Oldsmobile was certainly one of the great names in automotive history. It started as Olds Motor Co., founded by Ransom Eli Olds in 1897. General Motors purchased Olds Motor Co. in 1908 and hired the founder. Not surprisingly, disagreements occurred, and Olds left GM to form the REO Motor Co. When General Motors phased out the brand in 2004, Oldsmobile was the oldest-surviving American brand and one of the oldest in the world. REO Motor Co. made cars and trucks until 1936, then discontinued car production in favor of trucks until 1975.
There were five automotive divisions of General Motors: Chevrolet, Pontiac, Oldsmobile, Buick and Cadillac. Of those five, Oldsmobile was sort of their experimental division, the division that would try new ideas first. For example, Oldsmobile was the first division to offer a fully automatic transmission called Hydramatic, in 1940, and the first to use the overhead valve V8 they called the Rocket engine, in 1949. So it’s not surprising that it would be Oldsmobile to introduce the first American front-wheel-drive car since the 1937 Cord. The car was called the Oldsmobile Toronado, introduced in 1966, and was the Motor Trend car of the year. It was classified as a personal luxury car, designed to compete with Ford Thunderbird and GM’s own Buick Riviera.
At a monthly Blackhawk Cars and Coffee gathering, I met J.P. Wilson, an Antioch resident and owner of a beautiful 1967 Oldsmobile Toronado Deluxe. When new, his Toronado had an MSRP of $4,674, or about $33,375 in today’s dollars. He is rightly proud of his Toronado and pointed out some of the unusual features of the car for that time period. The flat floor is one, as with front-wheel drive there is no driveline to the rear, so there is no hump in the center of the car. I liked the “slot machine” speedometer, where the numbers spin, but the indicator needle remains stationary. Wilson then explained another unique feature.
“There is an inside handle on both ends of the door. The person in the back seat can get out without assistance because they can push the lever on the seat, push the seat forward, and easily lift the handle on the door to exit.”
Wilson, the third owner, bought this Toronado in 1985, paying $1,500 (about $3,350 in today’s dollars) from a woman in the Los Angeles area.
“The car was a different color, teal, and for another $1,500 I got it painted. The car was in decent mechanical condition, and it was my main car for three to four years. One day, I parked it at the BART station in Pittsburg, and when I came back, somebody had used a hammer and knocked in one of the door locks trying to steal the car. At that point, I decided I really wanted to keep this car because if it is worth enough to steal, it is worth keeping.
“I got the second new paint job done by Earl Scheib, of Concord, who did a beautiful job. Then I started fixing all the little things, which I thoroughly enjoy. Almost everything is either original, close to original or restored.”
The exterior color, called Cayenne Red Metallic, is a 1990s GM color that is very close to an original color for Toronado in 1967. The interior was also professionally done. Originally all black, the owner changed the seat inserts to red to match the exterior. Wilson, an electrician, did some cool lighting around the doors. He said the goal is to see the lighting, but not the lights, which he has expertly done.
Wilson’s 4,496-pound Toronado is powered by a longitudinal 425 C.I. V-8 engine rated at 385 HP that is combined with a heavy-duty turbo-hydramatic, three-speed transmission, all of which are under the hood. The engine and transmission have been rebuilt but are original. The car has been driven about 140,000 miles. It has all the luxury features of the day, including a tilt-telescopic steering column, power windows, power brakes and air conditioning.
For the owner, the restoration task is never done, like painting the Golden Gate Bridge. Over the course of his ownership since 1985, Wilson estimates he has done about 25 percent of the work himself and invested about $15,000. He believes the current market value is somewhere between $25,000 and $35,000 but has no plans to sell the car.
“It’s a weekend car that I enjoy driving,” Wilson said. “But I probably drive it less than 3,000 miles a year.”
While it’s not a concours d’elegance show car, it is a show car, and it got a lot of lookers and favorable comments at the Blackhawk Cars and Coffee show.
Have an interesting vehicle? Contact David Krumboltz at MOBopoly@yahoo.com.
