1942 classified ads from the New York Times

[1935Packard]

For reasons I won't bore you with (at least yet), I have been looking through archives of the New York Times at the automobile classified ads that appeared in 1942.  The Times used to run a car classified ads feature every day called "Automobile Exchange."   It was always in the sports section, usually on the last page of the sports section, perhaps on the thinking that it was men reading the sports pages and men who made the decisions of whether to buy a car.

 

Here's what the Automobile Exchange typically looked like, taking March 31 as a pretty typical one:

 

 

As you might guess, there were some ads for some pretty fantastic cars.  A few that stood out to me, like this from George C. Rand, Bugatti's New York agent and a noted race car driver:

 

 

And I'll take pretty much any of these, thank you: 

 

 

 

In 1942, with the war on, it was very hard to get good tires.  So a lot of the advertisements emphasized that the cars came with good tires.   It's a little funny today, though: Packard 12 Phaeton, with 6 good tires, and here are the sizes of the tires!  

 

"Hodich," at 1116 1st Avenue, the name in the Duesenberg advertisement, refers to Louis Hodich, described here as a "well-known New York dealer in used Duesenbergs." 

 

A few dealers were repeat advertisers, especially J.S. Inskip, Rolls-Royce's dealer in the U.S. who offered a lot of European high-end cars. Probably not too easy selling German cars in 1942, though.

 

 

Anyway, some pretty cool stuff, I thought.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited February 20 by 1935Packard (see edit history)

[John_S_in_Penna]

Very interesting, Mr. Packard, and thanks for sharing them.

Since those ads were in early 1942, car production had

already stopped for the war.  If the people knew how long

the country would be without car production, they might

have decided to keep some of those cars instead of selling them!

[West Peterson]

The first two here are from 1932 in Detroit. The third is from 1935 in D.C.

[TAKerry]

Its refreshing to see that new car depreciation is nothing new!

[1935Packard]

6 hours ago, TAKerry said:

Its refreshing to see that new car depreciation is nothing new!

 

It used to be a heck of a lot worse.  In those days, a car was worth around 10 cents on the original dollar by the time it was 6 or 7 years old.   

Edited February 20 by 1935Packard (see edit history)

[Rusty_OToole]

The same pagans are still around, ready to "sacrifice" their car.