet Cameo (aka, Cameo Carrier). This was Chevrolet’s first shot at civilizing the pickup truck. Take the basic, redesigned Chevrolet pickup, do fiberglass rear fenders to get rid of the step-side look, a specific white and red color scheme, and put in an interior that pretty much matched the 1955 Bel Air. Tail lights were a near match to the ’54 Bel Air. I think they were even trying to get rid of the break line between the cab and the bed, but that proved to be impractical when you fully loaded them. Something about a slight buckling in the bodywork.
As best as I can tell, this was the first attempt to put a passenger car interior into a pickup truck, plus making the outside a little more flashy (being a Chevrolet kid, I have no idea if there was a GMC equivalent – wouldn’t be surprised if there was.
Obviously, not a huge seller, and probably a little bit ahead of its time, but I do remember it being around for the ’55 and ’56 model years, at least. I think the ones seen with the two tone area on the rear fenders were ’56’s.
Ford’s Ranchero was their answer to the Cameo – doing them a step better, to boot.
There was a GMC equivalent. It was called the Suburban. I saw one at a show a few years back, first I’d ever seen or heard of one.
The Chev-Olds emporium my Dad worked at when I was a teenager had a red and white ’57 Cameo for a parts delivery truck up until the ’78s came out. The story was that no one wanted it in ’57-too expensive, so it was put into service for 20 years.
They didn’t have any trouble getting rid of it in the fall of ’77.
Whoa! The Hudson-based pickup may have disappeared by its inaccurate to say it failed. A commercial line based on the car which included pickups, panels and utility sedans was included in both Hudson and Terraplane lines from at least 1934 forward. They represented a steady business, one which continued until the advent of the new Step-Down Hudsons.
The main reason given for its deletion was the greater cost entailed to integrate the style into the more complex body structure of the Step-Downs. The steady yet small market numbers which had been tolerable with body-on-frame couldn’t be justified on the higher-cost unibody.
Another ad, Paul, in case you don’t already have it:
One more (1958):
I’ve always loved Rancheros and El Caminos. I wish they still made them, but it looks like nothing without 4 doors will sell anymore. Looks like America’s love affair with the automobile as something more than just a transportation appliance is over for good.
.
Silly Boy !
Of _course_ not ~ if it were , they wouldn’t have those reproduction bodies for so many different classic cars and truck .
I do realize we’re a dying breed but hell , enjoy it whilst you can .
-Nate
A friend of mine had a Raunchero in college. Looked like a car and rode like a truck.
IDK about the older ones; but I know from personal experience that the ’66 thru’79 Rancheros rode very smoothly.