To say the Gremlin was odd-looking is a bit of an understatement. It was after all, a polarizing proposal from beleaguered AMC, in need of calling for attention in any way it could. A “love it or hate it” design that did its job, finding enough love to be one of AMC’s best-selling models of the ’70s.
The Gremlin may have been a ‘funny’ car, but I’ve yet to come across snapshots of Hornet owners. Or Matadors. Or Pacers. AMC’s Gremlin was certainly quirky, but as can be seen, found much devotion from its owners.
Further reading:
Curbside Classic: 1977 AMC Gremlin – Purposely Contentious
Curbside Classic: AMC Gremlin – 1971 Small Car Comparison Number 6
Though the 1950s-60s photos here help me recall their era (childhood for me), I’d swear everyone pictured today is more or less my age. Perhaps some of these are “my/our first new car” (Wiki tells me production was 1970-79), though the last photo has sort of a “second owner” feel about it.
There were more Pintos and Vegas around then, but I saw plenty of these, too…..what fun!
I’ll take the cute girl in purple… oh and the car is cool too!
Many kinds of stripes.
I knew several Gremlin owners and we had them in the City Hall Fleet, good if weird cars .
-Nate
Gremlins were an affordable car that didnt scream tinny, tiny, and cheap so people were proud of their cars!
I like the lady in the mauve and purple outfit who is smiling in front of her Gremlin. AS for the dog, he has no license to drive!
The girl in the orange skirt appears to be levitating without legs. Since she has a Wednesday Addams vibe about her, it fits!
As for the Gremlin – it was a shortened Hornet IIRC. Since the Hornet was a decent car, I assume the Gremlin was too. Weird name for a car though, since Gremlins were supposed to sabotage machinery. I can’t read that name without thinking of the Twilight Zone classic The Terror at 20,000 Feet with a young William Shatner. One of the single scariest things I’ve ever seen on TV or the movies; ever.
You’re right about Wednesday Addams!
Good catch on Wednesday Addams. The Gremlin actually belonged to Cousin It but he let her use it to visit Eddie Munster.
Left out the 2 AMC Gremlins featured in the Simpsons. Marge had a red Gremlin. Hans Moleman had a green Gremlin.
I like the orange one. Then again, I’m of the mind that nearly any vehicle from the 70s looks better in orange.
The dog looks a bit embarrassed.
The semester I took driver’s ed in high school (spring 1977?) we started out the semester with a fleet of AMCs. There were several Gremlins, a Pacer, and a couple of 4 door Hornets. Those all were traded in (lease ended I guess) for Buicks and Chevys during the semester, which was what I finished Driver’s Ed driving. But the AMCs were fun and wacky, although even as 15 year old driver’s ed students we were hard pressed to take them seriously.
In retrospect, it seems weird that the school district would ever have wound up with 2-door cars as driver’s ed vehicles.
I love the juxtaposition of the two photos – the orange Gremlin X and the periwinkle blue one right below. In the lower photo, she is far too cool for the car (and seems to know it, but is cool with that). The orange car, however, is far too cool for its owner (who has no clue).
That periwinkle blue Gremlin reminds me of my law school roommate. His father worked at the U.S. Steel mill at Gary, Indiana. His go-to-work car for several years was a periwinkle blue Gremlin. The idea of a steelworker in a Gremlin (especially in that color) always seemed like an odd combination.
The orange one reminds me of a picture my parents have of 3 year old me washing the rims (same as rims as pic 5, btw) on theirs. That’s all i know of the one they had, which they traded in for a 77 Pacer Wagon.
I think the Gremlin was AMC’s final real hit with a passenger car. I remember seeing lots of them around, and they were not just bought by AMC loyalists, but by many others who couldn’t find anything comparable in the showroom of their favored brand.
I always found the Gremlin in “X” trim to be a really cool little car. It was a little dorky too, but a kind of cool dorky (if that makes any sense). Even today, I could see owning a Gremlin X if it had a 304 under the hood – one of the few AMC cars that I really took a shine to.
I’d say the closest equivalents to “cool dorky” lately would be the Honda Element, Nissan Cube, and (sorry PN) Scion xB. I don’t think its a coincidence I love all those cars and I loved the Gremlin growing up (moms best friend had one.)
The Gremlin really was AMC’S best shot at a Duster/Nova competitor, although it was sawed off to be sized more like a Vega. The Hornet 2 door sedan was stodgy looking and not popular like the Nova, Duster, and Maverick compact coupes. If you add Gremlin numbers, the total 2 door Hornet/Gremlin sales were several times the 4 door sales, like other lines of compact cars. The Gremlin was only about $50 less than a similar Hornet.
I don’t believe that AMC set out to build a weird car. They were just doing what they could with their limited resources. But once they realized that the public saw it as weird-looking, AMC did the smart thing and chose to embrace the weirdness rather than downplay it.
Of course, the Gremlin wasn’t the first weird car, but I think I could make an argument that it was the first American mass-market car whose manufacturer openly embraced the idea.
And there will always be people who are weird, or want to be perceived that way, perhaps including some of the people in these photos.
I was fascinated by the Gremlin from day one as a kid. Neighbors purchased a new one in white with the red hockey stripe. Real neat. Maybe that’s why I recently picked an Aztek as my current daily driver. Once a dork, always a dork!
Why is the dog is the only one that looks ashamed?
When the AMC Spirit came out for the 1979 model year, I thought it ‘corrected’ the Gremlin’s major styling problem, even if it did reduce the interior space a bit. I always believed the Gremlin would have sold better if it had the Spirit’s roofline from the beginning. Nonetheless, the Gremlin did sell well for an AMC product.
The Gremlin sold very well for an AMC. People who wanted normal could buy a Hornet, and mostly didn’t.
The VP of a small Consulting Co. I worked for in California had one. He always mentioned the “interesting” handling; given the horrible FRONT weight bias they had! He always carried 2 heavy sand bags in the rear to somewhat help compensate for that problem…….which on rain swept streets in the L.A. area became quite dangerous with 4 drum brakes and no ABS.
Even my ’56 Chevy 150 coupe was better handling than a stock Gremlin. OTOH, a creative design that allowed a cash strapped Company to have the first U.S. subcompact on the market by a little bit!! 🙂 DFO
Apparently Gremlin’s and bell bottoms go together. My recollection is these were road raced in the 70s, but the lighter and better balanced 4 cylnder Pintos ran away from them.
People started roadracing Gremlins in the late ‘70’s and depending on the class they were very competitive. When I raced SCCA Showroom Stock, I don’t remember if they used the 232 or 258 engine, but compared to the 1500-1600 cc engines of most cars in Showroom Stock C, the Gremlin had tons of torque and acceleration out of tight turns. And their 205-70-14 tires (X package) had a lot more grip than the competition’s 155 or 165-13’s. At least on the west coast, the 2300cc Pinto wasn’t popular though I suspect they had more Gremlin-like attributes than the FWD Rabbits, Fiestas and Colts that were popular here. Once the 1500 X1/9 was eligible it spelled the end for most of the econoboxes.
I love all of these photographs. The third photo with the young lady next to the lavender Gremlin shows these cars could have a certain panache. Or maybe she just makes it look that good.
Both.
I saw someone just yesterday (so, this would be the CC-effect, sartorial division?) wearing pants like that.
Thank goodness huge bell bottoms are coming back! I didn’t save all of those pants for nothing.
I wore bell bottoms in Vegas last week and was actually a little shocked by all of the genuine compliments they got.
I have to admit the Gremlin was not the first thing I noticed in the third photo (the gal in purple & mauve was).
There’s even purple in the car’s stripes.
This was not a good era for colour blind people like me. I cannot distinguish purple from blue. Purple and its variations seem to have been popular.
Really like the color of the car in the “lead pic”.
That one with the “cool dude” and the orange Gremlin is begging to be turned into a very NSFW internet meme. (I don’t want to bring the level of discourse down here but “**** Destroyer” was a popular one for a while.)
I did not know many people who had Gremlins, but in the early 80s an acquaintance had one that was badly rusted, but always seemed to run well. This was in Toronto so the rust was not uncommon, but there were large holes in the top of the fenders, so he covered them with duct tape to keep the spray off the windshield on slushy days. This guy had eclectic taste. He also had a beautiful 1964 Galaxie convertible and an Austin Healy 3000. I had several rides in the Ford, but I never saw the Healy. It might not have been roadworthy.
These were a much better choice than the Pintos, Vegas, Beetles and some of the Japanese cars available at the time.
The mechanics were solid and they were more relaxed on highway than most other cars under $2500.. It is true that they rusted, but that was common with cars selling for several times the cost of the Gremlin..
I may be prejudiced as I have a soft spot for AMC and Kenosha.
John ;
Those who “got” AMC products tended to be very loyal and had good results .
They were just appliances to me, some looked really good most were lackluster in looks and all had terrible slow steering with far too many turns lock to lock to be driven quickly much less fast .
-Nate
Chic sitting on the “primer” hood…looks like she was about to or already did pull her top up for the photo…😆
Good caption for the pic with the dog: “No, you cannot drive. You remember what happened last time!” I was a young man then. Any and all of those young woman could be an amalgam of the gals I may have known. Oh,to live it again!
I had a ‘ 74 still miss it
I’m 72 years old and my first brand new car was a 1972 Gremlin. I loved that car so and think about it every day. I swore by AMC that my best friend bought an AMX with the monster V8 under the hood. When I got married and had kids it was time to retire my first love and buy a Hornet Sportabout Wagon.. I still have the original bill of sale sealed in plastic with the AMC logo bright as day. This was handwritten back then. I really miss American Motors
Andy Barsky
One common denominator among these shots. Every driver is proud of his car and even the dog is!
Some of those cars came with av8 and they would hook up good to one was the Levi package
My first vehicle… 1973 in 1979…
That red 1973 Gremlin in the first photo is the exact twin of the car my father bought as a one-year-old used car in late 1974. I learned to drive in that car.
It was also the worst car I and my parents have ever owned. It would be easier to list the things that didn’t break on that car before it was finally junked in 1984 with 96,000 miles on the odometer.