Well, sorta. Paul posted a few years back about wanting to find an end-of-the-line 1957 Nash Ambassador; is this 1956 close enough? If so, let’s give EricClem a big cyber hug for this minty-green gift. But in the case this fails to cut the mustard, let me preemptively say, we’re very disappointed. Don’t come back until you find a proper ’57, and while we’re young, please!
I’m obviously joking, but such a nasty reaction would mirror the public’s reception of Nash’s biggest, ritsiest models, despite excellent efforts to win buyers over with fully integrated A/C, up-to-date suspensions and a reputation for quality. You gotta feel a little sorry for them; no, this isn’t the most successfully styled car, but it’s pretty cool looking in its own way and has plenty to redeem it.
It just goes to show, you sell people what they want, and maybe dictate to them what that is, but please, don’t sell them anything they actually need. No, the rounded dash with its minimum of protruding metal parts just won’t do, nor will the car’s apparent durability (with these seat covers and that dent in the driver’s door, it isn’t a garage queen).
I will pardon buyers who passed the Ambassador of the era over in favor of other cars based on its looks, however. As a rule, the styling of cars from the ’50s does not appeal to me at all; I’ll never understand the ostentation they embody alongside the very stark, minimalist architecture that was going up in most places (Googie excepted), but even with that said, this car is a bit overdone. It began life with a more subtle look, inspired by none other than Pininfarina, but as interest waned, on went the jewelry and makeup.
Even Googie architecture was more restrained than this, and all this decoration actually makes the car look smaller than expected. Every trick was thrown at it, including the external spare. This car fairly begs for validation, and it’s always sad whenever someone (or something) tries extra hard to achieve it. But even with the deepest sympathy, in real life we usually don’t care to give such sad types much attention anyway; it’s too painful.
It’s especially upsetting when the desperation hides genuine substance and integrity. Such would be the case here, with this car’s thoroughly modern overhead valve V8. Being an Ambassador Custom, and not an Ambassador Special, it has a 352 CID Packard unit routing power through a two-speed-plus-torque converter Packard Ultramatic and not the latter’s new AMC 250 V8/Hydramatic (this transmission was also used with the Ambassador Six). The final year 1957s would receive a 327 CID version of the AMC unit with 9.1 compression and a four-barrel car to go along with the Hydramatic, along with slightly more conservative styling. Maybe that’s why Paul wants to find one so much.
But even with all the improvements, 1956 production still plunged 2/3s from the prior year’s numbers, and as a relatively well-trimmed example with plenty of bizarre design flourishes, this car is quite uncommon, especially since it appears to be in regular use. If anyone is underwhelmed by this find (not likely!), I would not be one of them.
Related reading:
Car Show Classic: 1953 Nash Statesman – AMC’s DNA
Curbside Classic: 1956 Hudson Hornet – Waiting For Death In A Borrowed Four-Tone Suit
Here’s A CC I’d Like To Find: 1957 Nash Ambassador – The End Of The Road
FugLEEEE ! .
-Nate
(Nash owner)
Hehehe. Best punchline since ‘Some Like It Hot’
What we are seeing is how a brand didn’t evolve from its design elements when it should have.
The Nash tried to look different from the Hudson and the Rambler from the same company. Nash succeeded in looking different, didn’t it? But all that different ended up not looking good.
The inboard headlights, the front fender skirts and the central dashboard style were Nash styling elements that Mason favored while he was CEO of American Motors. He died before this car, but his favored Nash styling elements lived on until it no longer found a market.
Also, please recall that the subcompact Metropolitan had similar Nash styling. In its original design, the Metro had inboard headlights as well. That little car continued with the same Nash styling right into 1960 when it was finally given full wheel openings along with a trunk lid.
What we are seeing as ugly now – was not as ugly in 1956, but it wasn’t popular either.
When George Romney needed to compete with the Big Three, he recognized the futility of modernizing the Nash/Hudson and killed off those brands. So we were spared an AMC version of the Packardbakers in 1957-1958. Romney put everything he had into the new Rambler, and then brought back the older generation Rambler to give the newer Rambler a market bump AMC lacked with the continuation of Nash/Hudson.
So, this car carries upon it a long heritage of Nash styling upon a body that was needing a replacement. What it did have that was awesome was a modern engine, the industry’s best a/c, and terrific build quality – compared to its competition.
Nash isn’t the first brand to attempt inboard headlights, triple color paint, and an instrument panel placed in the middle of the car. And it isn’t even the only car to have all these style elements. But being conditioned to what the styling of the auto era was thanks to the Big Three, the Nash just plain looks bizarre.
” Also, please recall that the subcompact Metropolitan had similar Nash styling. In its original design, the Metro had inboard headlights as well. That little car continued with the same Nash styling right into 1960 when it was finally given full wheel openings along with a trunk lid. ”
WHOA ! _way_ incorrect .
The Mighty Metropolitan retained the skirted wheels throughout it’s entire production run , ’54 ~ ’61 .
It got the sorely needed trunk lid mid way through the 1959 year , same year as it got vent wings and a glove box door .
-Nate
Also, the Metro never had inboard lights, even as the prototype.
Its funny to look at a car where the whole is something less than the sum of its parts. Modern V8, wraparound windshield, 3 tone paint job and an all around well built car. And somehow it all equals this.
I have occasionally wondered what the result might have been if Nash had styled this car along the lines of the 56 Studebaker. The Stude was attractive for the era but was let down by its small and narrow size and shape. The Nash was sized just right for 1956 but was saddled with such odd styling.
Fabulous find!
…styled this car along the lines of the 56 Studebaker.
The 56 was the first normal looking Studebaker since 49 or 52. I like the 57s even better, much cleaner front end treatment, but the taillights took a step backard that year. The real looker was the 57 Packard version, which had the 56 Clipper taillights grafted on to the Studie body, though I’d probably lose the Dagmars. The 57 Packard insturment cluster was also a collection from the 56 Packard parts bin, and much nicer than the Studie dash.
The 56 Studies handled like such pigs though. In 57 they redesigned the ancient cam and peg steering and put a roller bearing on the peg. That reduced friction 60% and permitted much faster steering, 4 1/2 turns lock to lock rather than 5 3/4. They also went to variable rate coils in front to tame the nautical handling. As one 57 road test said “If this would have been produced in 1954, or even 55, they might not have been able to make enough of them”
pic: 57 Packard Clipper
You make some good points. It occurs to me that Studebaker perhaps should have done what Chrysler did when it killed the Imperial after 1975. The 1958 Packard could have had the badges changed and become offered as the 1959 Studebaker President. The cars were very nicely trimmed and were not bad looking. I always particularly liked that new 2 door hardtop roof that was a 1 year only design, as things turned out. The Packardbaker was a lousy Packard, but would have made a pretty decent Stude. Of course, maybe it would have just been too far past its sell-by date in 1959.
Of course, maybe it would have just been too far past its sell-by date in 1959.
In addition to the improvement in the cam and peg steering, and the variable rate front coils in 57, Studie went to asymmetrical leaves in 58 to attempt to tame dive/squat behavior during braking and acceleration. They could have added the X member that the Lark ragtops and Avanti later received to stiffen up the frame to sharpen handling.
But what were they thinking with the tacked on fairings for the quad headlights in 58? Even Checker did a better job of integrading quad headlights. The tacked on 58 tail fins were not any worse than what Dodge was doing, but those headlights….dang.
But getting past the foul handling and iffy styling, the cars were, as you suggest, well past their sell by date in 59. Even road tests in 57 were complaining about the high and narrow body having an “old” feel.
You havent seen a later Chrysler Royal have? I can tell, they take tacked on fins to a whole new level considering the entire assenblage is nailed to a 53 Plymouth Savoy it makes these Nashes look absolutely gawjuss in comparism.
Here’s that Chrysler Royal Kiwibryce is referring to.
Here’s that Chrysler Royal Kiwibryce is referring to.
The Plymouth under those fins is a 56. My Aunt had one.
Funny thing about the 55-56 Plymouth, it was the only Mopar that the hoods over the headlights looked like part of the fender, as they did on Packards those two years. All the other Chrysler products had hooded bezels screwed onto the front of the earlier style fenders.
Nice try but youve found a 55/56 Plymouth sorry, the Royal had stacked headlights and is built on the 53 Cranbrook body right thru until 60 or so when Aussie first got Valiants, Old Petes photo is the correct one
Nice try but youve found a 55/56 Plymouth
Pete’s pic is a 56. The 55 Plymouth had smaller tail fins, and I’m talking about the tailfins with the taillights in them, not the bolt on fins.
What a splendid find – a real Curbside Classic!
What an ugly pig of a car, though… Good riddance!
+1
A nice, definitely un-GM (probably its biggest failing) body shell, let down by some incredibly un-artistic placement of trim. And of that 66% drop in sales, the slight general downturn overall for the ’56 model year didn’t help.
Terrific find despite it having such a memorable face.
The nearly skirted front wheels are a very odd look to today’s eyes. Such a design requires that the fenders reside well outside the steering and suspension’s range of motion, which certainly adds to the odd look.
The “backward” arch of the C pillar is also a very unconventional element to today’s eyes. While contemporary designs attempt to capture an urgent sense of forward motion, this C pillar design seems to make the car appear that it is still…or perhaps rolling slowly backward….a truly iconic design since it is so peculiar compared to both its own contemporaries AND today’s design trends. Bravo!
Take off the Continental kit and do a do over in the front clip and this wouldn’t be so bad. The tail lights predict the ’58 Oldsmobile very well.
Ah the 1958 Oldsmobile. Talk about a car that it was so obvious the folks designing the front end never even met the folks designing the rear end when this car was being designed.
So odd, so very odd. I agree with jpcavanaugh – the individual elements are great, particularly the tri-tone paint and the wraparound rear glass. I even like the line of the side trim and the heavily skirted front fenders (though not the associated narrow track). However, the tail is fussy, the nose is tragic, and the whole car has an unusually upright, heavy look to it.
The nose styling was much better for ’57, with those side “pods” containing headlamps like should have been done in the first place. But by then it was too little, too late.
Still a very cool car, perhaps because of all its quirks. And a great find!
Besides the chipmunk face and the skirted wheels, I don’t get the center mounted insturment cluster in the Nash. The 56 Hudson, to my eye, looks a heck of a lot better.
The Hudson had better options under the hood as well. If you didn’t want the Packard V8, the choice in the Nash was an ancient 253 six, until the new (design pinched from Kaiser) 250 V8 came out midyear. Hudson offered the 308, considerably upgraded from it’s premerger form.
Of course, in Steve’s alternate reality, Hudson would have merged with Packard in 53 (Hudson made that proposal to Packard in August 53), been a retrimed Clipper with the same powertrain choice as the Nash version: Packard V8 and 308, and lower cost conventional suspension, rather than Torsion Level. Final assembly consolidated at EGB and Packard using Hudson’s body plant when Briggs was sold.
Pic: 56 Hudson dash, with speedo in front of driver, instead of a center cluster like the Nash
I’m no fan of the center-mounted instrument pod, but the dash is nonetheless gorgeous. If only such taste and restraint had been exercised on the exterior… this might be the ugliest car, or the ugliest anything, I’ve ever seen. Ugly with a capital F.
I wouldn’t call anything on that Nash really attractive.
Here’s what Studie pulled out of the parts bin for the 57 Packard dash. Not a bad effort for a car that was produced on a shoestring to keep dealers from suing the company.
I think the reflections from the side glass make the dash on the ’56 Nash look better than it might really be… it looks less appealing (although not hideous) in other photos I found on the web.
From the side profile it looks like any other 1950’s car. The front end is ugly but not too much of a turn off.
What I like the most about this car is that not only is it a unrestored survivor with close to 60 years of battle scars, it looks like a daily driver also. This is very refreshing in an era where a lot of these cars that are of the same age or newer seem to be garage queens or transported via a trailer.
What I like the most about this car is that not only is it a unrestored survivor with close to 60 years of battle scars, it looks like a daily driver also.
We are assuming that it still has the Packard drivetrain in it, rather than being changed out for an AMC 327 and Hydramatic. The Packard drivetrain suffered from insufficent development. While the weak clutches in the Ultramatic had been mostly corrected by 56, the engine’s oiling issues were never really addressed.
Actually it looks like that particular car has a 3 on the tree and not an auto but I cannot be 100% due to the glare from the window. But in any event I don’t consider a new engine or trans upgrade to diminish its status as a unrestored survivor as the rest of the car is original(now maybe if there was a 455 shoved into the thing it might be different though)
Cool looking car! Be even better if it were fully restored.
Definitely not a garage queen, as the licence plates indicate it’s a daily driver. That car is parked there quite regularly as I drive by in at least a couple of times a week. It is taken next to the CBC building and on the other side of the street is the wonderful Vancouver Public Library.
These cars look sorta like Japanese stamped friction toys — poorly proportioned, bulbous, a bit gaudy while looking cheap. You can imagine the toy maker saying, “Well, that’s close enough. What do kids know anyway?” Harder to imagine a car maker saying that, but harder yet to imagine they thought this actually looked good. Or good enough to compete… Probably even the Russians wouldn’t knock off the design!
I really do have a perverse love for these Nashes, from ’52 through ’57, just for being so different and wacky. Yes, they are a rolling disaster, but don’t blame any of that on Pininfarina; his 1951 proposal to Nash was pretty clean, and devoid of the front fender skirts and tri-tone paint jobs. AMC’s Ed Anderson can take credit, as well as for all the other rather wacky AMC styling right through 1963, until Dick Teague came along.
Right. It’d have been better to say, “Inspired by Pininfarina… a bit… in 1952.”
But man, thank God for Teague, one of my favorite American in-house designers.
That’s still odd looking, but methinks in a good way.
I’ve got a very contentious theory that this prototype was the actual originator of the Florida creaseline. Contentious, circumstantial, and based on quite a few (too many?) assumptions. Please don’t ban me from CC, Paul.
The early models were quite nice, probably because they hewed the closest (if not really all that close) to the clean lines of the Pininfarina prototype, but I’ve never been a fan of the narrow track and shrouded wheels on these cars. Just looking at the prototype, you can see how much better balanced it looks with a proper track and open wheel wells. I think along with Ed Anderson, George Mason needs to take some of the credit/blame.
Now, the front end of the ’61 Ambassador…that’s all on you, Ed.
This is actually a 1955 Pininfarina prototype first shown at the Turin Show. There is the question of the mysterious second body from 1952 of which there seems to be no photo. The first body in 1952 was a fastback bathtub Ambassador.
The photo is marked “1951”. But I’ve seen pictures of the same or virtually identical car labeled “1955”, but with different wheel covers, etc.
But that doesn’t make sense; it was in 1951 when Farina was asked to submit his proposal for the new 1953 Nashes. It would have to be from 1951, no?
The PF Catalogue Raisonne lists this as a 1955 Nash.
I posted the 1952 prototype image in the comments here:
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/curbside-classics-american/car-show-classic-1953-nash-statesman-amcs-dna/
(Sorry, I’m on iPad at the moment so can’t repost the pic)
The text for the 1952 refers to 2 bodies being prepared, and only one being sent to the US. My theory is that the picture shows the model left behind. It features interchangeable panels, so I think the second body had the reverse-cant roofline, but was based on the same frame. The panels would have been swapped around between the two to see which worked best. The text refers to the second body as a ‘three volume’.
JPC linked to some good articles in his story. There was an eyewitness description of the prototype that was shown in the US as ‘droopy and soft shouldered’ (IIRC).
Maybe this 1955 is the second prototype with some later work done to it. Given how highly Battista valued his Florida work, I doubt he would have waited three or four years to reintroduce something as significant as the crease and it doesn’t appear on any other PF car between times.
The only earlier Nash in the catalogue is the N-Healey Spider, given as 1951.
If that is a ’51 photo, then the family tie with the Nash-Healey nose job for ’52 is abundantly clear!
How can anyone dislike the Edsel after this ugly brute?
They should have kept just about everything from the Pininfarina design EXCEPT the pinched face. Instead, they kept its worst feature and changed everything else. That Nash is like a trainwreck, fascinating but still a disaster.
We had a neighbor with a 50’s Nash that broke in 2 going over railroad tracks. The tin worm got to the unibody after more than 10 years of midwestern winters.
While I agree about “the rounded dash with its minimum of protruding metal parts,” this design was offset by that huge protruding steering wheel cap that your face would have encountered in a crash (Sammy Davis Jr. lost his eye to the even more pointed protruding cap of his Cadillac @54 or 55 in that infamous accident). Proper praise to Ford for leading the way toward better steering wheel designs by the time this dated one was still being produced for 56.
The 52 Nash my family had that was covered back in January (https://www.curbsideclassic.com/curbside-classics-american/car-show-classic-1953-nash-statesman-amcs-dna/) was a pretty pure design compared to this overwrought 56 (only to be outdone by the truly hideous 57), albeit not the one that Pininfarina proposed. While they were sturdy cars in terms of the drivetrains, rust took most of them away within a few short years.
“Sammy Davis Jr. lost his eye to the even more pointed protruding cap of his Cadillac @54 or 55 in that infamous accident”
I did not know that! I was aware from that episode where Archie Bunker asks Sammy if he wants more cream in his eye but did not know the background.
Interesting fact of the day!
Re steering wheel cap, I believe it’s the book “Freakanomics” that argues the best way to make driving safe is to put a spear in the center of the steering wheel: you’d always drive as if you were in the Rose Bowl Parade because of the harm an accident would bring.
Good book, but this theory doesn’t account for the idiot that runs into your car while you’re driving carefully.
Shrinks call that “Risk Compensation.” Its validity, I think, depends upon the driver’s personality; for my part, my car having antilock brakes is not going to tempt me to follow closer. And I still don’t trust my automatic power doorlocks.
Hate to be pedantic, but it’s called the ”Rose Parade” or “Tournament of Roses,” which predated the football event.
I’m with you Perry in not liking most of the 50s American car designs, except for certain Big-3 2-door hardtops/convertibles in the 53-56 range. Those models were clean and powerful looking. I’m surprised this Nash is a ’56 it looks newer in its detailing though the uprightness says ’52.
The instrument panel with the simple design and meters in the center is a cool touch you would not expect from looking at the exterior.
The symmetrical dash appears to have been designed for ease in making right hand drive export or locally assembled versions. I can’t imagine there would have been many, considering the low production of the domestic version, although a photo of a RHD ’57 appears in Paul’s article on the ’57 linked above. Most British cars of the era seemed to have dashes that were similarly configured.
Good car, but chock full of bizarre styling clichés. Lexus, anyone?
Second photo, it looks like a Renault 4 is hiding in a 1965 Riviera. With a little bit of imagination of course.
HA! I laughed out loud and nearly lost a sip of my Manhattan. I definitely saw the Riviera in the fenders, but I didn’t see the 4 “hiding in plain sight” until your comment.
A most enjoyable revisiting of a long, lost presence on the road; even when they were on the road, there weren’t that many around. I appreciated the reference to “Googie” architecture and wondered how many readers thought it was a typo, intending to read “Google” instead.
Last time I saw a big Nash in the metal was at Sheparton Auto wreckers in Victoria OZ, I’d gone there to see if I could dispose of a very tired Mitsubishi for cash and there was a big Nash behind the fence in tidy condition tempting but where the hell would I find any parts.
Went back at the end of the week with a ride home sold said Sigma for $235(rapt way more than I expected) and the Nashes had multiplied there were two one green one silver grey side by side behind the fence for sale, er no thanks I’d already bought a 79 Holden Torana of dubious quality for $200 that ran and drove legally.
Interesting cars there at Shep, for sure. That place seems like a magnet for them. I once saw an EJ Holden 2 door sedan there, done correctly with lengthened doors. Apart from the bodywork it seemed stock. Weird!
” I’ll never understand the ostentation (’50s cars) embody alongside the very stark, minimalist architecture…”
This. The ’55 Chevy probably comes closest among mainstream Detroit iron, too bad GM couldn’t bring themselves to build it unchanged for at least 5 years or so.
Really, the annual redesigns of the era can have so much laid at its’ feet – even mighty GM couldn’t only build their good ideas, with five domestic car divisions needing a new look every year they had to build EVERY idea, the independents couldn’t keep up, and car design went through a silly season that no other form of design did at midcentury.
Hey Paul, How about this instead?
http://brainerd.craigslist.org/cto/4575401293.html
A 1957 Hudson…and only $900.
Umm; thanks, but no thanks. 🙂
Reverse CC Effect in action. I saw one of these parked in a driveway while out on an evening walk last weekend.
One of these days I’ll have to bring a camera on a walk – there are plenty of CCs here in suburban San Diego…
Awww, a Marlin and a Checker had a baby…
There is a green one in Mid-Michigan, that may well be the same car in Paul’s 2012 post. I was able to get some shots yesterday at a show in downtown Lansing.
The outboard quad headlights are definitely an improvement over the earlier design, and while I like the Nash skirted wheel look, the full openings on the ’57 are certainly more mainstream.
The rear is a bit busy, but really not any worse than most of the competition.
What really lets this design down is the side trim. The upper line is pretty good, integrating the door handles and ending as part of the taillights, but what happened with the lower line? Did somebody bump the drafting table? The zigzag part isn’t impossible, but the rear quarter that is just a solid rectangle of black is kind of lame.
Actually I think they came up with a pretty decent design for ’57. Unfortunately Nash got the front half, and Hudson got the rear.
Nearly identical to the 1956 Nash Statesman Super that I drove to college in 1975. I bought it from the stereotypical old lady and it had been parked since 1961 with only 18k miles on it but I sure had difficulties getting it to reliably run again! The only difference was mine did not have the continental kit and it had an inline six engine. Otherwise it was the same two tone mint green with white roof. After being assured they had a muffler, it spent an hour or two up on the rack of the muffler shop until they admitted defeat and put in a glass pack muffler, like a cherry bomb I think. They assured me it would “sound just fine” but at interstate speed it droned like a Cessna 150 at cruising speed. I also remember being ribbed about the placement of the headlights. One person commented that at night it looked like a jeep was coming due to the narrow space between the lights.
It got great mileage and I never got tired of the “what is THAT” question every time I parked. Ended up selling it a year later when it had about 25k miles on it through Hemmings to a guy in Chicago who, sadly, was going to use it up as a daily driver… -_-;
I’ve never been a fan of the styling of Nashes of this vintage—the overall shape, the close-set headlights, the tail lights. But the front parking light treatment on this one is especially grotesque.
Too bad it wasn’t parked so the photographer could get it against the backdrop of the Vancouver Public Library, but so be it.