V8 Packards in background of 1971 Studebaker Drivers Club photos

[Guest 63Stude]

http://good-times.webshots.com/album/561351287DGrCqN?start=12

A fellow recently supplied this link to the SDC website, of photos a late friend of his had taken at the 1971 South Bend Studebaker Drivers Club national meet. As a Studebaker guy I found them highly entertaining. On page two of the photos, top row, rightmost photo, it appears there is a line of '55 and '56 Packards outside the Avanti Motors building. Well, Newman and Altman, who ran the Avanti works at that time, had been Packard dealers in the V8 era, even before they had become Studebaker dealers.

For what it's worth (probably not much to Packard buffs), page 6 of the photo shows the old SASCO Parts Depot at Plant 8 in South Bend, when it was still owned by Studebaker in 1971! I do imagine they were still selling some Packard parts there at that time.

Bill P.

[Guest 1956Packard]

Also of note is photo 69 on page 6 (bottom left) is a photo of the 1956 Packard Predictor show car.

Also note photo 33

Geoff

[Guest 63Stude]

Yes, how could I have missed mentioning that '56 Caribbean convertible? That was Nate Altman's, father of the Avanti II and former partner in Newman-Altman Packard (later Edsel, later Studebaker) in South Bend.

That car sat for many years in the old Newman and Altman Parts/Standard Surplus building at 405 W. Sample St. in South Bend. I remember seeing it in a corner of the building every time I went to the annual May swap meet there, throughout the '90's. It was sitting in front of a huge Ultramatic Pushbutton Shift display in a case, which has since been given to the new Studebaker National Museum in South Bend.

Nate Altman, owner of that Caribbean, must have been quite a guy. I understand that the Avantis built under his hand ('65-76) were the best-assembled Avantis before or since. I have also heard he lived, breathed, ate, slept, and died, "Customer Service". I cannot imagine trying to get people to invest with him in resurrecting the Avanti after the collapse of South Bend--or that Studebaker would have even sold him the rights to the car when they were still assembling cars in Canada. Talk about an optimist!

Funny story I've heard often, was that Nate went to Morris Markin, President of Checker Motors in Kalamazoo, MI, to see if he'd be interested in adding the Avanti to Checker's assembly line. Markin said, "Do you think we'd build a car as ugly as the Avanti?!" Nate was so incensed at that and later said, "Can you believe he said that? I mean, they build the Checker Marathon!!!" and at that point decided to build the Avanti himself.

Bill P.

[Studemax]

Don't expect much of a response from Packard folk, they have never forgiven Studebaker for merging with Packard.

(They both would have croaked anyway)

[Guest imported_Speedster]

Hey, We Love Studebakers Too, at Least I do.

Altho I don't own a Stude, I would like to.

I think most of the Packard guys on this forum are just worried with 'Their Packard Problems', right now.

We Packard owners are a 'Self-centered Bunch' anyhow. Like, 'Take about My car, or Don't Talk to Me".

LOL, Not Really!

[Guest 63Stude]

Oh no problem, my idea wasn't necessarily to get responses, I just think they're neat pictures with some Packards in them! I was surprised to see the row of 'em outside the Avanti building.

I like V8 Packards. A few friends of mine over the years have owned them, I think they do ride remarkably well, and the facelift was a good one on the '51 body I think. A friend of mine was our small hometown's Studebaker and Packard dealer (even prior to the merger) and in fact sold '56 Caribbean convertible no. 1258 new, which still survives. I have color photos of it on delivery day.

I, too, think Stude and Packard were both doomed to fail in spite of the other, for the main reason, as Harold Churchill said about Studebaker's going out of business...."We didn't sell enough cars". One real eye-opener for me in those pictures, was the age of the Avanti building. I mean, production was going on in that building that late, and I can remember when Lordstown, OH's GM plant opened in '66 or so, and it seemed so modern in comparison. No wonder plant overhead was so high at Studebaker.

Bill P.

[55PackardGuy]

Bill,

Thank you for posting this interesting historical info. I, for one, have thought of the late '50s Studebakers as partners in grief with Packard, sharing many of the same woes of being independents. In spite of all the second-guessing about who might have "saved" whom, in the end none of the independents survived.

I also want to thank you very much for finally giving my memory a jolt about SASCO! My father bought many '55 Packard NOS parts, including trim and body parts, from a South Bend company in the '70s, and I could just never remember the name of that outfit. We had the (very detailed) catalogs, but I think they went with the cars when he sold them, along with the NOS parts.