(EXPANDED FROM 4/23/2021)
Once in a while a work of automotive history is smacked down by a critic who sanctimoniously points to alleged inaccuracies. Sometimes these kind of critiques are on target (if unduly indignant). However, at other times they can fall flat when suffering from their own factual problems.
Robert Ness’s (2017) comment in Curbside Classic illustrates the latter genre. He described Laurence Jones’s (2021) story on the 1962 Plymouth as “poorly informed,” replete with too much “Exner myth” and “bashing.” To back up his defense of Exner, Ness trotted out some fairly common talking points — but with an interesting twist.
Ness (2017) argued that Exner could not be blamed for the 1962 Plymouth because he was forced to shrink a full-sized design that looked much better. He stated that “Exner was in poor health back then and his associates created the downsized 1962s.” Ness implied that the 1963 reskinned models looked at least somewhat better because Exner’s “health improved.”
Was Exner’s ill health a key factor in 1962-63 styling?
Perhaps Ness has access to inside information, but my sense of the literature is that Exner’s health was not a major factor in how the 1962-63 models looked. For example, Exner’s biographer Peter Grist wrote that the designer’s family worried about how hard he worked on the 1962 models despite his fragile health (2007, pp. 124-125).
Exner apologists tend to blame a lack of time as the reason why the Plymouth’s styling looks like a last-minute nip and tuck of the big-car proposal that management had killed at the 11th hour (Katz, 1995; Godshall, 1992).
Management instead called for the Plymouth and Dodge to be downsized. I haven’t seen adequately discussed how the engineering department found the time for a pretty ambitious rethinking of the car’s mechanicals when the design team couldn’t do the same (go here for further discussion).
Perhaps Exner didn’t have the physical energy — and the motivation — to significantly redo a design that he had put so much effort into. That must have been a letdown, particularly when bean counters took away curved side glass, which was crucial to making the fuselage-like styling work well.
In addition, the main driver of the restyled 1963 models would appear to have been Chrysler’s new president, Lynn Townsend — not Exner. Townsend reportedly pressed for much more substantial sheetmetal changes than had initially been considered by design staff (Katz, 1995; Godshall, 1992).
Would the aborted big cars have done any better?
Styling is subjective, so Ness (2017) is entitled to his opinion that Exner’s proposed 1962 full-sized Plymouth Super Sport two-door hardtop “was a much better design” than the car actually produced. This seems to be a fairly popular opinion among former Chrysler designers (e.g., Godshall, 1996).
A direct comparison isn’t fair in a key respect. The Super Sport was given a unique — and quite sporty-looking — two-door hardtop greenhouse whereas the downsized hardtop was required to share a boxy roof with four-door sedans. This new approach, which presumably saved both development time and costs, apparently reflected a new corporate edict because the redesigned 1963 compacts and full-sized Chryslers followed suit.
Also see ‘1962-64 Plymouth: The odd case of prescience interruptus’
In general, the proposed big Plymouth had a relatively inoffensive design. However, it might have experienced a short shelf life because the rest of the industry was gravitating toward more angular and coke-bottle shapes.
More importantly, the proposed redesigns for the full-sized Dodge, Chrysler and Imperial were much more offbeat than the cars ultimately produced. If you didn’t like the shrunken 1962 Dodge, you may have liked even less the full-sized version. At least to my eyes, the Chrysler was uglier than the 1958 Edsel.
Ness appears to partly excuse Exner’s excesses by suggesting that many auto executives do not possess a “good eye” for styling. That’s a useful point. For example, we have discussed how George Romney let through some real whoppers, particularly in his early days as head of American Motors (go here). By the same token, Chrysler’s management bore ultimate responsibility for the increasingly bizarre designs the automaker produced in the late-50s and early-60s.
This is why it makes sense that Exner got fired. Townsend clearly wanted a head designer whose sensibility was more “commercial” than avant garde. Top executives are busy people, so why should they have to constantly worry about reining in their design department?
NOTES:
This article was originally posted on April 23, 2021 and expanded on June 10, 2024. Production figures were calculated from Gunnell (2002) and the auto editors of Consumer Guide (1993, 2006).
Share your reactions to this post with a comment below or a note to the editor.
RE:SOURCES
- Auto editors of Consumer Guide; 1993, 2006. Encyclopedia of American Cars. Publications International, Lincolnwood, IL.
- Godshall, Jeffrey I; 1992. “1962-64 Dodge: ‘The New Lean Breed.’” Collectible Automobile. Published October; accessed August 16, 2019.
- ——–; 1996. “Opportunity Knocked: The Super Sport Plymouth Could Have Made for 1962.” Collectible Automobile. Published December; accessed August 16, 2019.
- Grist, Peter; 2007. Virgil Exner, Visioneer. Veloce Publishing, Dorchester, England.
- Gunnell, John; 2002. Standard Catalog of American Cars, 1946-1975. Revised Fourth Ed. Krause Publications, Iola, WI.
- Jones, Laurence; 2021. “Curbside Classic: 1962 Plymouth Fury – If You Think This Is Bad…” Curbside Classic. Posted April 11; accessed March 11, 2021.
- Katz, John; 1995. “1962-64 Plymouth: Pivotal, Panic-Driven Mopars.” Collectible Automobile. Published April, pp. 57-69.
- Ness, Robert; 2017. Commentator in “Curbside Classic: 1962 Plymouth Fury – If You Think This Is Bad…” Curbside Classic. Posted 9:35 a.m., April 10; accessed March 11, 2021.
ADVERTISING & BROCHURES:
- oldcaradvertising.com: Plymouth (1962)
- oldcarbrochures.org: Dodge (1962, 1963); Plymouth (1962, 1963)
Now the 1961 Plymouth was one of the most bizarre design to ever grace 4 wheels (IMHO). In period I thought the 1962 Plymouth looked OK, not too weird and no fins. Yes, Virgil was a little out of control in the late ’50’s and GM and Ford cleaned their clock as a result.
I stand by my original post. Exner’s proposed non-downsized 1962 Plymouth was not perfect. It could have been “tweeked” a bit. For example the “widow’s peak” in the upper center of the grille should have been eliminated. But this original design was okay overall. Prior to production there is a good chance it would have been “tweeked”. If someone like Lee Iacocca had been around he could have guided the tweeks. I am convinced that many people don’t have a “designer’s eye”. Thus we have people who like the styling of the downsized 1962 Plymouth or the 1958 original Edsel. Well, you can shape an automobile many ways but not all shapes are equal. Some designs have at least minimal styling “harmony”. The Edsel was okay except for the Horse Collar grille. I don’t really know what went wrong prior to the building of the 1961 and downsized 1962 Plymouth. But Exner said he did not want to be held responsible for the downsized “plucked chickens” of 1962. Given the chance Exner would not have allowed them.
Robert, one basic challenge of defending the aborted big Plymouth is that it was a package deal — if Chrysler had gone through with the redesign, then the rest of the automaker’s brands would have needed to also switch to the new body. Although the Plymouth was relatively innocuous, the others were various shades of dreadful. And that couldn’t have been fixed with a few minor changes here and there. Chrysler management was right to pull the plug on what could have been a much more embarrassing sales disaster than what actually happened with the downsized 1962 Plymouth and Dodge.
There are stories of what was going on inside Chrysler Styling while Exner was out recuperating. The story goes that the senior Styling management was not expecting Exner to return, and certainly not when he did. This resulted in factions fighting over which one would be internally dominate so they would be the chosen successor. I would not discount that this level of in the studio turmoil did not affect the final product.
As a designer, not all designs translate at different scales. Sometimes the proportions just can’t resolve with too much or too little space to work with.
One should also give credence that Exner’s exit at Chrysler had far more about board room power politics than just this model year’s results. It has been described how Exner was really the odd man out when the battle was between people a couple layer above him.
The exit of Exner from Chrysler also coincided with Ford making the selection of Bordinat as the new head of Styling to replace the retiring George Walker. As Walker was not happy that his choice for successor (Engle) had lost out he engineered Engle’s move to Chrysler to replace Exner.
Unfortunately for Chrysler, it took until Tom Gale was VP for Chrysler to become a leader in design after Exner.
After the boardroom coup that saw William C. Newberg fired for conflict-of-interest allegations and L. L. “Tex” Colbert following Newberg out the door, Lynn Townsend had no choice but to fire Exner and find a designer / stylist with more conventional inclinations. Elwood Engel’s 1961 Lincoln made Engel’s move to Chrysler a slam-dunk. Townsend wanted new designs to turnaround the company and stop the flow of red ink. Engel’s fill-in-the-box designs were exactly what Chrysler needed, although the reimagined full-size cars wouldn’t arrive until the fall of 1964. An example of the bad times at Chrysler was the shrunken “big Valiant” 1963-1964 Chrysler: What had been a 126-inch wheelbase in 1960-1961-1962 became a 124-inch wheelbase car.