As we have seen, the first four-seat Ford Thunderbird, launched in 1958, revealed a lucrative market for stylish "personal cars," aimed at buyers looking for something with more dash and distinction than a normal sedan or coupe. Mechanically, the "Square Bird" was unexceptional, but it struck a chord, and many affluent buyers clutched the new T-Bird to their collective breasts.


The 1963 Riviera was based on a design by stylist Ned Nickles, although the sharp-edged roofline was suggested by a Hooper-bodied Rolls-Royce that GM styling VP Bill Mitchell once saw through a London fog. Bill Mitchell later told historian Dave Crippen that the original Riviera was one of his favorite designs.

Given the Thunderbird's great popularity, it took GM and Chrysler a surprisingly long time to respond. GM had dabbled with personal cars back in the early fifties, with the Buick Skylark, Oldsmobile Fiesta, and early Cadillac Eldorado, but those were limited-edition image builders, and they were far less profitable than the Thunderbird. The early sixties had brought a number of dressed-up versions of standard bodies, like the Oldsmobile Starfire and the first Pontiac Grand Prix, but GM's first direct response to the T-Bird was the 1963-1965 Buick Riviera. Swift, elegant, and reasonably agile for a big American car, the Riviera made a credible effort to blend luxury and genuine sporting flair. Although it failed to outsell the Thunderbird, the Riviera accounted for over 100,000 sales in three years, enough to earn it a permanent place in the Buick line-up.

As is often the case with both cars and people, as the Riviera aged, it began to show signs of middle-age spread. The 1966-1967 model, designed by Buick chief stylist Dave Holls, was still quite sporty-looking, but it was bigger in every dimension. By the 1970 model year, though, greater weight, softer suspension tuning, and fussy, conservative touches like rear fender skirts were starting to give the Riviera a matronly air.

Bill Mitchell had a different direction in mind for the next-generation Riviera, slated for the 1971 model year. Mitchell, who had begun his GM career in 1935, was fond of the rakish "boat-tail" speedsters of the twenties and thirties, cars like the elegant Auburn Speedster. Those themes had previously appeared on the designs that became the 1963 Corvette Sting Ray; now, Mitchell wanted to apply them to the Riviera.


A 1935 Auburn 851 Boattail Speedster. (Photo © 2007 Luc106; released to the public domain by the photographer)


A 1965 Chevy Corvette Sting Ray. (Photo © 2005 Stephen Foskett; edited 2008/2011 by the author and used and distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike 3.0 license)


The tail of a 1972 "boat-tail" Rivera. If you look closely, you'll see that there's a stress line down the center of the backlight, to keep the glass from snapping as the body flexes over bumps -- or when it was originally installed in the car. Stylist John Houlihan, who was involved with the design of the boat-tail Riviera, said the backlight was a major manufacturing challenge.

As with most of the cars developed during his tenure as VP of styling, Mitchell set the tone for the new Riviera, but he did not design it himself. According to former Buick stylist John Houlihan, the initial concept came from designer Don DaHarsh, working in Mitchell's "Studio X." A 3/8th-scale model of DaHarsh's concept passed to the Buick Advanced studio, then led by Gerald Hirshberg (later head of design for Nissan). Hirshberg and his team refined the concept further, with considerable input from Mitchell, eventually producing a full-size clay model with a Sting Ray-like boat-tail and a prominent V windshield. We've never seen a photo of that model, but it was apparently quite striking; John Houlihan described it as "spectacular," although he admitted it was not to every taste. The production car it spawned would be even more controversial.

If it had been up to Bill Mitchell and the Buick designers, the new Riviera would have been considerably smaller than the outgoing model, which by 1970 was up to 215.5 inches (5,474 mm) overall on a 119-inch (3,023-mm) wheelbase, weighing nearly 4,700 lb (2,130 kg). Jerry Hirshberg told authors Terry Dunham and Larry Gustin that the boat-tail was originally intended for the A-body platform of the Buick Special/Skylark intermediate line, which was some 14.8 inches (376 mm) shorter and roughly half a ton lighter than the Riviera. Pontiac had just "downsized" its Grand Prix coupe in a similar manner, switching it from the full-size B-body platform of the Pontiac Catalina to a modified version of the A-body Tempest/Le Mans platform. John Houlihan told writer Ray Stout that the boat-tail Riviera was originally slated to be somewhat bigger than the Skylark, which leads us to wonder if it was intended as another "A-Special" like the Grand Prix or 1970 Chevrolet Monte Carlo, combining the body shell of the two-door A-body with the four-door's longer wheelbase to produce a close-coupled hardtop with a heroically long hood. We don't know if that was the plan, but it would have been an interesting approach.

Unfortunately, cost considerations intruded. By Detroit standards, the sales volume of specialty cars like the Riviera was modest; they made far more business sense if they shared tooling with other models, which was why the 1966-1970 Riviera had shared the corporate E-body shell with the contemporary Oldsmobile Toronado and Cadillac Eldorado. John Houlihan's description suggests that, as originally designed, the boat-tail Riviera's commonality with the Skylark would have been limited, requiring a lot of new stampings and entirely new glass. That was a sharp contrast with the Grand Prix and Monte Carlo, which shared a surprising number of body panels with the mundane Le Mans and Chevelle hardtops, and it would have made the boat-tail expensive to build. To minimize production costs, GM president Ed Cole ordered the boat-tail redesigned to share the chassis and inner body stampings of the full-size (B-body) Buick LeSabre and Centurion, along with their conventional windshield and side windows; John Houlihan said the only new glass Cole was willing to authorize was the dramatic curved backlight.


The boat-tail Riviera was at least a foot (305 mm) longer and about three inches (76 mm) wider than Jerry Hirshberg and Bill Mitchell originally intended. Mitchell said he was particularly bothered by the greater width, but stylist John Houlihan felt the most unfortunate change was the use of the windshield and side windows of the B-body LeSabre/Centurion. We tend to agree; from some angles, the side windows don't seem to quite match the overall proportions. More successful are the chromed steel wheels, a popular option on Buicks of this vintage, priced at around $70.

Ed Cole and Bill Mitchell had had a similar argument back in 1962 about stylist Dave North's "Flame Red Car," which became the 1966 Toronado. There, too, Mitchell had wanted to use the A-body platform, but Cole and then-president Jack Gordon had insisted on the larger E-body shell of the 1966 Riviera. While North's design had translated surprisingly well to the larger dimensions, the boat-tail was not so lucky, losing much of its original dynamism in the process. The Buick design team made the best of it, but Jerry Hirshberg said later that it was a very unhappy experience.

The designers' discomfort was compounded when Buick management saw the results. Bob Kessler, who had been Buick's general manager during the boat-tail's development, had apparently liked both the original concept and the final product, but his successor, Lee Mays, did not. Mays had previously been the general sales manager of Chevrolet, he had been promoted to run Buick in April 1969, after butting heads with newly appointed Chevrolet general manager John DeLorean. Mays apparently had little regard for specialty cars in general (stylist Dave Holls said Mays had disdained the original Chevrolet Monte Carlo on concept), and he strongly disliked the new Riviera. According to John Houlihan, the boat-tail was the subject of some very contentious exchanges between Mays and Bill Mitchell.

In later conversations with author Terry Dunham and Larry Gustin, Mays reiterated his displeasure with the boat-tail, claiming that even the designers were unwilling to take responsibility for it. That wasn't true, but by their own accounts, few of those involved with the design were particularly satisfied with how it turned out -- Bill Mitchell called it "a tugboat." There was little to be done about it in the short term; the new model was too close to production for any substantial changes.

THE BIGGER BOAT-TAIL

As it finally emerged in the fall of 1970, the 1971 Riviera was not only larger than intended, it was actually bigger than its predecessor. Overall length was up to 217.4 inches (5,522 mm), the wheelbase to 122 inches (3,099 mm), and overall width from 78.1 to 79.9 inches (1,984 to 2,030 mm). Curb weight rose by about 110 lb (55 kg). The Riviera was about three inches (76 mm) shorter than the Centurion with which it shared some of its structure, but it was definitely a full-size car.

As before, the standard engine was Buick's 455 cu. in. (7.5 L) V8, introduced the previous year. Aa lower compression ratio reduced its output to 315 gross horsepower (235 kW), down from 370 hp (276 kW) in 1970; the optional Gran Sport package included a different camshaft, giving 330 gross horsepower (246 kW). In the new SAE net rating system, which GM was starting to phase in, Buick quoted a lower but more realistic 255 net horsepower (190 kW) for the standard engine, 265 hp (198 kW) for the GS. The sole transmission was again the ubiquitous three-speed Turbo Hydramatic.

Previous Rivieras had used a self-supporting cruciform frame -- one of the last in Detroit -- but the '71 now had a full-length perimeter frame and a new four-link rear suspension, similar in principle to the one used by the new Eldorado and Toronado. Front disc brakes, previously optional, were now standard.

Although Buick didn't offer the rear anti-lock braking system available on Eldorados and Toronados, the Riviera boasted a different technical novelty: an early electronic traction control system, dubbed "Max Trac." The Max Trac system, which initially listed for $91.57, used wheel and driveshaft sensors to detect rear wheelspin, and then retarded the engine's ignition timing to reduce power. Testers found it helpful on slippery surfaces, although they were dubious about its benefit on dry pavement; it could be deactivated with a dashboard switch. Max Trac was apparently not very popular, and it was dropped after 1974. (Authors Terry Dunham and Lawrence Gustin suggest that the real reason for its cancelation was that its ignition retardation conflicted with federal emissions rules. Given the proliferation of conceptually similar traction control devices on modern cars, we're skeptical about that, but we can see that it may have made EPA certification problematic, in the absence of electronic fuel injection and computerized engine controls.)


We believe the photo car is actually a 1972 model, but it has the front bumper and grille of a '73 Riviera; the '72 had an eggcrate grille and a smaller bumper with under-bumper parking lamps. There was little mechanical difference between the two.

Despite its greater bulk, the Riviera was still fairly athletic for a personal luxury car. The enthusiast press inevitably favored the optional Gran Sport package, which had slightly more power, a shorter (higher numerical) axle ratio, a firmer suspension, and fast-ratio steering, but Motor Trend's Jim Brokaw found the base suspension quite satisfactory, with a reasonably firm ride and decent cornering response. Even with the GS package, the Riviera wasn't exactly agile, but compared to most contemporary luxury cars, its road manners were among the first rank, providing good handling and a comfortable highway ride.

The new Riviera was really too heavy for Supercar performance, but it was brisk enough. In November 1970, Road Test's Riviera GS ran the standing quarter mile (402 m) in 15.9 seconds, with a trap speed of 88 mph 142 kph); a month later, Motor Trend clocked the standard Riviera from 0-60 mph (0-97 kph) in a bit over eight seconds, quicker than either the 1971 Thunderbird or the '71 Toronado. Top speed was not recorded, but it was probably over 120 mph (193 kph). Testers also found the Riviera's stopping power satisfactory, recording shorter stopping distances than its principal rivals, without the nose-heavy Toronado's penchant for rear lockup.

Press response to the boat-tail Riviera was cautious. Reviewers admitted it was a love-it-or-hate-it design, but they carefully avoided offering any judgment, although Road Test had a few choice words about rear visibility and the potential to wreak havoc in parallel parking situations. Public response was similarly guarded. The new Riviera was hardly a commercial disaster, but first-year sales were down about 10% from 1970, which had been a facelift of a five-year-old body. A price hike of close to $400 probably didn't help, although buyers in this class were less price-sensitive than most; a lot of personal luxury cars were ordered fully loaded, which took the Riviera's tab to around $7,500. Production of the 1971 models was also affected by the lengthy UAW strike in the fall of 1970, but Riviera sales remained almost unchanged for 1972 and 1973, while the Eldorado and Toronado posted significant gains. The Riviera had previously been the best seller of the trio, but it had now fallen behind its Oldsmobile and Cadillac rivals.

The 1972 Riviera had only modest changes, including a new grille and the deletion of the ventilation louvers on the rear deck; both engines were down about 5 hp (3 kW). There were more extensive changes the following year, reflecting new federal safety standards and Lee Mays' dislike of the original design. The former brought a stout new 5-mph (8-kph) bumper up front; the latter resulted in a reshaped tail that deemphasized the boat-tail "stinger."


From this angle you can see the exaggerated length of the 5-mph (8-kph) bumper. This car is missing the standard bumper guards -- if you look closely at the front edge of the bumper, you can see their attachment points. The 1973 Riviera offered a stand-up hood ornament, which this car does not have.

The new bumpers made the '73 Riviera six inches (152 mm) longer than the '71, and significantly heavier: curb weight now topped 5,000 lb (2,290 kg). The Gran Sport package remained available, but it no longer included the more-powerful engine, which was now a standalone option, dubbed "Stage 1," like Buick's hottest intermediate Gran Sports. Buick managed to hold the line on engine power, despite stricter EPA standards, but emissions controls were beginning to affect driveability and fuel economy. Cars' February 1973 test of a GS Stage 1 model recorded 0-60 mph (0-97 kph) times of just over nine seconds, but found that fuel economy could drop as low as 5 mpg (47 L/100 km) in vigorous driving.

AFTERMATH

Although Lee Mays retired shortly after the 1973 Riviera went on sale, his influence probably contributed to the boat-tail's short lifespan. The 1974 Riviera was not yet all new, but the curved backlight and boat-tail stinger were gone, replaced with a sharp-edged new roofline with angular rear quarter windows, reminiscent of the intermediate Colonnade coupes. A new 5-mph (8-kph) rear bumper brought overall length to a daunting 226.4 inches (5,751 mm) -- longer than the big Buick Electra 225 of a decade earlier -- while the standard engine fell to 230 net horsepower (172 kW).

If Buick had hoped a more conservative look would boost Riviera sales, they were to be sorely disappointed. The OPEC oil embargo that began shortly after the '74 Riviera's introduction undoubtedly played a part in its dismal sales, which dropped from over 33,000 the previous year to just over 20,000. Nevertheless, it appears that buyers found little to love about the new styling; the '74 Toronado outsold the Riviera by more than 30%, the much more expensive Eldorado by two to one. Even after buyers began to return to big cars in 1975-1976, Riviera sales remained low. The boat-tail may have been a polarizing design, but it had given the Riviera a clear-cut identity; the 1974-1976 models sacrificed much of that image, without offering a coherent new theme to replace it.

The Riviera underwent several subsequent redesigns: it was downsized with the rest of Buick's B-body cars in 1977, and in 1979, it returned to the corporate E-body and adopted front-wheel drive, like its Eldorado and Toronado siblings. The FWD Riviera was quite successful through 1985, but a further downsizing for 1986 once again sent sales plummeting. After a brief hiatus in the early nineties, the Riviera received a stylish redesign for 1995, but by then, the growing popularity of SUVs had largely decimated the coupe market. The Riviera expired for good in 1999. Buick has shown a number of styling studies for future Rivieras, but as of this writing, there has been no word of a new production model.

The boat-tail Riviera has been much maligned over the years, although it has a certain following. We can understand why the designers who worked on it (or saw the original concept) might consider it a disappointment, but we find it rather appealing. It doesn't quite gel -- the nose seems mundane compared to the dramatic tail -- and it works better from some angles than others, but it's fascinating to look at, and we think it holds up better than some more popular contemporary designs, like the Lincoln Mark IV.


John Houlihan said the Riviera's side sweep, similar to that of fifties Buicks, was another touch dictated by Bill Mitchell himself; it certainly adds drama to the rear three-quarter angle. Although the front clip of the photo car is from a '73 Riviera, the shape of the rear bumper and taillights (and the lack of decklid louvers) are definitely those of a '72. The '73s had a less peaked tail, with the the tail lamps integrated into the bumper, rather than above it.

Not having seen the original clay model, we can't comment on how on the Riviera might have looked, had it followed the initial concept. However, even if the production boat-tail was not the classic beauty Bill Mitchell and Jerry Hirshberg intended, we think it stands as an interesting bridge between the sporty themes of the sixties and the rococo formality that characterized luxury cars of the seventies. We also admire its share flamboyance -- subtle, it was not, but it still turns heads, just as it did almost 40 years ago.

Polish Buick enthusiast George Przygoda has (with our permission) translated this article into Polish. You can read the translation on George's website here: http://buick-riviera.pl/Historia-ciekawostki-wiesci/Wszystko-co-chcecie-wiedziec-o-Boattailu-od-Bucika-a-boicie-sie-zapytac.html. (In the interests of full disclosure, we should note that George has made several voluntary contributions to support Ate Up With Motor, although we did not charge him for either the use of the article or this link.)

Background information on the boattail Riviera came from "Buick Riviera Boattail 1971 1972 1973" (no date, Buick-Riviera.com, http://www.buick-riviera.com/history.html, last accessed 28 November 2010); a comment from stylist John Houlihan on that site (18 July 2000, Buick-Riviera.com, http://www.buick-riviera.com/houlihan_history.html, accessed 28 November 2010); a letter by John Houlihan to the editors of Collectible Automobile, reprinted with permission by Gary Smith in "Who Designed the '71 Boattail Riviera?" (25 July 2010, Dean's Garage, http://deansgarage.com/2010/who-designed-the-%E2%80%9971-boattail-riveria/, accessed 28 November 2010); the Auto Editors of Consumer Guide, Encyclopedia of American Cars: Over 65 Years of Automotive History (Lincolnwood, IL: Publications International, 1996); Dave Crippen, "The Reminiscences of William L. Mitchell" (8 August 1984, University of Michigan, Benson Ford Research Center, Automotive Oral Histories, http://www.autolife.umd.umich.edu/Design/Mitchell/mitchellinterview.htm (transcript), accessed 28 November 2010); Terry B. Dunham and Lawrence R. Gustin, The Buick: A Complete History (An Automobile Quarterly Magnificent Marque Book) (Kurtztown, PA: Automobile Quarterly, 1980); 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. 172-187; Ray Knott, "Evolution of the Riviera - 1971," The Riview, Vol. 19, No. 4, May-June 2003 (Riviera Owners Association, http://rivowners.org/features/evolution/evpt71a.html, accessed 28 November 2010) and "Evolution of the Riviera - 1972," The Riview, Vol. 19, No. 5, July-August 2003 (Riviera Owners Association, http://rivowners.org/features/evolution/evpt72.html, accessed 28 November 2010); Sean Cahill, "Evolution of the Riviera - 1973," The Riview, Vol. 19, No. 6, September-October 2003 (Riviera Owners Association, http://rivowners.org/features/evolution/evpt73.html, accessed 28 November 2010) and "Evolution of the Riviera - 1974," The Riview, Vol. 20, No. 1, November-December 2003 (Riviera Owners Association, http://rivowners.org/features/evolution/evpt73.html, accessed 28 November 2010).

Additional background information came from Robert C. Ackerson and Beverly Rae Kimes, Chevrolet: A History from 1911 (Automobile Quarterly, 1986, Second Edition); John DeLorean and 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, 1979); Jim Dunne and Jan P. Norbye, Buick 1946-1978: The Classic Postwar Years, (Osceola, WI: MBI, Inc./Motorbooks International, 1978, 1993, Second Edition); Robert Genat and David Newhardt, Chevy SS: 50 Years of Super Sport (St. Paul MN: MBI Publishing Company LLC/Motorbooks, 2007); Michael Lamm, "The Car You Wear: 1963 Buick Riviera," Special Interest Autos #33 (March-April 1976), reprinted in Terry Ehrich, ed., The Hemmings Book of Buicks (Hemmings Motor News Collector-Car Books) (Bennington, VT: Hemmings Motor News, 2001); and Josiah Work and Vince Manocchi, "SIA comparisonReport: Two Kinds of Personal Luxury: Riviera and Thunderbird for 1963," Special Interest Autos #94, August 1986, pp. 34-41.

We also consulted the following period road tests: "Riviera...A Buick That Lives Up to Its Slogan," Road Test, November 1970; Jim Brokaw, "Almost a Limousine," Motor Trend, December 1970; "One of a Kind," Road Test, April 1972; "The Princely Pachyderm," Cars, February 1973; Jim Brokaw, "Toronado, Thunderbird, Grand Prix and Riviera: You can get cozy with that 'personal luxury car' if you've got $6000 to $8000," Motor Trend, June 1973; "Buick Riviera: Another Good Year Ahead," Road Test, December 1974; "Buick Riviera: Once big, flashy and unique, it is now simply big," Road Test, July 1976, all of which are reprinted in R.M. Clarke, ed., Buick Riviera 1963-78 Performance Portfolio (Cobham, Surrey: Brooklands Books Ltd., 2000); "Buick Riviera: It creates the grand illusion of a 1949 vintage dream car meant to depict the Seventies," Car and Driver, October 1969 and "'71 Buick Centurion: Floating ride Buicks are no more," Road Test, January 1971, reprinted in R.M. Clarke, Buick Muscle Cars 1963-1973 (Cobham, Surrey: Brooklands Books Ltd., 2001); and Jim Brokaw, "Three for the Money," Motor Trend, December 1971 and "The Personal Luxury Cars," Motor Trend, March 1974, reprinted in R.M. Clarke, ed., Thunderbird 1964-76 Performance Portfolio (Cobham, Surrey: Brooklands Books Ltd., 2000).

This article's title was suggested by the German submarine film Das Boot (produced by Günter Rohrbach, written and directed by Wolfgang Peterson, based on the novel by Lothar-Günther Buchheim, West Germany, Bavaria Film/Columbia Pictures, 1981). In German, of course, "das Boot" simply means "the Boat."

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