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Designing a dream...
(Courtesy Executive Coach Builders
Buying a Limousine: Same as it
Ever Was
The re-birth of the Custom Car
In 1978, William F. Buckley needed a new car.
But the Cadillac Series 75
was gone, buried by government regulations and a confused Detroit that wasn't
sure how to face the strange new world of the small car. Buckley wrote,
...the Cadillac people had come up with
an austerity-model limousine, fit for
two short people, preferably to ride to a funeral in. The dividing glass between
the driver and driven was not automatic, there was no separate control
for heat or air conditioning in the back... This simply would not do.
Buckley's previous limousine, a Series 75,
had done a masterful 150,000 miles,
he in the back making calls, dictating, or entertaining, while chauffeur Jerry drove.
Had Buckley sought a new limousine in the 1920's, he would have found whatever he
wanted. He could have matched the car to his favorite suit, were that a priority as
it was for the Louisiana woman who sent fabric clippings to a LeBaron to match
interiors to her dresses. Or he could have asked that the limousine partition
house a piano keyboard. Florenz Ziegfield did. He ordered this embellishment
on a Minerva town car built for composer Rudolf Friml who used it to play
out compositions that struck him while riding in back.
The custom car, French style,
The Concours d'Elegance
(Courtesy National Archives & Record
Aministration)
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