Between 1935 and 1956, the Packard Motor Car Company went from the top of the heap among American automotive brands to just another independent, struggling to survive on the scraps of the Big Three. This week, we take a look at the Packard Clipper, the “bathtub Packards” of the late 1940s, and how the once-great automaker lost its way. We also examine one of the company’s odder experiments, the 1948 Packard Station Sedan.

PACKARD CHANGES DIRECTION

At the start of the Great Depression, the Packard Motor Car Company was the default choice for American luxury car buyers. There were cars that were more expensive or more exotic, but Packard had an aura of blue-blooded respectability that no other domestic automaker could match. A big Packard was not a sign of material accomplishment so much as a badge of class status, bolstered by graceful but restrained styling, impeccable quality, and exacting engineering.

A Sixth Series (1929) Packard Custom Eight (640) 2/4-passenger roadster. The 640 was styled in-house by Werner Gubitz, but many of its design cues came from Ray Dietrich, who was a design consultant for Packard in this period. The Custom Eight was powered by a 385 cu. in. (6,306 cc) straight eight rated at 106 gross horsepower (79 kW).

The arrival of the Depression left Packard in an increasingly precarious position. While Packard’s old-money clientele were less affected by the economic collapse than were the middle class, even the very wealthy were becoming wary of displays of conspicuous affluence. Packard sales began to drop, leaving the company in the red.

President and chairman Alvan Macauley recognized that if it were to survive the decade, Packard would have to broaden its market. He promoted Max Gilman, the gruff, no-nonsense head of Packard’s New York distributor, to general manager and appointed former GM executive George T. Christopher as assistant vice president, responsible for overseeing the development of a new middle-class car, the One Twenty.

The One Twenty, launched in January 1935, brought Packard within the reach of upper-middle-class buyers for the first time. While far from cheap, it was priced to compete with Buick and handily undercut both Cadillac’s LaSalle “companion make” and the Lincoln Zephyr. The One Twenty was followed less than 18 months later by a new Packard Six, the marque’s first six-cylinder engine since 1928. Both the One Twenty and the Six were solid, high-quality cars, sharing the styling of the “senior” Packards on a slightly smaller scale. These “junior” Packards were a great success, making 1937 the company’s best-ever sales year. Of the 87,000-odd cars Packard built for the 1937 model year, about 95% were Sixes and One Twenties.

An Eleventh-Series (1934) Packard Twelve five-passenger coupe. It rides a 141.9-inch (3,604mm) wheelbase and is powered by a 446 cu. in. (7,300 cc) flathead V-12 with 160 gross horsepower (119 kW).

Macauley assured the press, public, and stockholders that Packard had no intention of abandoning the prestige market, but Gilman, who became president in April 1939, had other ideas. Gilman and Christopher saw the senior cars as inefficient and outmoded. They were expensive and labor intensive to produce — the Main Plant, where the senior models were built, had nearly as many workers as the newer plant that built the junior cars — and their sales were very low. Sales of the Packard Twelve hadn’t topped 1,000 units a year since 1933 and the Super Eight’s annual volume generally hovered below 3,000 units.

The era of the great hand-built Classics was ending in any case. Cadillac had dropped its own V-12 and V-16 models by the end of the 1940 model year, and many other high-end nameplates had already expired. The market for truly bespoke bodywork had all but vanished; the new trend was to factory-built luxury cars with off-the-rack prices. Although Packard still cataloged a few “factory customs” carrying names like LeBaron and Rollston, most were little more than expensive trim packages, analogous to the “designer editions” that AMC and other manufacturers launched in the seventies.

Packard’s slow-selling 12-cylinder cars were quietly dropped in 1939. When the Eighteenth Series bowed in 1940, the senior models were little more than stretched versions of the junior cars, differing mainly in interior appointments and hood length. Even their new designations — One-Sixty and One-Eighty — suggested their commonality with the middle-class One-Twenty and six-cylinder One-Ten. The result was higher volume, but a serious erosion of Packard’s old-money reputation.

Two Nineteenth-Series (1941) Packards: a six-cylinder One-Ten club coupe (top) and a One-Eighty Custom Super-8 LeBaron sedan. Other than the side mounts, trim, and the substantial wheelbase stretch — 138 inches (3,505 mm) for the One-Eighty, 122 inches (3,099 mm) for the One-Ten — they look very much alike, although the One-Eighty cost about five times as much as its junior brother.

PACKARD STYLING

Playing in the middle-class market demanded that Packard become more competitive in both engineering and styling. Previously, Packard’s central imperatives were continuity and attention to detail, not innovation or fashion. The marque’s typical customer was very conservative and tended to react poorly to anything too new or too flashy. Packard stylists therefore had to walk a narrow line, updating the company’s look just enough to stay current without alienating existing buyers.

Until the early thirties, Packard styling — known within the company as “body art” — was the purview of engineers and draftsmen, who generally borrowed designs — sometimes but not always under license — from independent coachbuilders. Ray Dietrich (of LeBaron and Murray) became a design consultant in 1926, but it was not until January 1932 that Packard established a real in-house styling department. Its director was Edward Macauley, the 32-year-old son of Alvan Macauley.

A Fourteenth Series (1936) Packard Twelve convertible coupe. From 1935 to 1936, Packard’s V-12 was stroked to 473 cu. in. (7,756 cc), making up to 180 gross horsepower (134 kW) with the optional high-compression heads. Production of the Twelve ended in August 1939.

By the rather reactionary standards of Detroit society, Ed Macauley was something of a playboy. He loved jazz, was a fair saxophone player, and was very fond of motorcycles and sports cars. He had no formal artistic training of any kind, but, like Edsel Ford, he was a good critic and a decent administrator. To his credit, he was well-liked by Packard designers, engineers, and workers, his warmth, conviviality, and lack of pretension helping to overcome the undisguised nepotism of his appointment.

Since Macauley was an administrator rather than a designer, the real creative force behind Packard design became chief stylist Werner Gubitz. Gubitz, a German immigrant who had joined Packard from Dietrich Inc. in 1927, was actually three years older than his boss, but Gubitz was a quiet introvert, quite different from the bon vivant Macauley. Gubitz’s early designs showed the strong influence of Ray Dietrich (and for a time Alexis de Sakhnoffsky, a Packard consultant in 1931–1932), but Gubitz’s own sensibilities became more apparent as the thirties wore on, gracefully evolving Packard’s traditional themes in carefully measured steps suiting the marque’s conservative character.

A Fourteenth-Series (1936) Packard One Twenty. In appearance, the One Twenty was essentially a slightly shrunken version of the senior Packards, riding a shorter, 120-inch (3,048mm) wheelbase. It was the first Packard with independent front suspension, dubbed Safe-T-fleX, and hydraulic brakes, which were added to the senior lines in 1937.

THE PACKARD CLIPPER

This cautious approach to styling advancement served Packard well until the arrival in 1938 of the Cadillac Sixty Special. Styled by Bill Mitchell, the Sixty Special was a high-priced fashion leader with many design features that were considered groundbreaking at the time. Despite the reservations of some Cadillac executives, who feared it would be too big a leap for the brand’s existing customers, the Sixty Special became a great commercial success and had a galvanic influence on the American luxury car market, demonstrating that luxury car buyers were far more fashion conscious than most automakers had believed.

The Sixty Special evidently made Max Gilman very nervous, as did his and sales chief Bill Packer’s awareness that GM planned an even more radical new look for 1941. In late 1938, Packard management ordered Ed Macauley to launch a crash program to develop a Packard rival for the Sixty Special.

Today, the Cadillac Sixty Special’s lines clearly mark it as a car of an earlier era, but in its day, its notchback profile, gently rounded beltline, and thin pillars were quite radical. This is a 1941 model, featuring the new “tombstone” grille that would become a Cadillac trademark.

Macauley’s team worked hard to develop a new styling theme, but none of their proposals was deemed satisfactory. Part of the problem was that the styling section was very small, with fewer than 10 employees, including Gubitz and Macauley. Gilman looked for outside help, first from Briggs (which would take over body manufacture for Packard in 1941) and then from the firms of George Walker (later VP of styling for Ford), Don Mortrude (better known for his work on Chris Craft boats), and Bill Flajole (who later designed the Nash Metropolitan).

Still not satisfied, Gilman put in a call to Hollywood-based designer Howard “Dutch” Darrin, who was already selling a modest number of customized “Packard Darrin” roadsters. In early 1940, Gilman offered Darrin $10,000 — a tidy sum in those days — if he could create both a viable design and a 1/4th-scale model in only 10 days. Darrin agreed, and a week and a half later turned over the hastily contrived model to Ed Macauley.

Darrin’s model, for which he always insisted he never received his promised fee, was extremely bold for Packard: long, low, and wide, with flowing fenders that curved back into the doors. It had no running boards and its beltline featured Dutch’s signature “Darrin dip.”

In 1937, Dutch Darrin began offering customized Packard Darrins based on the One Twenty chassis; staring in 1940, Packard offered a Darrin-styled factory model as well. Most were Convertible Victorias, although there were a few Convertible Sedans. All of the Darrin-styled cars were lowered, stripped of their running boards, and featured the designer’s signature “Darrin dip” in the doors.

Exactly how much the production model reflected Darrin’s concept remains a matter of controversy. Darrin inevitably claimed most of the credit, although Packard staff members said the finished design was primarily the work of in-house designer Howard Yeager, who skillfully amalgamated the best elements of the various proposals. The resultant design, dubbed “Packard Clipper,” was not as radical as was Darrin’s proposal — for example, Yeager concealed the running boards rather than omitting them — but it was heady stuff for Packard: sleek, streamlined, and thoroughly modern.

A magazine ad for the 1941 Packard Clipper. The quoted price is rather misleading; while the cheapest One-Ten business coupe started at $907 FOB Detroit, the Clipper actually started at a hefty $1,420. (Ad scan: “1941 Packard Clipper” courtesy Alden Jewell; used with permission)

Mechanically, the Clipper was based on the One-Twenty, but was priced between the One-Twenty and the One-Sixty, starting at $1,420. This was nearly 50% cheaper than the Sixty Special, which was one of the priciest models in the Cadillac line, but for once, the Packard gave away nothing to its rival in styling sophistication. The Clipper sold very well, accounting for about 25% of Packard’s total volume in 1941, and outsold the Sixty Special by four to one — not surprising given the vast price differential.

For 1942, Packard extended the Clipper’s styling to most of the line, save convertibles and some senior cars. The newly expanded line showed every sign of being a great success, but America’s entry into World War II ended civilian production in February 1942.

Darrin also built a modest number of Clipper-based Convertible Victorias based on the Packard One-Eighty chassis. Total production amounted to about 35 Victorias in 1941, 15 in 1942, plus perhaps a dozen Convertible Sedans. This is a postwar recreation, based on the later Super Clipper.

THE POSTWAR BOOM

Shortly after the cessation of civilian production, Max Gilman abruptly stepped down. His exit was officially due to poor health following a late-night car accident that January that had hospitalized him and his female passenger, but the real issue, so far as the Packard board was concerned, was that Gilman’s passenger was someone else’s wife. The appearance of impropriety was too much for Alvan Macauley and the board of directors, who demanded Gilman’s resignation and appointed George Christopher to take his place.

Packards of the Twenty-First Series (1946-1947) were nearly identical to the prewar 1942 Clippers, differing only in detail. This is a 1947 Custom Super Clipper, the top-of-the-line series. It’s 215.5 inches (5,474 mm) long on a 127-inch (3,226mm) wheelbase, weighing around 4,300 lb (1,950 kg) all up. Base price was $3,449, more than $250 more expensive than a contemporary Cadillac Sixty Special.

In personality and bearing, Christopher was an unlikely choice to lead a company like Packard. Unlike most Packard executives — who, Ed Macauley notwithstanding, tended to the patrician — Christopher spent his off hours working his cattle ranch and hog farm in Ohio or bowling with Packard workers as part of the factory bowling league. These were not simply cosmetic gestures toward Packard’s rank-and-file; we suspect that Christopher felt more at home with the linesmen than in a board room.

Given his blue-collar bearing, it was no great surprise that Christopher disdained the big Packards even more than Gilman had. While Christopher recognized that Packard still needed the senior cars to maintain its reputation, he had a very limited tolerance for extravagance or needless expense, so his support for the pricier models was at best grudging. His goal was maximum volume in the mid-priced field. In 1944, he declared that he would build 200,000 cars a year, more than double Packard’s best previous year. Even the chaos of the war’s end did not dampen his enthusiasm; shortly after V-J Day, Christopher boldly proclaimed that Packard would build 100,000 cars in 1946, 30% more than its 1941 volume.

The Packard Custom Super Clipper was powered by Packard’s 356 cu. in. (5,833 cc) straight eight with nine main bearings and 165 gross horsepower (123 kW). It’s not particularly powerful by modern standards — although 0-60 mph (0-97 km/h) in around 13 seconds and a top speed of perhaps 104 mph (167 km/h) were quite brisk in its day — but it’s among the smoothest engines ever built.

Packard had emerged from the war in good but not robust financial shape. Its wartime profits had been tightly constrained, but it was well-capitalized and free of debt. Better still, the end of the war brought a robust seller’s market. Customers hadn’t been able to buy new cars in more than three years and pent-up demand was tremendous.

Seeing that market, Christopher made one of his most controversial decisions. When civilian production resumed in September 1945, he chose to concentrate on the junior cars, including six-cylinder models and even taxicabs; the senior models didn’t reappear for another seven months. That created considerable friction with Packard dealers, who would have had little trouble selling as many top-of-the-line cars as they could get. Aside from whatever damage Christopher’s decision was doing to Packard’s prestige, it was costing dealers a great deal of money.

Dealers were even more annoyed when Packard’s actual production fell well short of Christopher’s wildly optimistic projections. Constrained by shortages of raw materials and strikes at key suppliers, Packard built only about 42,000 cars for the 1946 calendar year. Packard still managed to outsell Cadillac, which was struggling with similar problems, but it was not an auspicious start. Christopher responded by announcing a $20 million expansion program and launching an effort to build up Packard’s dealer network to support his 200,000-unit sales goal.

One hallmark of forties Packards was a high standard of interior materials, including luxurious and durable Mosstred carpeting. The wood paneling on the dash is synthetic, albeit very well executed.

THE BATHTUB PACKARDS: THE TWENTY-SECOND SERIES

Packard’s initial postwar cars, the Twenty-First Series, were basically the same as the prewar Clippers except in minor cosmetic details. Christopher was reluctant to invest in styling, so Gubitz’s already tiny staff was cut back further during the war. For the Twenty-Second Series, the company’s first postwar cars, Packard turned to Briggs, which was now building all Packard bodies. Briggs’ styling section was not huge — many of the designers formerly employed by Briggs’ LeBaron subsidiary had moved on — but it had better facilities than Packard did. Perhaps more importantly, from Christopher’s standpoint, Briggs offered styling services to existing clients as a value-added service — no extra charge.

The Twenty-Second Series was born of several contradictory impulses. Both Ed Macauley and Packard management were concerned that the Clipper would look dated after the war, but Christopher wanted to carry over as many of the existing dies as possible in the hopes of minimizing tooling costs.

The front-end treatment of the Twenty-Second Series, which attempts to translate the traditional Packard yoke grille into a more horizontal idiom, was based on ideas tested on Ed Macauley’s heavily customized personal car, “The Phantom,” which Packard employees nicknamed “The Brown Bomber.”

As a result, the Twenty-Second Series Packard emerged as essentially a bloated and rather corpulent Clipper. According to John Reinhart, who replaced the retiring Werner Gubitz as chief Packard stylist in 1947, it was contrived by Briggs chief stylist Al Prance and modeler Walt Bracher simply adding more material to the existing shell to visually integrate the body, fenders, and hood. That was the postwar trend, but the main effect, as with the 1949 Nash, was to make the new Packard look like an inverted bathtub. It was more modern, but hardly more attractive.

Christopher apparently liked the design, but few others within Packard agreed. Reinhardt also thought the Twenty-Second Series was a waste of money, which is hard to argue: Not only was the Twenty-Second Series uglier than the Twenty-First, the new model was significantly heavier and ended up costing almost as much to develop as Packard would have spent tooling for an all-new body.

The Twenty-Second Series Packard Super Eight used the short-wheelbase (120-inch/3,048mm) chassis, but the bigger 327 cu. in. (5,361 cc) straight eight with 145 horsepower (108 kW). A close look at its lines suggests its structural similarity to the outgoing Clipper, with the slab sides that earned the Twenty-Second Series its “bathtub” nickname.

In merchandising, at least, Christopher had learned from his earlier miscalculations. When the Twenty-Second Series debuted in July 1947, the upper-series convertibles were the first to appear, with the rest of the line following in early September. The Clipper name was dropped, replaced by prosaic Eight, Deluxe Eight, and Custom Eight designations. The six was now offered only on fleet and export cars; it had made sense in the late thirties, with the economy still reeling from the Depression, but in postwar America, it only served to drag the brand down. Nonetheless, the senior cars remained hard to distinguish from the cheaper junior models, which for obvious reasons went over poorly with owners of the more expensive versions.

THE 1948 PACKARD STATION SEDAN

The Twenty-Second Series also included a new wrinkle: Packard’s first postwar station wagon.

A prewar Packard station wagon, built by Cantrell and based on a Sixteen-Series (1938) Packard Six. Its 245 cu. in. (4,020 cc) six was rated at 100 gross horsepower (75 kW).

Commercial-bodied Packards were not new; a number of coachbuilders, notably Freeport, Illinois’s Henney, had built wagons, hearses, and even ambulances on Packard chassis for many years. Packard launched its first catalogued station wagon models midway through the 1937 model year. As was customary for woody station wagons, the bodies were built by outside coachbuilders: initially J.T. Cantrell & Co., later Hercules, which also built wagon bodies for Chevrolet. The market for Packard wagons, which were inevitably very expensive, was small and sales never amounted to more than a few hundred units a year. They were dropped before production ended in 1942 and they did not return after the war.

Like other Twenty-Second Series Eights, the Packard Station Sedan was 204.6 inches (5,197 mm) long on a 120-inch (3,048mm) wheelbase, powered by a 289 cu. in. (4,730 cc) straight eight making 130 horsepower (97 kW). Since the Station Sedan weighs almost as much as the bigger Custom Eight sedans and has 30 fewer horsepower (22 kW less), 0-60 mph (0-97 km/h) probably takes close to 20 seconds, with a top speed of perhaps 95 mph (153 km/h).

According to most sources, the new wagon was Ed Macauley’s idea, although it’s conceivable that it was suggested by the sales organization. Unlike previous wagons, the Station Sedan, as it was called, was built by Briggs, like other Packard bodies. It shared much of its inner structure with the standard Eight sedans along with their 289 cu. in. (4,730 cc) straight eights, although it was one of the most expensive models in the line — starting price was over $3,400, more than a Super Eight convertible. The price reflected the wagon’s high tooling costs; despite its commonality with the sedan, it required a new roof and rear quarter panels as well as the tailgate.

Twenty-Second Series Packards had independent front suspension and a live rear axle on leaf springs, although the latter also featured an unusual lateral locating strut; it connects the left side of the axle to the right frame rail, like a Panhard rod, but incorporates a hydraulic shock absorber rather than a plain steel rod. The springs and shocks were very soft, giving a smooth ride at the cost of soggy handling and copious body lean.

The rationale for the Station Sedan is unclear. The market wasn’t exactly crying out for high-end wagons; Buick’s Roadmaster station wagon, probably the Station Sedan’s closest direct rival, sold only 529 copies in 1947. The Station Sedan was arguably the most attractive of the Twenty-Second Series Packards — which may have been the point — but its cargo space was modest and the small tailgate limited its load-carrying versatility, reflecting the wagon’s sedan origins. Moreover, while it was steel-bodied in a structural sense, the Station Sedan was still a labor-intensive proposition for owners, requiring regular sanding, sealing, and varnishing to maintain the tailgate and side ribs. If the Station Sedan was indeed Ed Macauley’s idea, we suspect he suggested it more on aesthetic grounds than practical ones.

Station Sedan sales were modest, accounting for fewer than 4,000 units in 1948 and 1949 — less than 4% of Packard production — and it was dropped after 1950. Station wagons enjoyed a tremendous boom in the fifties, but the trend was toward all-steel wagons, with wood giving way to easier-to-maintain ersatz woodgrain.

The Station Sedan is not quite a woody — the door panels and window surrounds are synthetic, but the side ribs and the tailgate structure are real hardwood, which requires annual sanding and varnishing. Aside from being rather small, the tailgate has no drip rail, which made it more susceptible to leaks and led to interior rust problems. Note the license plate holder — it flips down when the tailgate is open, allowing the car to be driven (legally) with the gate open.

PACKARD STUMBLES

While the “bathtub Packards” were much derided in later years, they actually received a number of styling awards when they were new. The public was less enamored of the look, but when the Twenty-Second Series cars first appeared, it was still a seller’s market and people bought them anyway. Packard managed almost 99,000 sales for the 1948 calendar year and the company reported a healthy $15 million profit. It also outsold Cadillac by around 50%, in part because Cadillac’s all-new 1948 models didn’t arrive until the spring of 1948.

In March 1948, Alvan Macauley finally retired as chairman of the board. By the end, Macauley had become quite disgruntled with George Christopher. As proficient as Christopher was at manufacturing, his capacity in other areas was limited; his postwar track record suggested that he had little grasp of design, marketing, or product planning. Moreover, there was an obvious culture clash that only worsened with the passing years.

Dealers were also displeased with Christopher, holding him responsible for Packard’s failure to meet the oft-promised production goals and for the fact that Packard still didn’t have anything to match Cadillac’s popular Hydra-Matic transmission other than the troublesome Electromatic clutch. The production shortfalls were due in large part to steel shortages beyond Christopher’s control, but the latter issue was a direct reflection of Christopher’s reluctance to invest in R&D; production of Packard’s Ultramatic wasn’t approved until that spring, seven years after Cadillac had introduced automatic transmission.

The standard Packard Eight sedan was the mainstay of the Packard line, but by 1950, its sales were dropping precipitously. Comparing its profile with its GM contemporaries makes clear the reasons why. There are still vestiges of the lovely Clipper (note the curve of the C-pillars), but the sedans look decidedly ungainly; the 22nd and 23rd Series design works best as convertibles or wagons. (Photo: “50packard” © 2009 Cortcomp; resized and used under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported license)

By the end of his tenure, Macauley began looking for expedient ways to rid himself of Christopher, including a proposed merger with Nash that would have made George Mason Packard’s new president. In the spring of 1948, Macauley tried to recruit George Romney, then the head of the Automobile Manufacturers Association (AMA) headquarters in Detroit, offering him a seat on the board and a handsome salary of $50,000 a year to become Packard’s executive vice president. George Mason convinced Romney to join Nash instead, largely on the strength of Nash’s upcoming compact car, but if Romney had accepted Macauley’s offer, he would almost certainly have replaced Christopher within a few years.

The Twenty-Third Series (1949-1950) Packard had very few changes from the Twenty-Second Series and most modifications were cosmetic. The Super Eights now shared the longer body and most of the styling cues of the Custom, which caused sales of the latter to shrink noticeably. The Custom’s main distinction was now the nine-bearing, 356 cu. in. (5,833 cc) engine, which was discontinued after 1950. Despite its remarkable smoothness, it was expensive to build, heavy, and no longer substantially more powerful than the Super Eight’s 327 cu. in. (5,361 cc) engine. Packard later developed a nine-bearing version of the latter engine, which it used in senior cars through 1954.

The situation grew worse with the arrival of the Twenty-Third Series cars in May 1949, Packard’s 50th anniversary. The seller’s market was losing momentum and GM and Ford Motor Company had already begun to roll out their first true postwar designs. All Packard could boast was a year-old design that hadn’t exactly been a styling triumph to begin with. (In fairness, we’d be hard pressed to say the 1949 Lincolns were any more attractive, but they at least had the virtue of being new.) Packard now offered automatic transmission, but still couldn’t match GM’s flashy new hardtop coupes or Cadillac and Oldsmobile’s advanced OHV V8s. Packard’s well-proven straight eights actually gave away very little to the conservatively tuned early OHV engines, but it was a serious marketing problem, adding to the perception that Packard was falling behind the times.

Packards still sold well in 1949, but there were already signs of trouble. The arrival of the 1949 models left dealers with large stocks of unsold ’48s, prompting Christopher to ask the board for $2 million in dealer allowances to move the leftovers. The resulting price cuts on nearly new models had a chilling effect on resale values, something that would haunt Packard for the rest of its existence. Despite the allowances, some overextended dealers went under, shrinking Packard’s dealer body by about 500 franchises.

THE FALL OF GEORGE CHRISTOPHER

Packard outsold Cadillac by almost 20% in 1949, but it was for the last time. Although Packard ultimately posted a net profit of $5.3 million for the calendar year, ongoing problems with production and raw materials resulted in operating losses through much of the year. Sales for the 1950 model year declined sharply, as did Packard’s market share, which fell by more than 30% from 1948 to 1950.

By the spring of 1949, a bitter internal battle was taking shape over the design of the Twenty-Fourth Series. Christopher wanted to facelift the “bathtub” body for the 1951 model year, allowing another year to recoup its tooling costs. Aghast, some senior Packard executives went directly to the board to argue that another year with the bathtub cars would be a commercial disaster; engineering VP William Graves threatened to resign if Christopher didn’t authorize an all-new body for the Twenty-Fourth Series.

Revised and considerably gaudier tail lamps were another styling fillip of the Twenty-Third Series (except the Station Sedans, which retained the taillights of the Twenty-Second Series). Packards of this era are noteworthy as the last American cars to use glass, rather than plastic, taillight lenses.

Christopher finally conceded, ordering Ed Macauley and John Reinhart to develop a new car for launch in the fall of 1950. This capitulation did not improve Christopher’s internal popularity; in September, the Packard board named many of the executives who’d opposed him to a new advisory committee, which was explicitly authorized to bypass Christopher and advise the board directly.

At the insistence of the engineering staff, Reinhart’s Twenty-Fourth Series proposal, presented in September, was heavily influenced by Oldsmobile’s popular “Futuramic” Ninety-Eight and included Packard’s first pillarless hardtop, dubbed Mayfair. Christopher approved the design, but immediately found himself in a new sparring match with the advisory committee over tooling amortization schedules. The board sided with the committee, leaving Christopher understandably furious.

To no one’s great surprise, the board demanded Christopher’s resignation in an acrimonious special meeting about a week later. Christopher retained the presidency in a titular sense through December 31, but he had already been stripped of any meaningful authority. Operational control of the company fell to finance VP Hugh Ferry, who was promoted to executive vice president.

Packard’s famous pelican hood ornament was introduced in 1932. Influential dealer Earle C. Anthony said it looked more like a cormorant than a pelican and in 1938, the company’s advertising began describing it that way, although in the late forties, Packard management reasserted that it was indeed a pelican. After the war, it was one of four optional mascots; the others were the Egyptian, the Flying Wing, and the Goddess of Speed (popularly known as the “donut-pusher”). Adding any of the four cost an extra $10 or so on most Packard models.

Christopher, frustrated and angry, returned to his farm, where he died less than five years later. On January 1, Hugh Ferry became president of Packard in title as well as name.

AFTERMATH

The departure of George Christopher marked the end of an era for Packard. Fifteen years earlier, Alvan Macauley had looked to outsiders to transform both Packard’s operations and its audience. Now, the company was again in the hands of a longtime veteran; Hugh Ferry had joined Packard back in 1908. Nonetheless, the retrenchment was only temporary; Ferry made clear that he did not want the presidency and his leading priority would be to recruit a successor. The favored choice was another outsider, James Nance of Hotpoint, with whom Packard soon entered into a complicated two-year courtship.

Max Gilman and George Christopher have a checkered reputation among Packard fans, but in some respects, Gilman and Christopher were both successful and necessary for Packard. They presided over a complete modernization of the automaker’s production and accounting methods, without which Packard would undoubtedly not have survived the thirties. In effect, Gilman and Christopher had taught Packard to build high-quality cars to a price, which had never previously been a priority. Unfortunately, in the process, they had also stripped Packard of much of its former identity. By the late forties, Packard had gone from looking down on Cadillac to desperately chasing Oldsmobile and Buick.

The Twenty-Fourth Series (1951) Packards, the work of John Reinhart, had a much lower hood, slimmer fenders, and a better-realized horizontal grille than the Twenty-Third Series they replaced. This is the new top-of-the-line Patrician 400 sedan with a nine-bearing version of the 327 cu. in. (5,361 cc) straight eight.

Packard sold more than 100,000 of the all-new Twenty-Fourth Series cars, but while the new model was pleasant, it was conservative and ultimately derivative. Even Packard’s customary high-quality materials were being steadily downgraded in an effort to reduce costs. Worse, the brand’s move down-market had not attracted many new customers; by the early fifties, only 30% of buyers were first-time Packard customers. An extensive Booz Allen study done in early 1951 summarized the situation in painful detail: although Packard was still making money, it had become a dying brand.

20/20 HINDSIGHT

Many historians feel that Packard should have seized upon the postwar boom as an opportunity to reestablish the senior line. Given the production constraints the company faced at the end of the war, that probably would have been a wiser course — both Packard and Packard dealers would have been better off if more of the cars they built in 1945 and 1946 had been Custom Super Clippers rather than six-cylinder models.

Nonetheless, Christopher’s reasoning was not wholly illogical. The voracity of the market in those years took many automakers by surprise; even some GM execs feared another deep recession like the one that followed the end of the First World War. Furthermore, the high-end market was the first to be sated as the frenzy abated. Luxury car sales were already softening by 1948 and a “top-heavy” Packard lineup probably would have cut into the company’s overall volume, robbing it of the capital it needed for developments like Ultramatic.

Another common argument is that Packard should have established the junior cars as a separate marque. Packard apparently considered doing that in the late thirties, but decided not to because most newly established brands in the past decade had flopped. Jim Nance revisited the idea in the mid-fifties, briefly registering “Clipper” as a separate marque, but by then, it was really too late.

On the other hand, Mercedes-Benz has managed to maintain its snob value for decades despite applying the three-pointed star to an abundance of diesel taxicabs and down-market forays like the A-Class. The difference is that Mercedes has never deemphasized its high-end S-Class models. Instead, it uses the sales of the mass-market cars to fund the development of the S-Class as its styling and technology leaders and then allows those design cues to trickle down to the cheaper models.

Packard could have done the same thing, but neither Max Gilman nor George Christopher had any interest in doing so. Hugh Ferry and Jim Nance took steps to restore the balance, but by then, economic crises had drained Packard’s cash reserves, pushing the company into an ill-fated and ultimately terminal merger with Studebaker. That, however, is a story for another day (which you can read about by clicking here).

FIN

---

NOTES ON SOURCES

Our sources included Robert Ackerson, “1950 Packard DeLuxe Eight: The Last of Packard’s Postwar Pachyderms,” Special Interest Autos #64 (July-August 1981), reprinted in The Hemmings Motor News Book of Packards: driveReports from Special Interest Autos magazine, eds. Terry Ehrich and Richard Lentinello (Bennington, VT: Hemmings Motor New, 2001), pp. 58–65; the Auto Editors of Consumer Guide, “1937-1942 Packard Clipper” (31 October 2007, HowStuffWorks.com, auto.howstuffworks. com/ 1937-1942-packard-darrin.htm, accessed 24 April 2010); “1941-1947 Packard Clipper” (23 October 2007, HowStuffWorks.com, auto.howstuffworks. com/ 1941-1947-packard-clipper.htm, accessed 24 April 2010); “1948-1950 Packard Eight Station Sedan” (11 September 2007, HowStuffWorks.com, auto.howstuffworks. com/ 1948-1950-packard-eight-station-sedan.htm, accessed 24 April 2010); and Encyclopedia of American Cars: Over 65 Years of Automotive History (Lincolnwood, IL: Publications International, 1996); Arch Brown, “1937 Packard Six: A Packard for $795,” Special Interest Autos #67 (January-February 1982), reprinted in The Hemmings Motor News Book of Packards, pp. 34–41; Eduard Fischel and Johannes Thiry, assignors to Siemens Apparate and Maschinen Gesellschaft mit beschänkter Haftung, “Servomotor for the Remote Control of Aircraft,” U.S. Patent No. 2,179,179, filed 24 November 1937, issued 7 November 1939; “Golden Anniversary Packard Models,” The Motor 6 July 1949, reprinted in Packard Gold Portfolio 1946-1958, ed. R.M. Clarke (Cobham, England: Brooklands Books Ltd., ca. 1988), pp. 19–21; John Gunnell, ed., Standard Catalog of American Cars 1946-1975, Rev. 4th ed. (Iola, WI: Krause Publications, 2002); Dave Holls and Michael Lamm, A Century of Automotive Style: 100 Years of American Car Design (Stockton, CA: Lamm-Morada Publishing Co. Inc., 1997), pp. 217-228; Bob Johnstone, “Packard History – 1945-1984” (n.d., Bob’s Studebaker Resource and Information Portal, www.studebaker-info. org/ text3/pack-hist-1945.html, accessed 13 March 2010); John Katz, “Dazzling Darrin,” Special Interest Autos #188 (March-April 2002), pp. 32-37; George Hamlin and Dwight Heinmuller, “A Normally Tall Man Can Easily See Over It: The Clipper, The Nineteenth and Twentieth Series, 1941-1942” and “One Guess What Name It Bears: The Twenty-Second and the Twenty-Third Series 1948-1950,” Packard: A History of the Motor Car and the Company (Automobile Quarterly Magnificent Marque Books), Third Edition, ed. Beverly Rae Kimes (Princeton, NJ: Automobile Quarterly Publications (CBS Inc.), 1978); Michael Lamm, “Body by Briggs,” Special Interest Autos #19 (November-December 1973), reprinted in Hemmings Classic Car #44 (May 2008), pp. 62–67, and Hemmings Classic Car #45 (June 2008), pp. 56-62; and “1956 Packard Patrician,” Special Interest Autos #36 (September-October 1976), reprinted in The Hemmings Motor News Book of Packards, pp. 88–94; George Mattar, “1941 Packard One-Ten Deluxe,” Hemmings Classic Car #4 (January 2005), pp. 28–33, and “1948 Packard Station Sedan,” Hemmings Classic Car #12 (September 2005), pp. 50–55; Mark J. McCourt, “Dramatic Darrin,” Hemmings Classic Car #53 (February 2009), pp. 20–29; “Packard’s Ultramatic Drive,” Product Engineering July 1949, reprinted in Packard Gold Portfolio 1946-1958, pp. 22–24; Richard K. Phillips, “Into a New and Untried Middle Ground: The One Twenty, 1935-1936,” Packard: A History of the Motor Car and the Company; Jim Richardson, “A Taste of Opulence: The affordable beauty of Packard’s Model 120 sedan,” Special Interest Autos #196 (August 2003), pp. 24-29; Mark Theobald, “Hercules-Campbell Body Co.” and “J.T. Cantrell” (2004, Coachbuilt, www.coachbuilt. com, accessed 23 April 2010; James Arthur Ward, The Fall of the Packard Motor Car Company (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1995); Burt Weaver, “driveReport: 1941 Packard 6,” Special Interest Autos #11 (June-July 1972), pp. 44–49; Bill Williams, “1948 Packard Station Sedan,” Special Interest Autos #17 (June-July 1973), reprinted in The Hemmings Motor News Book of Packards, pp. 51–56, and “The Heraldic Packard: Company Hood Ornaments and Emblems,” Packard: A History of the Motor Car and the Company; Josiah Work, “Classic Fastback: 1947 Packard Custom Super Eight,” Special Interest Autos #144 (November-December 1994), reprinted in ibid, pp. 43–49, and “Packard’s Handsome Hybrid: 1951 Packard Series 250,” Special Interest Autos #84 (November-December 1984), reprinted in ibid, pp. 66–74; J. Patrick Wright, On a Clear Day You Can See General Motors: John Z. DeLorean’s Look Inside the Automotive Giant (Chicago, IL: Avon Books, 1980); and L. Morgan Yost, “The End of an Era: The Seventeenth Series — September 1938-August 1939, The Eighteenth Series — August 1939-September 1940, The Nineteenth Series — September 1940-August 1941, The Twentieth Series — August 1941-February 1942,” Packard: A History of the Motor Car and the Company.

We also consulted the following period road tests: Tom McCahill, “MI Tests the New Cars: Packard,” Mechanix Illustrated April 1946, “MI Tests the ’48 Packard,” Mechanix Illustrated January 1948, and “New Packard Takes McCahill for a Ride,” Mechanix Illustrated August 1949; “Comfort and Convenience — U.S. Style,” The Autocar 29 April 1949; and “Golden Anniversary Packard Models,” The Motor 6 July 1949), all of which are reprinted in Packard Gold Portfolio 1946-1958.

---

RELATED ARTICLES

• Charge of the Light Brigade: The Last Stand of the Packard Motor Car Company
• Fork-Tailed Devil: The P-38 Lightning and the Birth of Cadillac’s Famous Fins
• Lark and Super Lark: The Last Days of Studebaker
• Take Me to Your Style Leader: The 1938–1942 Cadillac Sixty Special
• The Once and Future Coupe: The Studebaker Hawk
• The People’s Packard: The Packard One-Twenty and How NOT to Build a Brand

---