1961 Dodge Pioneer - $4500 -Superior, WI - Not Mine

[58L-Y8]

1961 Dodge Pioneer two door hardtop - $4500 - Superior, Wisconsin 

https://duluth.craigslist.org/cto/d/superior-1961-dodge-pioneer/7128323224.html

1961 Dodge Pioneer. Rust free Nevada car. Slant six with automatic. Some small dents on body. Runs and drives, but smokes a little. $4500.

Call Tim at (Two-eighteen) - 3-nine-3-eleven-fifty-five 

 

I have no personal interest or stake in the eventual sate of this 1961 Dodge Pioneer two door hardtop. 

Personal note: This is the perfect antidote for the same-old, same-old car show  or cruise night ennui.  Exner's wild late styling and a leaning tower of power!

[John_S_in_Penna]

Thanks for sharing your finds, 58L.

 

If I may make a suggestion:

Please be sure to copy the phone number

from the ad (where there is one).  Otherwise,

your helpful thread will become obsolete very

quickly, and someone who reads it here will be

unable to respond.

[58L-Y8]

Thanks John_S.  Please note I write out the contact phone number with a combination of words and numbers so scammer bot computers can't glean phone numbers from the posting on here.   Those robot computer programs are always scanning websites for phone numbers to use for robo-calls, but can't understand the combination of numbers and words.  Too bad we have to do this to outsmart those creeps. 

 

Those CL postings that only have an email contact with a link to copy and paste have to be responded to more than once to get the seller to take the response seriously, again because of the many scammers misusing the system.

Edited June 20, 2020 by 58L-Y8 (see edit history)

[John_S_in_Penna]

I really appreciate seeing other people's interesting findings!

I swear I have enough cars--due to cost, maintenance, and storage--

but sooner or later someone here is going to tempt me irresistibly!

 

If I like a car, I'll print out the information from the internet and save it,

just as I might save a magazine ad.  I've found that one can call about

a car many months later and find that it's still available--and that the

price is more flexible, more reasonable.

 

For the Craig's List ads that have only the Craig's List e-mail for

contact:  Do you think that e-mail expires as soon as the ad does?

[Bloo]

6 minutes ago, John_S_in_Penna said:

For the Craig's List ads that have only the Craig's List e-mail for

contact:  Do you think that e-mail expires as soon as the ad does?

 

Yes.

[58L-Y8]

1 hour ago, John_S_in_Penna said:

For the Craig's List ads that have only the Craig's List e-mail for

contact:  Do you think that e-mail expires as soon as the ad does?

The only way to get a response is to be persistent, list the name of the car for sale, indicate your general location and current interest, in an effort to get around the spam dumpster where most goes.  A second, third or fourth request for a response should note that in the email subject line, spammers won't bother with more than one or two tries.   

[JamesR]

My parents had the station wagon version of this car when we were kids in the early 60's. Ours had the big round afterburner taillights, however. After all of these years, I still can't figure out why some of the Dodges in '61 had the small rectangular taillights and others had the big round taillights. I'm sure someone here will enlighten me.

[6T-FinSeeker]

This car has been for sale for awhile.  Perhaps someone can get a good deal.

 

 

[John_S_in_Penna]

2 hours ago, JamesR said:

I still can't figure out why some of the Dodges in '61 had the small rectangular taillights and others had the big round taillights. I'm sure someone here will enlighten me.

 

The extra round taillights were a mid-year addition.

I don't know why they were added--for styling or for

functionality.

 

The senior Dodges had a different contour for the

reverse fin, in which the molding surrounded a

faired-in round light in an unusual configuration;

those didn't need the extra round light added.  See below:

 

[Bloo]

Functionality. The small taillights were notoriously dim. Chrysler had retrofit kits with the round lights.

[JamesR]

2 hours ago, John_S_in_Penna said:

 

The extra round taillights were a mid-year addition.

I don't know why they were added--for styling or for

functionality.

 

The senior Dodges had a different contour for the

reverse fin, in which the molding surrounded a

faired-in round light in an unusual configuration;

those didn't need the extra round light added.  See below:

 

 

Thanks for the explanation John, but I'm not entirely sure I'm getting this.  Are you saying there were two different versions of the round taillight? One for a retrofit and another for higher level models? Our wagon had the same taillights shown in the picture you provided...those are the only round '61 Dodge taillights I'm familiar with (but obviously I'm no expert.)

[Bloo]

The bigger cars (Polara etc.) had a different rear quarter panel, bigger swoop in the fin, and a round light on the outside like John_S_in_Penna's picture.

 

 

The smaller ones (Dart Phoenix and Pioneer for instance) had a little rectangular light down below. People complained they were dim. There was a retrofit kit to add a round light, and some later cars probably had it from new.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited June 21, 2020 by Bloo (see edit history)

[John_S_in_Penna]

And I'm quite sure that the station wagons,

even the lower-line Dodges, all had the same

taillights that the senior Dodge cars had.

They did not have the kind that needed to be

retrofitted.

 

Here is a Dodge Dart Seneca station wagon:

Edited June 21, 2020 by John_S_in_Penna (see edit history)

[John_S_in_Penna]

While we might like some of these cars today,

they were from a time when designer Virgil Exner

was putting forth increasingly odd and outlandish

designs.  Some of his designs, I would say, were

downright ugly, such as his asymmetrical proposals

which we discussed on another thread:

 

 

[JamesR]

Okay, that makes sense. Thanks for clearing that up, Bloo and John. I'd say the '61 Dodge had one of the most interesting taillight histories of the 1960's. And among the most interesting taillights. I remember when my dad brought our '61 Dodge home as a new used car (in about '63); one of the neighborhood kids (a friend of mine) saw the big outrageous taillights and said, "WOOWW!"

 

What else could he say? 😄 I actually thought the car was a little strange looking, but I was impressed that my friend was impressed, and remember the car and the vacations we took in it very fondly.

[58L-Y8]

I recall reading that some state DMV laws stated that both taillights were to be visible at all times from whatever angle.  As seen on the station wagon, in a 3/4 view, only one light was visible because of the styling and side-mounted location.   The retrofit taillights were supplied to remedy this situation.

[Bloo]

That's interesting. I have never seen one of the larger cars or a station wagon with extra lights, only the Pioneer/Phoenix. It doesn't seem like the retrofit housings used on the Phoenix/Pioneer quarter panel would even fit.