Two years ago, I moved to a small LA suburb called Gardena, California. A town of about 60,000 located south of downtown and well east of the beaches, Gardena is primarily a blue collar bedroom community. During my time here, I’ve noted a number of curbside classics, all of them very original and none of them pampered garage queens. Over the next month or so I’ll document them, starting with this Dodge Maxiwagon Sportsman.
Thanks to Paul’s extensive history of the Dodge van (available here), we know that Maxiwagon refers to the overall length, while Sportsman indicates a passenger van. We can also use his information to narrow it down to a single model year. In 1978, Dodge reconfigured the side glass, eliminating two small fixed windows and extending the rear windows to wrap around the rear cap. Then in ’79, Dodge updated the front end appearance with stacked square headlights eliminating later years from consideration.
Here is a better shot of those wrap around windows, along with view of the one piece rear door. I thought this option may have arrived with the new rear end cap, but it appears Dodge offered it for several years before the redesign. In 1978, it was still touted as a “Dodge Exclusive,” and buyers who chose the single door option gained the benefit of an unobstructed view while using the interior rear view mirror.
Our van does not have a sliding side door, but it appears the option had been available since 1974, so the buyer chose not to invest in one. Despite that, this truck looks nicely turned out, with two tone paint and bright side trim (but no bright windshield trim).
Here’s a look inside. Although Chrysler waited until 1979 to release new front sheet metal, they updated the dashboard in ’78. I didn’t spend much time reviewing interior trim levels, but those wood grain door inserts indicate this isn’t a base model interior.
I captured a near identical “NuCarPrep”sticker on a ’77 Plymouth Arrow a few years ago (that one used blue text), since I’m surprised to see these factory prep stickers survive for over 30 years. If nothing else, I’d expect the sun to fade the print or burn up the vinyl, but it appears Chrysler went all out when the specified the sticker material. I’m also surprised how flat the windshield is in this picture- All vans are “boxy,” but I’d still expect this glass to have 2 or 3 more inches of depth.
In contrast to our new car prep sticker, this right front tire has not held up very well. The other tires were all in better condition (although to be fair, this one sets the bar very low), but spotting this slick reminds me why I prefer to position myself well clear of other cars whenever traffic allows buffer zones.
I’ll close with one more thing that caught my eye. While I’ll give the owner credit for laying some tape over the fuel fill, this approach still makes me go “huh?”
A quick online check tells us any local Autozone offers new fuel caps for $10. Here in California it’s about $60 to top off the tank, so I can’t imagine why you wouldn’t invest a sixth of that in a new fuel cap.
With that, I’ll wrap up the post. Regardless of condition, this 42 year old van is still plying the streets of Gardena, and appears mostly serviceable. Next time, I’ll have something for fans of equally original early sixties GM B-bodies. See you then!
Very informative write-up Dave. As a cable TV technician In 1979 I had a ’79 Dodge Van with the stacked 4651 and 4652 headlamps as my work vehicle at Indianapolis Cablevision . It had a Van Ladder on it as a cherry picker. My excellent eye for detail always noticed how Chrysler vehicles of this vintage had the “Unleaded Gasoline Only” labels on the fuel gauge and above the fuel filler instead of “Unleaded Fuel Only” like most other manufacturers used. This van must be a 300 series as it has the 8 lug 16″ or 16.5″ wheels with LT tires and the floating rear axle.
A guy I worked for came into some money in 1985 and decided to surprise his wife with one of these in the same two tone to haul their four girls around. She had learned to drive on a Toyota, followed by a Mercury comet and an Aspen station wagon.
Needless to say she was less than amused so one of my job duties quickly became driving her anytime she had to go to the city.
I liked driving it. It handled very well for effectively a bus but even I wasn’t brave enough to try and parallel park the thing!
Those wraparound quarter windows were a fine idea to improve sightlines. The execution wasn’t as fine; there’s a lot of distortion through the wraparound portion. Vans like this bring memories of preschool field trips (to the Red Seal potato chip company, the local Pepsi bottling plant, etc)—CB radio to keep in touch with the other vans, sloppy side window latches flopping closed over road bumps, and two or three of us kids sharing one lap belt. That last would make any safety expert today throw up, but at the time it was an “Eh! Better than nothing ¯\_(ツ)_/¯” matter.
The NuCarPrep decal certainly is an odd survivor!
” preschool field trips (to the Red Seal potato chip company, the local Pepsi bottling plant, etc)”
During my Elementary school days back in Michigan, we visited a dairy one year and later on the Kellogg’s Cornflakes plant in Battle Creek, but we used a traditional school bus.
Interesting side note, according to the interwebs, the Kellogg’s company no longer allow tours:
“On April 11, 1986, Kellogg’s stopped giving tours of its breakfast-food plant. The reason for the end of the 80-year tradition was said the fear that company secrets were at risk due to spies from other cereal companies.”
The other problem with the 1978+ version of the Maxi was that it messed with the proportions. The early maxi looked right, but this one got a longer stretch out back and always looked off balance to me.
The other thing that never looked right to me on the post-’77 vans was that the bottoms of the windows were all lowered except the one on the front door which now was out of line with the others. I’d like to think it was some sort of knowing homage to Virgil Exner, but it was probably done to save a few bucks. When I learned Dodge planned to revise the front of the front of the vans the next year I assumed they’d update door at the same time, but no. Likewise when the front was revamped twice in the ’90s the window size again stayed the same, although the vent window eventually disappeared.
I prefer the original front to any of the ’79 or newer looks.
I have seen Mopars with “Airtemp” window stickers that were surprisingly long-lived.
What an interesting find indeed and thanks for sharing. These vintage vans do not seem to have as much a fan base as pickups of a similar vintage so I try to photograph the vans I find around Oregon. I wonder what the current owner uses this van for anyway? Really hope they get some new tires on this vehicle and even a gas cap. The vintage sticker can stay.
Found this van while in Oakland last year, Oakland Oregon that is.
Oakland, OR
Love it! I would love the standard length more, but this rust-free version has its appeal. The guy I knew who owned the 73 always griped about the newer versions. The side doors were farther forward and the opening of the main door was half blocked by the front passenger seat back. With the extension behind the front doors that had never been a problem.
And wow, wasn’t there a less obtrusive place to put that NuCarPrep sticker?
My guess is that the dealership placed it there so it was really obvious while this vehicle sat at the dealership and figured the customer would remove it shortly thereafter.
“And wow, wasn’t there a less obtrusive place to put that NuCarPrep sticker?”
Well, in 42 years no one has found reason to remove it….
I’m sure it worked just fine, but that absurdly long rear overhang looks frightening. I have a vision of somebody loading a pallet of bags of cement just inside the rear door and the front wheels lifting off the ground.
It is frightening. The handling traits of extended 15-passenger vans became notorious. These things were used as church buses and were often driven by inexperienced drivers. NHTSA says “15-passenger vans should only be driven by experienced, licensed drivers who operate this type of vehicle on a regular basis. A commercial driver’s license is ideal.” They are involved in more rollovers (especially when carrying over 10 people) than passenger cars, and some owners/operators aren’t aware full-size van tires are often intended to be inflated at much higher pressures than car or SUV tires.
https://www.ntsb.gov/safety/safety-alerts/Documents/SA_001.pdf
https://www.nhtsa.gov/sites/nhtsa.dot.gov/files/documents/13699_15-passenger_van_factsheet_english_060418_v3a_tag.pdf
If you guys went to church during this era, you’d recognize it as a standard church van.
Wouldn’t the lack of a gas cap also cause this van to fail California’s smog check? Which, being a post-1975 model, this van would still require. I know I once had to replace the gas cap to get my car to pass.
“Wouldn’t the lack of a gas cap also cause this van to fail California’s smog check?”
Which is why California has a Smog Check- Some of us replace missing fuel caps to hold in fuel vapors and keep out rain water, but others- Not so much.
For those owners, an every other year Smog Check forces the issue…. every other year.
Perhaps he has two vans and they share one gas cap, it swaps places every time the smog check is due 🙂 $10 is $10…
Or the vehicle may be registered in a “change of ownership” smog check county.
My MP unit got 2 of these assigned to us after many miles of base shuttle use. Ours were strippos badged as Plymouths instead of Dodges, but same van. Our motor pool installed a table and facing bench seats in the middle and some debris and equipment bins along with 1st aid equipment in the back. They were quite handy as MP traffic accident investigation vehicles. We used the center table for taking on scene witness statements. Wish I had taken a photo of them when equipped with all the MP lights and gear. The motor sergeant correctly figured these would spend a lot of time parked at accident scenes and put 2 Federal light bars on the roof and strobes on all sides. Although fully equipped for MP duty, these things handled like pigs. We prohibited our MPs from responding code 3 in these vans due to handling concerns. Some of my younger and more bullet proof MPs probably did so anyway, but luckily, no accidents during my watch.