(first posted 12/2/2016) Some cars are so monumental in automotive history that it’s easy to write about them. While a 1969 Riviera will never have to endure accusations of groundbreaking technology, it also isn’t like we’ve covered the second generation Riviera in such arduous detail that no stone has been left unturned.
Yet this 1969 Riviera proved to be a challenge with my initial literary attempts seeming rather forced. After some introspection I have concluded why that is.
There is nothing intrinsically wrong with a ’69 Riviera; it’s rather attractive despite being a slightly fussier iteration of the second generation that came about in 1966. The original theme I had toyed with for this article was awkwardness, tapping into those wonderful situations in life where a graceful response is a smidgeon more challenging than usual.
I figured I could tie such a theme into various awkward events, like falling through a deck or going into a job interview with an open fly. Thankfully, I’ve only experienced one of those.
One awkward memory from my time in second or third grade drove me toward this initial theme. During a Halloween function at school when I was in second grade, I had observed the sixth grade girls had a lot more variety of shape about them than the girls in my class. Upon disclosing this observation to my father, his hearty laughing left seven year-old me uncertain about what to think.
In a sense, that innocent childhood observation falls into line with this Riviera. It looks just enough like the original 1963, but possessing the curvature of maturity.
Shortly after starting this article, a much broader thought hit me. I have zero experience with, and zero exposure to, any second generation Riviera; I can’t recall ever having seen one. Perhaps this thought about exposure was due to contemplating the perspective of a New Yorker who graduated the same rural high school a decade after did. It was at this time our white Riviera started to coalesce into something more workable.
For what it’s worth, her explanation on flight from her small town (somewhat similar to my scenario) is what captured my interest and is the only reason I’ve linked to an article of this persuasion. She provides a nicely textured description of southern Illinois, a description that shows the downward economic spiral for the area and picking up when I left in 1992.
Despite the three to four years of life experience this Riviera has over me, this is a car nobody in my rural area would have ever driven. It would have been viewed as too opulent, too much in initial outlay, and of woefully limited usefulness. Fuel mileage then, as now, was a secondary consideration despite most people routinely driving well in excess of 20,000 miles per year; yes, I grew up around a lot of pragmatic (but often highly inconsistent) people – pragmatism is a virtue that isn’t a citizen of the Riviera’s wheelhouse.
430 cubic inches of V8 engine? 360 gross horsepower? I can almost hear the response: That’s entirely too much engine. A person doesn’t need that much engine…and they sure as hell don’t need that much power.
For that matter, anybody purchasing a vehicle higher on the Sloan Ladder than an Oldsmobile generally needed to tread lightly or risk being accused of getting too big for their britches. Fords and Chevrolets work just fine, thank you very much – but there were still pitfalls to be cognizant of even with a Ford.
Old mindsets die hard and can be genetic to some extent. My paternal grandmother scoffed greatly upon my parents purchasing their lightly used 1985 Ford LTD Crown Victoria. Why? It had power windows, the ultimate symbol of unmitigated sloth; such extravagances were a thoroughly frivolous expenditure ringing hollow in benefit as such a boondoggle only held the potential of catastrophic nightmares for the dope who purchased them.
Plus it had “those fancy wheels”; yes, Ford really shafted their buyers with aluminum turbine wheels.
My great-uncle James (he who infected me with Mercury poisoning) was teased relentlessly by his brothers upon purchasing a Ford Ranchero in 1974. Why? It had “the big engine” under the hood. Little did anyone care to realize its optional 351 (5.8 liter) V8 was not the top engine offering that year. A truck(let) should have a six-banger; anything else is wasteful.
In 2007 I purchased a 1987 Dodge D-250 pickup. It was a great pickup, purchased from a small town in nearby Audrain County. With a $400 price tag, my outlay wasn’t going to necessitate skipping groceries or a house payment. Yet I was chastised by my father for purchasing a 3/4 ton pickup. His assessment was something to the effect of “You don’t do anything to require that much of a pickup.” My impolite mental retort was how being 34 years old exempted me from seeking permission and, since it’s my money, I would wipe my ass with a $50 bill if I felt like it.
Sometimes remaining polite can be awkward.
The judgmental behavior wasn’t limited to just the paternal side of my family, either, although it was watered down; maybe that quaint little river known as the Mississippi that lay in between my two sides of the family helped with this dilution.
When my maternal Grandfather Albert purchased a Lincoln Town Car in 2001 or 2002, the snarky comments from his siblings, nieces, and nephews about having dumped all that money on a Lincoln got old for him in short order. Their unabated critiques soon became a source of contention despite his perpetual “I don’t give a shit what you think so be quiet” demeanor and responses.
Of course, nobody said anything about Grandpa’s older sister Stella and her husband having multiple Cadillacs. Perhaps it was due, in a weird way, to their living in St. Louis thus being both out of sight and out of mind. However, upon Stella and Ed moving back to old home turf, the Sedan deVille promptly went away for a Mercury Grand Marquis.
In my grandfather’s case, maybe it was the raw concern of Stella and his other, overprotective older sisters. Grandpa is the sixth child, the baby of the family, so he was likely viewed as being incapable of reason (as it seems the youngest child is all too often perceived as having an IQ loss of 45% based solely upon their birth order; Mrs. Jason is another example of this phenomenon). This babying knew no limits; three of Grandpa’s four older sisters sat him down one day to inform him he was actually the seventh child as one ahead of him had been stillborn. They had intentionally waited until they thought he was old enough to digest the news. He was 85 years old when they told him.
I digress.
As mentioned earlier, some things were grossly inconsistent; when my paternal Aunt Elizabeth and her husband bought a Toyota Corona coupe in the mid- to late-1970s, nary a derogatory word was uttered by anyone of the WWII generation – those one might suppose would be most inflamed about such transgressions. Keep in mind in this area at the time “foreign car” was interchangeable with “Volkswagen” and nothing else; perhaps my paternal grandfather Ed had greased the skids when he purchased a new VW bus in 1959.
Or maybe the lack of scathing critique was because the Toyota had a four-banger under the hood – and no power windows.
But to remain consistent in their perpetual inconsistency, never was a word uttered when Elizabeth’s Toyota was dumped for a Fox-body Mustang in 1982, which was followed by a string of Oldsmobiles and Buicks. There was a Nissan that intermingled in there, but it was a turkey and got jettisoned for another Buick.
Despite having the same name on the title, and the same tri-shield emblem on the steering wheel, a Riviera was never on the radar for the handful of Buick buyers in the extended family. Aunt Elizabeth still drives Buicks; Grandpa Albert’s younger half-sister Rose and her husband have owned Buicks since the first Reagan administration, with a G-body Regal leading the charge.
Of the bunch, it might seem Rose, or Stella, would have been the most likely candidates to pilot a Riviera. Neither had children and both reaped the rewards of shrewd investments.
But neither Stella nor Rose would have ever entertained a Riviera; both were too pragmatic.
Are these examples a microcosm of a broader spectrum of people? I certainly hope not although my experiences can be extrapolated to the general population of my old, bucolic stomping grounds. This litany of personal experiences also played to what the Riviera truly was: An exclusive car that wasn’t for just anyone.
The goal was to make exactly 40,000 copies during the Riviera’s freshman year of 1963, an intentional move to help cultivate an aura of exclusivity. Successful with that, this set a general tone for the Riviera as the 52,872 Rivieras produced for 1969 was the highest volume made until 1984 and the third largest in Riviera history.
My apologies if this epiphany has exhausted your senses. Regardless, it was great to find a car that is truly new to me, an occurrence that has been infrequent – and perhaps this also gives some insight about why my findings over nearly five years at CC are somewhat homogeneous. The area where I live now is, in a limited number of ways, even more pragmatic than where I grew up. As an example, this is an area where about every eighth car on the road is either a GM A- or W-body.
Or maybe my automotive findings haven’t been so homogenized. These were the days when the E-body was unique to each division and the Riviera name still possessed a degree of aspiration for those so inclined.
Found near Fulton, Missouri, August 2016
Related Reading:
1966 Buick Riviera by PN
Interesting discource. That relentlessly practical mindset is alive and well in many of us, including myself. Backup cameras? Why, did they stop making mirrors? And why is there an iPad in the middle of the dash? And power windows? Are you afraid of tearing your rotator cuff cranking the window down? Airbags? Why, doesn’t your car have brakes? Whenever someone I know buys a new car, those are the thoughts that run through my head. I always have to bite my tongue and say something like, “I really like the color.” This attitude only increases with the encroachment of old age. You kids get off of my lawn and keep your gadgets off of my car. And the same thing for spell checkers. There’s a squiggly red line under “discourse” and I know how to spell that @#$! word. Nice Riviera, by the way…
I agree with much of this but not the backup cameras. I installed an aftermarket one on my pickup and it’s been one of the best vehicle accessories I’ve ever bought.
Of course my pickup, like most modern vehicles, has awful visibility out the back despite having larger mirrors and more glass area than most. Small cars can hide completely out of sight behind me at stoplights, not to mention kids and other obstructions.
Oh and I also appreciate the safety advances. Yeah they can be heavy and expensive but when my kids are in the car it’s worth every penny to me.
If I hadn’t watched the crash test videos on YouTube, I too would have seen airbags as frivolous. Additionally, the comparison between old design bodies and new bodies is painful to observe. Our favored vintage cars will kill us during a partial offset collisions, while the cheapest Nissan Versa dutifully sacrifices itself to protect its occupants..who escape with a sprained thumb. The new safety tech is incredible, and I have become a little less excited about my teen son driving his 1968 Mustang.
Did someone mention crash tests? I remember all the furor over this earlier but still had to post it.
https://youtu.be/C_r5UJrxcck
I’m ok with backup cameras (well, actually I love mine), and ABS (invoked just once or twice, it you never know …) and airbags (never used, knock-on-Dynoc). Oh, I do like power mirrors. The rest of the stuff I can take or leave. My new Tacoma has quite a few gadgets which can’t be avoided, but still has manually adjustable cloth seats. In some ways my wife’s 15 year old New Beetle is the most frivolous car we’ve owned: turbo, leather, sun roof, two door. But it’s still a stick shift 4 cylinder car. Back to the Riv – I like these, but have never known anyone who owned one. So perhaps even out here in the Bay Area a lot of folks have midwestern automotive values. Just with Civics and brown diesel Jettas, not A bodies and W bodies 🙂 Oh, very well-written Jason, thank you!
Backup cameras I can deal with, nice option to have. Heated seats & steering wheel who needs that. I do however wished my car had heated mirrors.
I never even thought about a heated steering wheel until I rented a Dodge Dart in Winnipeg in February. When it is -30 and you get in a cold car and have instant heat on your glove covered hands it convinced me that the heated steering wheel is one of the greatest automotive inventions ever. Should be standard on all cars.
Yes, yes, yes! I had a loaner Infiniti G37 with the heated steering wheel option. The weather was in the mid-30’s, and that heated wheel was the best thing since sliced bread. I would absolutely add that feature to any new vehicle, along with a rear-view camera.
I need heated seats.
For my wife.
Happy wife, happy life.
🙂
Heated mirrors sound useful but I can only think of 2 times I’ve used the ones in my pickup over the past 6 years in Minnesota.
Backup cameras came up in conversation the other day. One friend said she could park perfectly if she did it as she’d been taught forty-odd years ago, but never could get it right if she used the camera. 🙂
My DTS has a giant head restraint and wide C pillars that combined are difficult to see around, and my neck and back aren’t as stiff as most of the senior citizens that bought them. With giant pickups and SUVs everywhere, I try to find parks I don’t need to back out of.
Jason’s interesting talk of family dynamics with regard to car purchases points to the trouble Detroit was facing. By the time this handsome, powerful Riviera was built, the wealthy enclaves of the coasts were being lost to Detroit.
In 1969, it was hard to argue that the quality, creature comforts, ease of use, or performance were any short of the high end imports. Indeed it was the reverse. Similarly, the prices asked for Detroit’s offerings were less than foreign offerings. Lincoln and Cadillac had been unsuccessful in super high end offerings in the 50s and did not repeat.
Having a high end import denoted sophistication to people increasingly estranged from average Americans who in late 68 had just elected someone antithetical to all they believe. The imports weren’t stained by any of that. The sophistication led to thoughts of German technicians and British craftsman building their cars. Not whatever the unskilled workers throw together on the fast assembly lines in Detroit.
So shut out from the sophisticated, Buick is left to try to peddles this car in flyover country. Yet here there is less money and what there is comes with attitudes like those described by Jason. Buying a Riviera will not signal hard work leading to success. It will label you as “too big for your britches.”
Given all of this, Riviera sales are pretty impressive. The gradual decline of specialty offerings like the Riviera is more understandable and probably inevitable.
To some extent, that was true, although Lincoln and Cadillac did do excellent business with both the Mark III and Eldorado, which were certainly accepted by the Hollywood crowd if not necessarily “ancestral manor” set. That didn’t last — Cadillac, in particular, squandered their remaining exclusivity, although it was enough to carry them through the ’70s.
Whatever exclusivity they ever had was not enough to make a success of the 50s Eldorado or Continental Mark II. Even in the 50s.
I think 1969 is too early a year to identify as the wealthy enclaves of the coasts being lost to Detroit. I would peg that year more like 1974 or so. Yes wealthy coastal folks who had access to foreign car dealers were buying high end cars foreign cars like Jaguars and Mercedes starting in the 1950s and it may have accelerated in the 1960s as the dealers expanded, but my argument would be that those folks didn’t abandon Detroit, they just bought those cars in addition to American cars. I believe it was the next generation that abandoned Detroit, and started to do so in the mid-1970s.
Examples: My grandparents in Santa Barbara California had a number of imports in the 1950s and 1960s, including an Austin, an MG Magnette, and a Jaguar, but as Aaron Sevenson says, they continued to buy American including both a 1970 Lincoln Mark III and a 1975 Buick Riviera. Despite a 1979 Honda Accord bought for gas mileage reasons (see COAL here https://www.curbsideclassic.com/blog/coal-capsule/coal-1979-honda-accord-or-confessions-of-a-spoiled-rich-kid/), they never abandoned Detroit.
My other grandparents in Brentwood, Los Angeles California bought only one import, a 1974 Audi Fox, also for gas mileage reasons, but never went back, preferring Fords and Lincolns for the rest of their lives, with the exception of a 1981 Buick Skylark.
My parents, on the other hand, did abandon Detriot. Through 1974, the only import they purchased was a 1968 VW Squareback Wagon. My father had a 1955 Buick, 1959 Ford Ranch Wagon, 1961 Corvair Monza, and 1963 Corvette Sting Ray convertible before my parents were married. My mom did not own a car of their own until after they were married in 1966. They then purchased a 1965 Ford Galaxie XL convertible, which they replaced with the VW and a 1967 and 1969 Chevy Impala. The VW was replaced by a 1970 Buick Sport Wagon. When we moved from Pasadena California to Greenwich Connecticut, the Impala was replaced by a 1973 Ford Torino Sedan. Then a 1974 Vega Wagon and the beginning of the transition to imports: a 1974 Opel 1900 Sportwagon. The Opel far outshined the Vega, as Paul has so effectively argued, and we then had our last american car as the transition began in full force. When the axle cracked on the Vega, it was replaced by a 1975 Jeep Wagoneer, and when my Dad’s business career began to grow, a 1975 Mercedes 300D. From then on it was all imports, with the only exceptions being a 1987 Ford Taurus Wagon for my mom after my parents’ divorce and a 1998 Ford Explorer my dad bought for a beach house. Mercedes, BMWs, Saabs, Volvos, Audis, Hondas, Acuras, Toyotas, but nearly no american cars.
That’s when the coastal abandonment of Detroit began. It wasn’t the “greatest generation” but their kids. My parents were 5 and 7 years older than the baby boomers, but it was their generation and the baby boomers that led the abandonment of Detroit.
I will draw two pictures though. 1961 Up and coming 28 year old leaves Washington at end of Eisenhower administration for a Wall Street job with a big signing bonus. New car Thunderbird.
1969 Up and coming 28 year old leaves Washington at the end of the Johnson administration for a Wall Street job with a big signing bonus. New Car 300 SE
No fault whatever of Buick and Ford but the situation being faced. By 1981, Detroit is not even building anything appropriate. Rivieras are for old people and Tbirds are chromed up compacts. By sad necessity.
John, they are good pictures and may be true. My dad actually was 28 in 1969, and an insurance executive. When we moved to Connecticut in 1972, it was because my Dad got a job on John Street (5 blocks north of Wall Street) in the financial center of Downtown NYC. I guess the bonus went to the relocation money the company paid, as we flew first class on a 747 and were packed and moved by Bekins movers.
That said, I don’t think people were as wealthy in those days as you’re envisioning, at least as far as cars were concerned. My dad ended up choosing a 1973 Ford Torino Sedan as he could not afford the BMW 2002 he wanted which cost 50% more.
Within 4 years, we had our first Mercedes but it was a 300d, not an S class. S classes were very exclusive in those days, and remember marginal tax rates on high incomes were staggering by today’s standards. I knew and was around a number of people in the 70s and 80s who would have been classified as being Super Rich including Ivan Boesky and a managing director of Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette (famous Wall Street broker), and only one set of my friends had S class mercedes (the mom drove a 300sd, and the Dad a 6.9) and they owned Oil wells and had a private plane.
I guess my point is that from my experience, in those days, S class mercedes were driven by much older people. The young turks and hot shots in those days just weren’t a rich or flashy as they are now.
There was no MB 300SE in 1969. 🙂
Seriously, though, a well-heeled 28 year old was not likely to buy either a Tbird or S Class. Even in their day, these were cars for older folks. A 28 year old in NYC with a chunk of cash to spend in 1961 would have bought an Austin Healey, a Porsche 356, an Alfa, or a Corvette. Not likely a T Bird. I lived back then, and saw what people were driving.
And in 1969, it would have been not all that different: add BMW to the mix, including a 911, Jag XK-E, Alfa Spider or some other sporty import, maybe even an Italian exotic. Still possibly a Corvette, but much less likely. But certainly not a big four door S Class. Maybe at age 35-38, married with kids. More like age 45.
keep in mind that the overwhelming majority of NYC residents don’t drive to work, so their cars were/are largely “toys” and to impress the women. You think a well-heeled 28 year old wants to drive an S Class on the weekend? In wild and crazy 1969? Not likely. His boss, yes. But not him.
I think one change from then to now is back then a 28 year old would be more likely to be married with small children, hence past overt sports cars.
I agree the 61 and 69 young turks I described would be fewer than 1 in a hundred. Their buying choices would influence the 10 or 20 a step or two down the ladder debating the merits and payment terms of Cutlasses and 2002s. I believe the term then was Pacemakers before the heart device.
Good catch on Mercedes. Should be 280SE 3.5.
No; the 3.5 didn’t come until 1970. 🙂 And it was very pricey.
Car and Driver says a 1970 280SE 3.5 Coupe was $13,430 with zero sex appeal (http://www.caranddriver.com/reviews/mercedes-benz-280se-35-road-test-review). NADA has no original MSRP for a 280SE 3.5 Coupe.
NADA says a 1970 Cadillac Coupe Deville was $5,884 and a 1970 Jaguar XKE II Coupe was $5,725.
NADA says original MSRP for a 1970 Mercedes 250C was $6,260. Still probably considered a grandmother car at the time, but a more realistic comparison. My uncle, my dad’s more prosperous older brother had a 1969 230-6, and he would have been 31 in 1969, so probably a more realistic Mercedes for a young turk!
According to NADA, a 1970 Cadillac Fleetwood 75 Limosine was $11,178. That’s what the Boesky’s had when they moved out of NYC to Connecticut, and what the true young turk in NYC would have, complete with a driver.
I really do think John is making a good point, I just think he’s off by five or more years. By 1974 or 1975, the abandonment was fully under way. Even then there was a trend to among coastal families to having an import sedan (BMW, Mercedes, and others) for the husband and domestic, full sized wagon for the wife. Coastal “sophisticates” didn’t “shut out” Buick or other american Luxury manufactures evenly or completely, but they started to in the mid-seventies on sedans and coupes, and started to shut out full-sized domestic wagons in the 1980s.
Good article, to quote it on Mercedes 280SE 3.5 drivers
“Here I am and you will observe I obviously Have It Made, but I have too much taste and knowledge of fine things to be driving a common vulgar Cadillac” In 1969!
If Buick demonstrated the Riviera to this person, how would he react to the Buick slogan. “Wouldn’t you really rather have a Buick?” sneer right, and a huge change from 1961.
A 28 year old in NYC
wouldn’t have bought a sports car unless he lived in the leafy suburbs and took the train. The roads were too crappy by then.
Jason: What would Grandma say about the
20+inch wagon wheels and acres of chrome
look on today’s rides?
The part about your grandpa being told he was indeed the youngest when he was 85 was great. Nice comic timing. 🙂
I love these Rivs, but the bumper/grille almost ruins it for me; the ’70 finally went off the deep end with those skirted quarters. I had a chance to snap up a really nice black ’67 a few years back for about $8000; I probably should have, but my heart’s always been set on the early ones. This one looks great in white.
I remember when I was maybe 11 or 12, my mother’s Aunt and Uncle were visiting from Minneapolis. They were much more stylish people than most of our family and drove one of these.
I had never seen one up close and remember slowly walking around and around it, taking in every one of those luxurious curves. The Navy blue car was so exotic to me that it may as well have been French.
It was so unlike the sea of Catalina’s and 88s around me, it was hard to believe that it came from the same company.
Two thoughts.
1. My dad’s best friend moved his family from South Bend to Binghamton, NY, for a short time in about 1971. We drove out there to visit and Dad’s friend drove us around in one of these. It was the first car I’d ever been in with power windows and it was all I could do not to wear the switch out from playing with it so much. I was fascinated.
2. Your stories of judgmental family and friends is much like what I saw when I left northern Indiana for points south in the Hoosier State. I was surprised by it, this tendency in families and in friend networks to hold people to arbitrary group norms by criticizing any choices they made that seemed at all uppity. It wasn’t just cars; it was clothes and houses, too. Anything, really, that could have status associated with it. The underlying message was: don’t do anything that differentiates you from us. Stay like us. Like I said, I experienced none of this growing up in “extreme southern Michigan,” which is what I jokingly call South Bend because the culture there was so different from what I experience once you cross the southern St. Joseph County border.
Pride and Greed are two of the Seven Deadly Sins, which is the basis for a lot of the criticism, Jim. They were entrenched in many as gateways to the road to ruin.
I think that’s more likely than “stay like us”.
Any of the Seven Deadlies can take one down a misguided path. Even without being religious, the wisdom of them delivers a valuable cautionary tale.
My dad used to avoid the luxury stuff too in the 80’s: “just more stuff to go wrong” is what he’d say. And back then, it was. Although today I also know my mom being very frugal was probably a part of it too.
I avoided power sliding doors on our first minivan 9 years ago for that reason, they had a reputation for expensive failure. Not the second time around. Today I’d still never buy, say, a Land Rover because the reliability of their luxury accessories is atrocious and they are just a poor value all-around. Plus I’d feel pretentious driving it…and I would be. So that mentality is still alive and well if perhaps not as common.
It appears, in the final photo, that perhaps some Sears Booster Shocks were freshly installed; so popular in the era and suitable for raising the profile of many a sagging, full sized GM’er.
Oddly, the only time I’ve seen a 2nd generation Riviera in the last several decades was in a small Midwest town (Palmyra, Mo.) less than 100 miles from who you found this car.
It was in VERY rough shape, and being driven down Main St. by a couple who didn’t exactly convey an image of cheerfulness or friendliness. In many ways, the image of that battered Riviera driving along a formerly prosperous, but now boarded-up Main Street stuck in my mind as a proxy for many themes faced by rural Americans these days.
On a lighter note, when I saw that car, I was walking with one of my kids, who was about 7 at the time. When she saw the Riviera approaching, she said “Look, that car’s driving backwards!” It wasn’t, of course, but the front end, with its hidden headlights and wide grille, just didn’t look like the front end of a car to her.
Palmyra is a town I’ve been to more times than I can count. The deterioration, reflecting a more prosperous past, is depressing.
The Riv doesn’t surprise me; when I lived in Hannibal (8 miles south) there was still a guy who drove a ’69 Dodge Charger R/T. It had holes in the fenders large enough for me to crawl through.
Jason, this is such a great little essay on cultural mores, and a really enjoyable read for a slow Friday morning in the office. I’ve commented here before about my parent’s choices of vehicles in conjunction with the influences on them growing up and the self-imposed restrictions particularly on Dad based on his desire to fit comfortably into his business community. This article just gives me enough pause to ponder those things all over again.
Just as RLPLAUT’s COAL series was about so much more than the cars, so many of our impressions of vehicles, their owners and their places in society are inspired by our experiences with them, whether directly or through osmosis by filtering through the commentary of our families and communities. Such a thought provoking phenomenon.
One of the touchpoints of this piece for me was your reference to the ideas of those folks “Across the River” as compared to those closer to home. I was brought back to a time in the ’70’s and early ’80’s when, growing up in fairly rural Sussex County, NJ, I was exposed to frequent references to those from “Down Below”, which referred to folks from about 30 minutes Southeast, which delineated what was commonly considered NYC Suburbs (Coincidentally the areas of NJ where much of RL’s series is set). My mother, herself having grown up in the wealthier and more cosmopolitan “Down Below” happened to be “One of Those”, and she was sometimes thought to be a bit too big for her britches, as she was inclined to do her shopping and attend her medical appointments “Down Below”, under the impression that the bumpkins around us would likely settle for less-than-the-best, simply because the poor simpletons didn’t any know better. (In truth, Mom could very often BE too big for her britches.)
My father, the son of a zinc miner, who was born and raised and made his business in the area in which we lived, was clearly viewed through a different lens from Mom. The automotive (and fashion, etc.) choices in my family represented quite a cultural dichotomy, which in retrospect probably had a great deal to do with these diverging world views. Largely as a result of this often unspoken societal “weirdness” in our little corner of the world, there seemed to me at many times during my upbringing to be a bit more scrutiny applied to what we wore, what we drove, where we shopped and just what presentation was made. My father, who never spoke very openly about all of this, clearly made many of his choices based on an ingrained knowledge of this pecking order, having come from where he did. My mother and some of her offspring (yours truly not excluded, unfortunately) very often missed the point. I could write volumes on the interesting, comedic, and sometimes rather painful results of some completely inadvertent faux pas made over the years, but suffice it to say that this morning’s piece struck a nerve, and I’m sure I’m far from the only one who was taken back through his own experiences by this. Thanks
Thank you. I’m glad this has hit home (hopefully in a good way) as just the other day I asked Paul to preview this as I still felt it contained a sour note. I’m glad Paul thought otherwise.
The article I linked to set me off in thinking about all these things. And, while I won’t even begin to claim in my experiences while growing up were unique, they were a partial bubble off from the norm. That’s likely good.
Yes, the river was a barrier of sorts. I grew up in a house that sat on a bluff overlooking the Mississippi River, so I could see Missouri from the living room. There was quite the contrast between the two locations; the Illinois side was very economically depressed, the county I lived in had the highest per capita murder and teenage pregnancy rate in the state (I did not make any contributions to that), and this was a county that had its patrol cars repossessed in the early 2000s, after things went even further downhill.
Conversely, the Missouri side contained the vibrant mid-sized town of Cape Girardeau and, 20 minutes south, Sikeston at one time in that era had the highest number of millionaires per capita of any town in the United States.
My parents, he an engineer and she a registered nurse, opted to live in the town where dad grew up. In this town of 450 where I also grew up, we literally had the largest and nicest house in town. And then my parents added on to the place.
A Riviera like this would have been fine for the attorneys or doctors in Cape or Sikeston; where I was, any Riviera was frivolous. A Cutlass Supreme was fine, but that was pushing it. The societal pressure existed more than what I realized at the time, but it was there for whatever reason.
Incidentally, I’d forgotten to mention that link. Even my rather lax Friday work ethic prevented me from getting fully immersed in that article, but I’m looking forward to digging into that later, maybe over a glass of wine. Good stuff.
In 1985, a couple hundred miles northeast in Chicago, a Riviera was still an aspirational car. I remember being shocked when my dad came home in his- a $20,000 car (50k in today’s dollars)- because we really didn’t deal in things that nice. But he really wanted it, and there were already rumors of downsizing the next year (we all know how that turned out.) Get in while the getting’s good, perhaps.
Thanks for the article!
It’s easy to forget now, but in the 60s, and to a lesser degree the 70s and 80s, the Riviera was almost like a Marque unto itself, in a fashion similar to the Corvette or Thunderbird. The fact that they were top of the line halo models added to the mystique. It’s too bad that more old Rivs didn’t survive. They were a sweet ride.
This was a very nice essay and relatable from several angles for me. I also enjoyed the other essay you linked to, a very good inclusion that also makes some very good points.
It’s interesting how this website here is for the most part drawing very disparate people together, from often very different backgrounds and locations along with very different present circumstances. The articles brought home how the country seems like less of a melting pot nowadays (as opposed to a plate of separate and divided ingredients) however websites such as this one (perhaps especially this one) are doing more to assimilate people than anything else. Sure there are occasional squabbles but there is usually common ground to be found eventually on some aspect of the discussion.
Nicely done, Jason.
Thank you and I agree with what you say about drawing disparate people together. With all the divisiveness in this country (and I suspect the world, also) it’s good to have a place to go where such things aren’t par for the course.
The best way for multiple entities to move forward is to find common ground. We, as a group of highly different individuals, have definitely found common ground with our passion for automobiles.
I am 100% behind you on the truck. When I buy a truck, I want a TRUCK! No wussy 1/2 ton, or even worse a 1/2 ton shortbed. No sir, I expect my truck to do a full hard days labor and want more of it tommorow. I would never consider less than a F250 ( with the 7700lb GVWR) or F350 (with the 9000lb GVWR). I am always fantasy shopping with my 78 and 79 “Truck Buying Made Easier” Ford books putting together my dream truck. Maybe, just maybe, someday I’ll find one in the metal somewhere, for $700. Yup, that’ll work.
Great post Jason! You had me laughing out loud. I just hope that you experienced falling through the deck rather than the alternative scenario you laid out…
Beautifully written piece and a touching commentary on how stultifying family and community influences can be.
My dad CRAVED a Cadillac when I was a kid, but knew that as a college professor at a small university with money issues, it would be really bad form, so he drove VWs while my mom drove the “nice car”, a stripped down Olds 88.
A friend’s father was up-and-coming at P&G, and there were very clear lines drawn as far as what kind of car people at each level drove…don’t buy an Olds if your boss drives a Pontiac…and as soon as you get promoted, better jettison the Pontiac for an Olds so you don’t put your underlings in a bind, automotively. The P&G guy bought an S-Class for himself when he retired…felt like it was not a good idea prior to that.
Funny the social constraints people conform with…
The man I worked for from 86-94 in the jewelry store had spent the 60’s as a manager of a M Systems grocery store in little Anson TX. He had always liked the 2 seat T-Birds and in 62 he bought a 57. When 20% of the buissiness walked away, because they thought he was too uppity, the owner of the chain, one Mr. Kimball ( who the Ft. Worth Kimball Art Museum is named after) made him get rid of it. So glad I avoided all the small town politic’s, although Wichita Falls isn’t exactly a metropolis.
Jason, you wrote: “I figured I could tie such a theme into various awkward events, like falling through a deck or going into a job interview with an open fly. Thankfully, I’ve only experienced one of those.”
So which one?
Well, the picture showing the broken wood is my deck and the width of the hole equals that of my leg bone just below my knee.
Excellent article, Jason. I was never aware of the “class divides” growing up, as we moved so often just coping with being the “new kid” all the time was a full time adjustment [5 schools in one year at one point].
However kids were certainly learning to get their snob on as a favorite jab was “Where’d you get that ? K-Mart ?”
I did grow up with a sense of modesty about “stuff”, what I now realize was likely related to the Seven Deadly Sins I mentioned above.
Mom suffered the most as I suspect she bore the brunt of it from, ironically, my peacock Grandmother who would have imprinted the 7 DS on her psyche.
My Mother was a good looking woman, intelligent and able to swing a hammer or wield a paintbrush better than any man. But never without her “eyes” on and always with great hair. She wasn’t the frail sickly little frou frou Granny wanted her to be and bless her for that.
She was modest to a fault. The cranberry red with white vinyl top and white leather 87 Coupe Deville my Dad bought her she referred to as a “showboat” and was embarrassed to be seen in it.
Granny was a striver though: impeccably dressed and wanting to distance herself from her Okie roots [a phrase she despised, BTW] and manners. Once my birth grandfather died she hooked up with a real estate guy and it was furs, fine cars, fine dining and to quote “as much fun as I could have”. Yet she too was a financially prudent woman and could turn a nickle into a $1.00.
Dad finally got the Cadillac he’d wanted in the early 70s. For Mom of course, but I remember being horrified at the thought he was considering a used one at that time. I thought it was a trashy thing to do [ I was 14 or 15 ].
Generally I trace my prudence back to the Depression Era DNA courtesy of my grandparents and Father and Mother running through my veins. The virtues of thrift and delaying gratification run deep. And I find the 7 DS a valuable warning guide for living my life.
Lots of values schizophrenia running through this family, but more familial rather than social. I’ve never let my social set dictate what car I’d buy.
Too many of them did stupid stuff with money and got themselves caught up in the whole debt slave, live for now thing. Rejecting Baby Boomer values was one of the best choices I ever made in my life.
” It had power windows, the ultimate symbol of unmitigated sloth; such extravagances were a thoroughly frivolous expenditure ringing hollow in benefit as such a boondoggle only held the potential of catastrophic nightmares for the dope who purchased them.”
That’s a fine turn of phrase right there, and sums up those values in a nutshell.
My family has, as a whole, always been relatively thrifty when it comes to cars, but without so much expressed judgement. Then again, maybe there was no judgement to express because no one went too far outside the lines. My parents always bought used, and other than an ill-fated foray into an Audi 5000, stayed pretty basic.
Somehow it didn’t translate to me, with my first “nice” car purchase being a used Lincoln. At the time I didn’t really care what others thought of it–it was what I wanted. And other than some “old person car” comments from friends, I didn’t really get much flak on the purchase, though nowadays I realize that to many people probably looked poorly upon that purchase, just silently. It could have been seen as tacky, classless, “big for my britches” even as a used car, or just downright stupid. At 24 I didn’t see any of those things, social constraints be damned.
I don’t regret it. Now, at 36, I’ve fallen all the way to the other side of the coin, driving a car that probably has a negative effect on my image for a different reason–it’s an old heap. But it’s paid for, which might warm the heart of those same thrifty folks that were silently judging 24 year old me in my Mark VIII.
Love hearing your different perspective Jason. Growing up in a crowded city with neighborhoods ranging from dirt poor to richest in the nation gave us exposure to just about everything, from simply sitting in traffic. A bore to most people was a car show in motion for a guy like me. Especially when rust isn’t a favor, you saw old and new.
It was almost impossible not to be intimately familiar with any car that sold more than 10,000 units a year. I can’t imagine anyone in LA older than 35 maybe 40 not knowing about this Riv. They seemed to last longer than the ’63-65s and were on the road forever.
Someone was saying how a mid-seventies Cutlass Supreme was to their 30-somethings what a 3-series is to modern day yuppies. Likewise, the kinds of people you saw in these Rivs are the ones you see in mid-large German sedans today. These folks just don’t look right in crossovers because they don’t get admired enough.
Well Jason this was an interesting post and I’ve enjoyed all your contributions. It didn’t seem to mention the Riv too much. One of my brother’s classmates family bought a new ’69 Riv after driving their ’57 Buick for at least twenty years. I got to ride in it a few times and I was impressed. The Riv was a glamour car like the T Bird, not a young person’s car like a loaded up Mustang or Corvette but something a mature successful person would reward himself with. They were not as pretentious as a Caddy, but it was car that the common man or woman would like to own. The ’66 is the best representative of the second gen. much cleaner and simpler, but the ’69 was not too bad. I got to own a few Rivs over the years and they were good road cars. That picture of the Lincoln Town Car looked pretty good, I was tempted for a while.
Well you did a fantastic job or reminding me to apply silicone lubricant to the manual window of my ’02 Silverado. Cranking it was starting to hurt my shoulder 🙂
As of 2023 one can no longer get a Silverado with manual windows. What would your grandfather think?
It was six years ago, to the day, when I made my last comment. This morning when I clicked on this post, I showed my Wife the picture of the ’69 Riv and said,” Why can’t they make a beautiful car like this anymore?” That is the question. Cars like the Riviera were all about the style, they were practical enough to be used as transportation by a single person or childless couple, and that made them exclusive as they didn’t fit into a lot of people’s life situations. Even if you could easily afford them. Of course it all depends on your personal tastes, but for me, this type of car, filled me with longing. In my eyes, these were the epitome of automotive design, beauty, luxury, and performance. These were actual dream cars to me. At least I had a few.
My ’77 Coupe de Ville and my ’94 Seville were my last dream cars, and there won’t be another one to take their place. I dabbled with some Jaguars for a time, but ended up dissatisfied. As I’ve mentioned before, I moved onto a Mustang to fill my PLC needs. I’m satisfied that my ’06 looks like the classic Mustangs that I once wanted.
I’ve never felt any familial or social pressure over any of my automotive choices. For one thing, we didn’t have many of our extended family around. We also weren’t that close with the ones that were around. My Mom grew up during the Depression, and my Dad was an immigrant who arrived here with nothing but a few clothes and maybe a hundred bucks in his pocket. They were always very frugal and cautious with their money which served them and our family, well throughout their lives. My Dad was too practical to waste money on older fancy cars, but I’m certain that he got a vicarious kick out of most of my purchases.
I’ll just park this one here. 🙂
I may be in the minority, but I prefer the ’68-9 to the ’66-7, probably because I assembled a plastic model of the former as a kid. The pointy fender edges of the latter look too fragile (likewise for the Olds of the time).
The ’66 and ’67 were imo the prettiest Rivieras and one of the best Mitchell era cars. A friend has a gorgeous turquoise metallic ’67 GS and I’m first in line if/when he decides to sell it. A masterpiece along with the ’65 Corvair coupe. and several other mid ’60s GM cars… GM design at it’s very best was as good or better than anyone in the world.
Interesting post Jason. I have never seen a ’66-69 Riviera in decades (for that matter, neither a ’65). I’ve always considered the second generation Riviera with the batmobile look a bastardization of the first generation Riveras.
In regard to your comments about pragmatic automobiles as opposed to what was regarded as wasteful extravaganzas, one of my uncles who was a conservative Republican farmer-who endured the great depression- drove Oldsmobiles for years-the first one I remember was an Olds 88 (’54 I believe) then a ’63 98, followed by a ’66, ’70 and I believe a ’73. The ’66 had all the bells and whistles including a reverb with the radio! I never heard him complain about “useless” options like power windows. In 1975 he surprised everyone by buying a Dodge Charger-talk about conspicuous consumption!
Regarding accessories now on automobiles, I like the backup camera on my Odyssey and the heated seats; I always regared those as useless but on a cold day they are really nice. I never thought power sliding doors were required, but I definitely like them.
Every time I see a white 68 or 69 Riviera it unfortunately brings up a sad memory. In the late 90’s, give or take, there was one for sale in my neighborhood. I was kinda interested, but my budget wasn’t really in car buying mode at the time, and while it was in decent shape it did need a little TLC. Well, my next door neighbor’s kid bought it. Unfortunately he was good at killing cars, and this became his next victim. He tried to hop it up, or swapped in a different engine, or something, and it suffered an engine fire. It then sat in his driveway, directly adjacent to mine, with the hood sitting on the roof and a tarp over the engine compartment (they could get away with this because our driveways were in back off an alley). So I had to watch it rot for several years before it disappeared, to be replaced by an 80’s BMW which eventually suffered a similar fate. I don’t live there anymore, mercifully.