Late 1930s Willys Cars

The Willys (English pronunciation: Will-iss) survived the Great Depression of the 1930s by going small, as I wrote here.

Model 77 had some advanced styling features when it was introduced in 1933, but its basic body was somewhat old-fashioned looking to begin with, and it aged rapidly as competitors launched rounded, streamline-suggestive designs.  So Willys fought back for the 1937 model year with its restyled model 37 on a still-short 100.5-inch (2553 mm) wheelbase.

Its styling was in keeping with the times, but compromises from standard-size American car fashion were required due to the car's small size.

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This is a 1937 Model 37 coupe.  Its rounded prow can be justified because a conventional (at the time) vertical or slightly backwards-leaning front would have made the car seem stubby indeed.

Advertisement image of a 1938 four-door sedan.

A Model 38 two-door sedan.  The rain gutter on this and the car in the previous image creates an awkward distraction from the aft window profile and fastback that are otherwise in harmony.  My guess is that the shape was needed on the four-door model because, had it followed the rear door cut, rain water might have poured into the back seat area when the door was opened.  Even so, a better gutter trace could have been found.

Just for fun, here is a publicity photo.

The Model 38 was retained for the 1939 model year, but the Overland line was added.  Its wheelbase was 102 inches (2591 mm), the small difference added forward of the cowling.

The prow became less rounded, more assertive.  The grille opening was lowered in tune with styling fashion.  Headlights and their housings have a mean, aggressive look.  Note how the headlight housing shapes echo the prow and grille basic forms.

Another publicity photo, this of an Overland posed next to the Henry Dreyfuss styled Broadway Limited locomotive.

The 1938 Graham "shark-nose" design.  It appeared a year later than the Willys 37, but its frontal styling might have influenced that of '39 Overlands.  (Shannons Melbourne Auction photo.)

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Failing Brands, Shared Body: Graham and Reo

What do you do if your automobile manufacturing company is at the lower end of the sales rank hierarchy while the country is in a Great Depression and overall car sales are about half of what they were in prosperous times.  One possibility is to reduce costs by sharing car body designs with a car maker in similar straits.  There are several cases of this happening in America and Europe, and the one featured here involved Graham-Paige and Reo for model years 1935 and 1936.

Information on Graham is here and that on Reo here.   As it happened, Graham-Paige ceased production in 1940 while Reo exited car business in 1936 to concentrate on trucks.

Like some other low-production car makers in those days, Graham and Reo sub-contracted many components of their cars to specialists, including bodies.   Staring in 1935 they each bought the same basic body from Hayes, with certain trim details customized for the sake of brand identity.

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One such "something about a Graham" was the body it shared with Reo.

Side view of a 1935 Graham.  Chrysler Airflow seating positioning hadn't trickled down to Hayes; note that the rear seat is above the rear axle as was the norm pre-Airflow.  The windshield is only slightly sloped back.  Perhaps the most advanced styling feature is the cautious fastback profile. This photo and the following one are from Lucky Collector Car Auctions.

Rear 3/4 view of the same car.  1935 was the model year that Pontiac introduced its famous Silver Streaks on its hood and grille.  Here the '35 Graham happens to have two sets of chromed streaks on its trunk lid.

This is an illustration of a 1935 Reo, so a few artistic liberties were probably taken to enhance appearance.  It does show that even fenders were shared with Graham.

Both brands had similar grille profiles and somewhat V'd front bumpers.  Differences include grille details, hood side vent designs and headlight mountings (on fenders for Graham, the sides of the radiator grille assembly for Reo).  Photo from the IMCDb web site, which explains the fuzzy quality of the image.

Graham for 1936.  The grille is a variation on the fashionable "fencer's mask" convex style.  Fenders were redesigned into more of a teardrop form, so the headlight attachments were moved to the car body.  An inexpensive cosmetic change was the detailing of the hood's side vents.

Same car from the rear.  Fastback slope was increased, so the aft side windows are much smaller than in 1935.  The trunk lid "streaks" are gone.  Photos from Niwot Auctions.

1936 Reos differ from Grahams mostly due lack of a fencer's mask grille.  Gone is the V'd front bumper.

Front of a for-sale '36 Reo showing its new pattern of grille bars, the vertical ones extending beyond the upper frame.

Rear of another for-sale Reo.  This has a bulged trunk that increases storage capacity, a common option in those days.  Chromed "steaks" that vanished from Grahams now appear here in simplified form.  This car has a divided back window like the '35 Graham shown above.  The 1936 Graham's backlight is not divided, but the window outlines are the same.

I include this Mecum Auctions photo of a 1937 Graham for completeness, as it represents the last version of that Hayes body.  The grille pattern has been simplified and the side hood vents restyled.  More costly changes are some fender reshaping and, especially, a new, V'd windshield.

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American Business Coupes

Wikipedia deals at some length here with the coupé (in America: coupe) body type.  A few lines of the link deal with the business coupe: "A coupé with no rear seat or a removable rear seat intended for traveling salespeople and other vendors who would be carrying their wares with them."

The American business coupe was part of the product mix for many brands from the late 1920s into the early 1950s.  Most were advertised as business coupes, but some coupes had more general names, yet could be used for business purposes.

The logic of using a coupe for traveling salesmen, consulting engineers and many other business activities requiring road travel was that coupes were: (1) usually inexpensive to buy; (2) had a usefully minimal seating capacity; and (3) had small cabins but also the long wheelbases of large-cabin cars so that there was room for a larger than normal trunk for carrying stuff.

Below are examples of this long-departed type of automobile body in chronological order.

Gallery

1929 Buick Master-Six Business Coupe
An early example.  The trunk is fairly small, so this body might also have had a rumble seat version.

1934 Hupmobile Aerodynamic Coupe
This is probably a rumble seat coupe.  I show it because of its very small cabin that seats two (or perhaps three in a pinch) and its long trunk area.  The rear-mounted spare tire would have made this an inconvenient business coupe because it would have interfered with loading.  A business coupe version would have been possible if the spare tire was repositioned.

1936 Oldsmobile Eight Business Coupe

1936 Buick Special Business Coupe
Two General Motors business coupes from mid-range marques.  I suppose these were offered for salesmen or business representatives requiring a more substantial image than that offered by entry-level brands.  The cars shown here used the same basic body.

1936 Packard One-Twenty Business Coupe
Another example of a mid-range business coupe.  Surprising, given that it was from the maker of luxury cars, but Packard had to enter a lesser market range in order to survive the Great Depression.

1937 Graham Cavalier Series 95 Business Coupe
A business coupe from a minor brand.  Note the illustration showing how the spare tire was stored, providing more convenient trunk space.

1939 Plymouth Business Coupe
A business coupe from Chrysler Corporation.  Like the Graham, it is a four-window coupe, something becoming common for business coupes by the late 1930s.

1939 Chevrolet Master Deluxe Business Coupe
This publicity photo shows a business coupe being loaded.

1939 Graham Combination Coupe
The text (click on the image to enlarge) mentions that a business version of this coupe was available.

1940 Chevrolet Master 85 Business Coupe
I include this brochure page image because it shows storage variations.

1941 Dodge Luxury Liner Deluxe Business Coupe
A nice example of a small cabin on a long-wheelbase car with the resulting large trunk.

1941 Oldsmobile Special Business Coupe
Yet another view of business coupe storage.

1949 Dodge Wayfarer Business Coupe
Business coupe production continued post- World War 2.  This one has Chrysler Corporation's redesigned postwar body style.

1951 Studebaker Champion Business Coupe - Mecum Auctions photo
Perhaps the flashiest business coupe of the lot, though that 1939 Graham comes close.  These small-cabin Studebakers have always fascinated me.

1950 Chevrolet Styline Business Coupe
Even General Motors continued business coupes into the early 1950s.

UPDATE: Further research shows that Chrysler Corporation's Plymouth brand offered business coupes as late as 1957.

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