(first posted 4/16/2012) Elwood Engel, fresh from Ford Motor Company, did not waste any time making his mark at Chrysler Corporation. His most famous design, the 1961 Lincoln Continental, set the standard for his future design themes. Virgil Exner’s questionable post-fin designs of the early Sixties, such as the 1961 Plymouth, were going to be a thing of the past. Elwood would see to it.
Virgil Exner, Chrysler’s design chief from the mid-’50s through the early ’60s, saw both hits and misses during his tenure. His ‘suddenly it’s 1960′ 1957 models were beautiful, but indifferent quality and extremely rust-prone bodies wrecked what could have been a watershed moment for Chrysler. Subsequent redesigns during the 1959-60 period, though attractive, were not sales kings, as the 1957 models’ quality issues turned off many potential buyers. In short order, the fin’s popularity rose and then fell, and a new direction was needed.
The styling of both the 1961 Plymouth, with its deep-sea creature appearance, and the 1961 Dodges, with reverse fins, fell flat. The shrunken 1962 Fury, Dart and Polara 500 did even more damage, although by now their quality was much improved from years prior. Chryslers fared much better during this period, despite quad headlights set at a 45-degree angle, which were pretty unusual. The same cars would return for ’62 sans fins, as the new look of the Sixties was trending towards lean, linear styling. In late 1961 Elwood Engel moved from Ford to Chrysler, where his influence would be felt in short order.
What would become the 1963 Chrysler started out as a design for the Imperial. However, the Imperial was selling well below what Chrysler wanted it to, so the design was appropriated for the Chrysler line instead. While an all-new Imperial would have been welcome (the 1962 and ’63 Imperials would lose their fins and become much more modern looking, despite retaining the wraparound windshield and basic underpinnings that went all the way back to 1957), it was probably a good move to give the design to a higher volume line. The 1963-64 Chryslers were much more in tune with the times, and while it had been too late to drastically alter them for 1963, he would finally get his chance to shine with the all-new 1965 models.
Elwood Engel really liked long, rectilinear designs, as his classic 1961 Continental showed. Since Chrysler had been burned–badly–by trying to be the Big Three styling leader, Engel decided to play it safe with very conservative lines. He loved squared edges, with fender peaks edged in bright chrome, and ‘fill to the corners’ design. Long, low, wide and smooth was his bailiwick, and the 1965 Chryslers showed off all those styling cues in spades. While not wearing leading-edge styling, they were nonetheless very attractive cars. In 1965 came the final ‘letter-series’ 300L; sales of the ‘banker’s hot rod’ had been steadily decreasing since the 1962 introduction of the more affordable non-letter series 300s that replaced the mid-line Windsor.
While not quite as special nor as luxurious as the traditional 300L, the new 300 series was extremely popular and, with the right options, could come very close to a letter-series 300 in terms of luxury and performance. Considered the sporty Chrysler, and priced above the Newport/Newport Custom but below the New Yorker, its competition included the Buick Wildcat and Mercury Montclair. An attractive face lift for 1966 (as shown above) included a handsome new grille and wraparound tail lights.
For 1967, 300s returned as both two- and four-door hardtops as well as a convertible. New styling featured a slightly sleeker version of Engel’s favorite design cue, the rectangle. The front end continued using a crosshatch grille and quad headlamps, but tail lamp orientation changed to vertical from horizontal. Coupes received a stylish reverse-slant C-pillar.
Much was the same for 1968, but some minor reshuffling of exterior trim made the cars even more attractive. The 300 received its own unique front-end styling that now featured concealed quad headlamps.
Tail lamps, now with round inboard back-up lamps, returned to a horizontal position. Neither tail lamps nor parking lights wrapped around the side of the car, so now-mandatory side marker lights graced the front bumper and rear quarter panel. Chrysler’s side marker design (featured on all 1968 Mopars, in fact) was very attractive, with a small round lamp set into a circular chrome bezel.
As always, the 300 was not a cheap car. Two- and four-door hardtops went for $4,209 and $4,285, respectively, and the convertible cost a princely $4,536 (slightly under $30K, in 2012 dollars). The convertible was the least-frequently seen 300 body style for ’68, with a mere 2,161 produced for the model year.
Chrysler did not scrimp on the 300’s power plant. A standard 350 hp, four-barrel 440 V8 connected to the ever-durable, three-speed Torqueflite automatic. If that wasn’t enough, you could order up an optional 440 TNT; with a dual exhaust and dual-snorkel air cleaner, it produced 375 hp with a remarkable 480 lb ft of torque. All 300s had the proven front torsion-bar suspension and rear leaf springs. A Sure-Grip differential, power front disc brakes, Magnum 500 wheels and heavy-duty suspension were also available.
The best feature, in my opinion, was the hidden headlights. Sure, they could be finicky–especially on snowy or icy days–but come on, they’re so cool looking!
Interior accommodations were also very nice. All 300s came with standard bucket seats (with a ‘buddy seat’ between them), but a traditional bench seat was available if you wanted one. You could also get an optional AM radio with 8-track or an AM/FM Multiplex stereo, with up to five speakers.
Despite their attractive styling and ample power, not too many 300s were made for 1968; only 34,621 of all types came off the assembly line that year. Muscle cars and pony cars had caused the full-size sporty car market to crater, and cars like the 300 and Impala SS would not be around much longer. For 1969, all Chryslers, including the 300, got an all new body. Those fuselage-bodied 300s continued, with minor changes, through 1971 before being discontinued.
The Brougham era was going great guns by that time, and the market for sporty full-size cars had diminished to near-zero. It was so much more impressive showing up in a broughamy ’71 New Yorker coupe with a blue brocade interior!
I found this 300 in March of 2012, at an acquaintance’s repair shop. After spotting Mike and getting the OK to take some pictures, I approached this rare Mopar. It looked pretty mean with the Keystone wheels, white-letter tires and dual chrome straight pipes on the back. I have never seen one of these in person, and it looks great. The coupes were very distinctive, thanks to that reverse-angle roofline and just the right amount of side sculpturing to keep things interesting.
The 300 was big, bold and made no apologies for what it was. That brash character Chryslers had in the Sixties would be diluted in the Seventies and eliminated with the K-cars in the Eighties, although the current 300 brings much of the 1968’s character into today. Is Chrysler on the way back? I hope so.
These might be more in-line with buyer’s expectations for its time, but I think they have lost the uniqueness of Chrysler’s designs of earlier time, which always seem to be at least somewhat different (sometimes wildly so) than other big 3 cars. Now in this era they’re the same square, slab-sided mediocrity as all the rest.
Actually, the reason I liked these so well was that all the other big cars were going “coke bottle” and were quite a bit swoopier, particularly by 1968. The big Chrysler was kind of countercultural. It was unapologetically out of the styling mainstream, once again.
One of my favorite cars ever was a 68 Newport Custom sedan I drove in the late 1990s for a couple of years. But as much as I liked it, I always wished that it had been one of the Three Hundreds. That front end is one of the best of the 1960s from any manufacturer. That pointed hood and front bumper were unique to the Three Hundred, and must have been very expensive given the low volume of the car.
The fastback 2 door Chryslers of 1967-68 I always considered really attractive. But then I like my cars big and square. What a great find of one of my favorite cars.
The dashes on these 67-68 Chryslers were very expensively built, and included several chrome-plated diecastings. It was an unpleasant shock going from that expensive all-metal dash to the cheap plastic wonder in the 84 Olds 98 that replaced the Newport. I still miss ammeters.
Funny, last night I was drooling over a black 66 300 on epay, and showed it to my wife. She said, “Might as well paint it yellow – that car is bananas!”
Lo and behold, a yellow 300, though in more of a custard, with matching blonde. I’ll take it, says Don Draper.
JP, whenever you mention your Newport, I wish we were riding in one. 🙂
I have a copy of that ad (and many other Chrysler ads) framed on the wall in my den, and a color photocopy of it hanging on the wall in my cubicle at work.
I came very close to buying a daffodil yellow on black 300L once. The fact that I already had my dark blue one probably drove the decision to pass on the yellow one. In the years since, I don’t think I’ve ever seen another one in either color.
You bring up a bad memory. In the early 80s, I was in college and belonged to a Mopar club. They ran a contest for ID of a batch of photos, much like our CC clues. The prize was a 1965 300L that was complete but needed work and needed to be picked up. I dove into the contest like Tom Klockau on steroids. The short version is that I won the contest. But the club announced that there had not been enough entrants who paid the fee for the club to buy the car, so they were sending my entry fee back. If it had been any organization other than that club, I would have gone to work to get my car, but I let it go. I guess you could say that I owned but never took possession of a 300L. Pity me.
“The dashes on these 67-68 Chryslers were very expensively built, and included several chrome-plated diecastings.”
The dashboard cores on these cars are a single huge pot-metal casting. I read that, at the time of their manufacture, they were the single largest cast pot-metal piece ever made.
“I still miss ammeters.”
I will miss mine, but in rewiring one of my cars I will be bypassing it. Failure of the ammeter, leading to various problems including dashboard electrical fire, is a sore point for aging Mopars.
@Failure of the ammeter, leading to various problems including dashboard electrical fire, is a sore point for aging Mopars.
I once had an old auto electric specialist tell me that the problem was a brass nut that screwed onto removable ammeter contact terminal (which he called a jam nut). The nut would eventually work loose and you could eventually hear arcing in the dash between the terminal and its contact. If your ammeter sounded like a geiger counter, you are on the verge of a big problem. His cure was to solder the terminal to its copper contact, which he claimed eliminated the problem. It was from him that I learned that every single amp of the electrical system (except for the starter circuit) was first delivered to that ammeter before it was then distributed to everywhere else in the car.
Part of the problem was that the circuit board itself was part of the “stack” of things pressed together on the studs. If you overheat the ammeter because of excessive current draw, the PCB will get baked and warp/shrink, causing the whole stack of electrical contacts to not be under tension any more.
I can’t remember the physical construction of the ammeter well enough at the moment to determine whether your proposed fix will really cure the problem, but I suspect not. The ring terminal on the wire that goes to the bulkhead connector is also part of the stack of connections. You can’t solder that in, and if you somehow did, you’d never be able to remove the instrument cluster from the dashboard without desoldering it or cutting the wire.
If you never had a problem somewhere else in the charging cct, you’d probably never have a problem with the ammeter. However, the other “Achilles Heel” of the system is the bulkhead connector at the firewall. All of the charging current goes from the alternator, through the bulkhead connector, through the ammeter, through another set of contacts in the bulkhead connector, to a ring terminal on the starter solenoid, then to the battery. The bulkhead connector terminals are just push-together terminals, and somewhat under-rated for the job.
Even if the ammeter is kept in-circuit, bypassing the bulkhead connector with a direct wired connection is recommended. Failure of the power terminals in the bulkhead connector are inevitable unless they are taken apart, cleaned and coated with dielelectric grease to prevent corrosion before they start to fail.
You are right about those firewall plugs. When I had my 68, it spent a couple of days in the auto electric shop. The guy got everything working pretty well, but it was still losing about 1 volt, probably in those firewall plugs somewhere. A great idea for ease of assembly that did not work out so well as the cars aged.
Fortunately, we Mopar guys still have the British Lucas people to look down on. 🙂
We all miss the metal dashes, whether we know it or not. Even the lowly VW bug’s painted metal dash with actual chrome trim is a big part of its appeal. Is there a modern dash anywhere to match the glory of the sixties Chryslers?
PS: I’m a lifelong computer engineer, my employer makes the chips inside smartphones and tablets, and I still hate touchscreens, especially in the car. I’d like to see a non-touch flat screen in a proper metal dash with real chrome-plated buttons and knobs.
Gimmeee! Gimmeee! Gimmeee!
The single thing that bothers me about the subect in question is putting those round back-up lights on a linear design. It really doesn’t work in my book. The rest of the car? Yes! Beautiful. Those mid-late 60’s Chryslers were beautiful in their own right. GM was the style leader, hands-down, but Chrysler, for the most part, design-wise, left Ford in the dust.
“Is Chrysler on the way back? I hope so.”
I sincerely hope so, too…
I always liked the 68 300 taillights better than the 67s, which just ran up the back fenders and made the rear of the car look rather plain. I see your point though.
+1 on the reverse lights. It looks like someone remembered them at the last minute and popped on a couple of those ‘stick-’em-anywhere’ lights from the late-night infomercials.
One possible inspiration for the reverse lights is the Chrysler turbine car. I don’t know the history of the turbine car design (Engel involved? the turbine car body was imported from Italy) but except for the extreme depth of the turbine rear clip – this car looks like a “flattened” turbine car rear end. I know that one of the ideas for the turbine car was the jet/turbine engine.
The Turbine Car was definitely Engel. In fact, Engel was responsible for the ‘Bullet Bird’ T-Bird at Ford before he left for Chrysler. The Bullet-Bird then morphed into the ‘Flare Bird’ which was surely one of Engel’s last Ford projects and (obviously) very closely resembled the Turbine Car.
I saw a kid delivering pizzas yesterday driving a 1968 Chrysler. Matched the green two tone one depicted in the ad. Got a quick word in, 60k miles and grandma can’t drive anymore. A small amount of body damage on the rear right quarter, otherwise a shiny Oregon car. Lucky kid, he’ll go broke trying to pay for gas. Hope he gets good tips while using his delivery boat!
Even with the cheap US gas that would be a struggle to feed we are paying $2.20 per litre now and Ive never seen a 300 delivering pizzas
The grillework and hidden headlights are my favorite part of the 68 300. I wish the grille could be easily retrofitted onto a 66. The design was actually based on a Chrysler concept car called the “300-X” that was made from a 1966 Chrysler.
While this is a very nice example, I think the 67 restyle showed signs of the beancounters at work. The stainless steel outline mouldings that ran along the fender edges from front to back were gone, along with the special door handles integrated into the trim. The dashboard is also much less ornate than the beautiful 65-66 dash, although part of this is surely the result of new impact standards forcing the removal of hard, pokey interior bits.
I’m not crazy about the concave body sides, something that Engel wanted to try while at Lincoln but was not allowed (for good reason). The complex curve ahead of the wheelwell was difficult to stamp properly; from some angles, it always looks like the car was hit there and has had some bodywork done, but that’s the way they all are.
My best friend is a banker. His modern day bankers hot rod? CTS coupe performance version. Black with black leather.
Very nice car Tom, Thanks for the review.
Oh the exhaust on the example makes me cringe. Couldn’t they have at least tried to make them equal length from the license plate?
The gas tank is mounted offset between the frame rails so there is only a gap on the passenger side. The pipe on the right side is tucked in between the gas tank and frame rail in the factory location. The pipe on the left is hanging down below the frame rail all the way from the rear axle back.
Either the exhaust shop that bent the pipes made the passenger side first, then went, “uh oh, we can’t route the drivers side the same way”, or they wanted to reuse the original hangers on the passenger side instead of fabricating new hangers.
I don’t actually know how the pipes were routed if one ordered this car new with the “440 TNT” engine with factory dual exhaust.
I usually don’t call this out but it really needs to be routed so the exhaust exits behind each rear wheel.
Nice, but make mine a ’65 new Yorker two-door hardtop (formal roof). That “fastback” roofline just doesn’t work for me…too Dodge-like.
I never understood the “vinyl on the C pillar but not on the roof itself” thing. Give me one with either a full vinyl roof or none at all, please.
Highly practical! No direct UVs to wear it out prematurely.
Admittedly, it works a bit better with certain colors; orange wouldn’t be my first choice. But I do like that vinyl C-pillar, for some reason.
I have Bad news, Paul, especially with the climate around your place. UV is not your worst enemy with the vinyl padded C-pillar. They trapped water behind them and rotted out the C-pillar.
Even California cars had the trapped water rust problem. Worse are the mid 70’s GM cars with the “halo” vinyl tops. Big time C pillar rust bubbles. Even in California . . .
I always thought they had to do it, because the rain channel over the doors went straight back over the C-pillar. But maybe it was the other way around?
It was probably an attempt to be a little different. Engel couldn’t completely eliminate the Exner influence from Chrysler.
Elwood…Jake, that’s very good. Just the thing for Monday Blues.
My Dad still likes to talk about the 68 Chrysler 300 convertible he purchased brand new two weeks after he got out of the Army in July of 68. It was a copper color with a black top, 440 TNT with bucket seats but not console.
“Just like riding in an aircraft carrier” he always says….He’ll really enjoy the writeup on this….Thanks for posting it!
I always liked the hidden headlights and unusual back-up lights on these 300s. It was an effective way to provide a bit of differentation on the same basic body. Customers could tell whether the car was a Newport, 300 or New Yorker in those days.
I also loved Chrysler’s ads during this time – the division actually boasted that it did not make any “junior editions” (meaning, it did not offer a direct competitor to the Cutlass, Skylark, Tempest, etc.). The ads said, “All Chryslers are big.”
Wasn’t the Green Hornet’s “regular” car a 300 convertible? (Black Beauty was a customized 1966 Imperial sedan.) Kato hit a switch, and clamps rose from the garage floor and grasped the wheels, and then the entire floor rotated to reveal Black Beauty.
Hidden headlights! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bJdZtiDRMvg
Green Hornet was a ’66 Imperial – BOF – Barris customized.
Not George Barris…. The Green Hornet’s car, Black Beauty, was the work of Dean Jeffries.
My dad had a ’67 yellow 300 convertible. We took a lot of road trips in that monster. I like the grill on this ’68 much better. Hidden headlights always look cool to me. I eventually learned how to drive in dad’s 300. Scraped off some side trim crossing a narrow bridge in Omaha once. The steering was so sloppy.
TV’s “Green Hornet” had a 66 300 ragtop, that would be turned upside down for the Black Imperial. In reality, implausable, the fluids would all drip!
I love the look of this year 300, with the hidden headlights, but make mine a four-door hardtop. The brochure says leather seats were optional, so I’ll take those, preferably in red if available.
Ah, nothing says ‘businessman’s express’ like a mid-to-late sixties Chrysler. Lincoln and Cadillac drivers were gentlemen who had made it, but an executive in a Chrysler was a hustler on the move.
Beautiful. Engel was brilliant. I’m not much for the reverse-rising C-pillar treatment. Here, it seems like a tacked on fad. I prefer the formal pillar of the four-door hardtop. Or Paul’s Tang-colored two-door.
My 68 Fury III had the reverse C pillar, just like the featured 300. I bought my Fury in 1973, when I got a decent job a year out of the service. I remember the salesman telling my Dad he’d have to co-sign for a loan. My Dad told the guy to get the car ready, he’d give the guy a check if I didn’t. ($ 960 drive out.)
I drove the car for 3 years. The 318 auto was pretty quick without the emission stuff. I used to see a yellow 68 Chrysler coupe once in a while in my area. It had the black vinyl reverse roof. A really sharp car. I haven’t seen it in about 4 or 5 years. The owner wasn’t very talkative one day when I remarked how nice it was. In fact, he was borderline rude.
I’ve always thought that if you drive a nice old car, it’s a person’s duty to accept compliments and comments gracefully. The other day, I was getting gas in my 78 Eldo, and a guy behind me complimented the car, and asked a number of questions. I replied in a very friendly manner and made the guy’s day. Mine, too.
How much for it?
I somehow totally missed this until I spotted it in the rotating images at the home page today.
Loved these cars, know an uncle of good friends who may still have their ’68 4 door hardtop 300. Of the 68’s, the 300 is the best looking of the 3 models.
I had the base 68 4 door Newport sedan and it was not highly optioned either but had power brakes, power steering, AM radio (thumbwheels and all!), a driver’s side remote mirror and that was it, the AC unit was the under-dash unit from AirTemp – which didn’t work when I had it. Oh it blew out air, but it didn’t get cold though.
This being the very early 80’s and it was my first car even though it was past it’s prime, but still very much drivable despite a little smoking, sagging springs and a nearly non existent muffler and a very weathered, flat, dull metallic blue/green paint and had the base 2bbl 383 motor in it and had 113K miles on it roughly.
So needless to say, I have a soft spot for these, especially the 2 door models, but make mine with buckets and a console though.
Knew a mechanic who had a restored and very rare Chrysler 300 convertible. It was in the stock red and I think either a white top or a black top, I forget now and it was STOCK. It was a lovely sight to see indeed.
I had a 68 300 two door hardtop silver with black top just like the one shown above and its always been the best car I ever owned. It run and rode like no other car and I mean run with its 440 engine. I have always wished I could find one with a have way decent price but haven’t been able to find one so far. If I knew then what I know now I would have never gotten rid of it.
Thanks for this article that I just happened to come across. Mr. Engel is not nearly as well known as his Chrysler predecessor Virgil Exner or GM’s Harley Earl and Bill Mitchell, but he should be. At Ford, he headed the styling team responsible for the magnificent 1961 Continental and his Chrysler designs were always clean and good-looking. They sold well too. Just as important, Mr. Engel was by all accounts a nice guy and not a standoffish autocrat like Exner, Earl or Mitchell. RIP Elwood.
“Autocrat” a nice play on words!
Love my 68
Being a fan of the Wildcat and ’69-’70 Marauder among others, it’s no surprise I like this car a lot. The ’68 with its covered headlights has been in my mental garage for years. If I could pair it with the ’67 rear – perfection.
Engel really got a lot out of the ’65 – ’68 Chrysler. By my count there were 12 reasonably unique front / rear designs, two major side sculptings, three coupe rooflines, four four-door rooflines, and in my book, they all worked rather marvelously. This may be a rare case where fiddling with a great design didn’t spoil it. Considering the roll Engel/Chrysler was on, one wonders what a second major refresh would have looked like – I’d be willing to sacrifice a couple of the Fuselage years to find out!
The Keystones on the subject car are a good stand-in for the rare factory Magnum wheels. I understand that Chrysler had to recall some mag wheels in the ’60s, I don’t know if that applied to the big Chryslers, but the wheels are quite rare.
Tough to pick from the coupe, convertible and hardtop. The best solution is probably to just collect the whole set!
Hop in my Chrysler, it’s as big as a whale
And it’s about to set sail
I got me a car, it seats about twenty, so come on
And bring your jukebox money
Tom, your essay is a good piece of history. Thanks for it. I had a friend who in 1968 had bought the New Yorker four-door hardtop. it was a beautiful and comfortable automobile. The six-window sedans of this vintage were also elegant. i attached a 1966 Newport example.
Yes, I have decided that the perfect Chrysler of this generation would be a 67 Three Hundred with a 68 Three Hundred front clip.
Chrysler picked up on the Red Adair story (oil fire fighter) in its 1967 advertising, and a 300 gets star billing. A touch campy in a ’60 way, but a lot of fun…
https://youtu.be/zV5tZmQeKN0
John Wayne made a movie loosely based on Adair’s exploits, and there is some good car watching in it. For us Covid 19 homebound car lovers, Hellfighters is a great flick.
A sneak sample of the Mopars featured…..
Great writeup and photos, thanks. I am not a fan of the round backup lights on an otherwise smooth flowing design. I feel they could have been integrated into the taillights instead. A beautiful looking car from front to back.
Chrysler gets some grief for dropping the letter-series 300 after the 1965 300L, but it was really the right move. With the wave of intermediate musclecars opened up by the ’64 GTO, specialty-engine, niche, full-size musclecars were on the way out, and the high-strung, finicky, maintenance-intensive Street-Hemi just wouldn’t have fit the letter-series ‘businessman’s express’ ethos of the 300.
The standard 300-series managed to maintain nearly all of the panache of the letter-series but with the easier-to-live-with (and still plenty powerful) 440 TNT engine and lower price that opened it up to a lot more customers.
“Is Chrysler on the way back? I hope so.”
Now, the brand is down to minivan and 300 sedan. And, the parent company is Stellantis, no longer having ‘Chrysler’ in the name at all. Chrysler Corp, Fiat Chrysler/FCA and DaimlerChrysler defunct names.
Recent news is Chrysler brand will be “all EV” by 2028. Some assumed “the whole company” including Ram, Dodge and Jeep would do so, forgetting name is simply a brand, now.
Lots of changes since this post.