[ last update:
01.05.2015 x]
The (new)
Cadillac Database©
Foreword
How it all began
If you are not interested in this trivia page, you may
return to The (New) Cadillac Database© Index Page
Pour accéder à d'autres informations
importantes, cliquer sur le drapeau
General
The automobile has been around for a hundred years ...that is just about as
long as it takes a volcano to sneeze. Ten thousand years from now some future
archaeologist may dig up the remains of one of them, a vestige of our 20th and 21st
century means of personal transportation. Comparing it to his own already outmoded,
reverse-gravity, personal mobility capsule, he will probably consider our "cars"
as something totally inane. And yet we consider them to be one of the most admirable
contraptions that man ever built ...that is before the world's petroleum reserves ran out!
Among the automobiles of the world, in my opinion some have always stood out
from the rest. The (new) Cadillac Database©, as you
may have guessed, relates exclusively to my own favorite marque.
My purpose in compiling this electronic record has been to concentrate in one
place, for convenient reference, the thousands of facts, figures and tidbits I have
gleaned about these cars over the last half-century, ever since my interest in GM's
leading brand was sparked off at Xmas 1955 by a colorful magazine advertisement I saw for
the 1956 Sedan de Ville [picture further down].
By essence a database is up-to-date only at the time the latest changes and
additions are made; that date is shown in square brackets at the top left-hand corner of
each chapter, part, section or page. The accuracy of the contents also is conditional on
the accuracy of the inputs. In this respect, I have noticed that "facts" from
different sources sometimes are contradictory. Included here, therefore, are only
those "facts" drawn from the source(s) which, in my opinion, seem the most
reliable. It is for you, the user, to point out any errors, omissions or
inconsistencies you may come across so that, together, we can improve the database and
thus better serve the hobby.
The topics, key-words, dates and substance included in The (new) Cadillac Database© are drawn from a multitude of books,
magazines, press cuttings and general or factory publications making up my vast,
collection of literature accumulated since 1955 and relating to Cadillac and La Salle
automobiles. They have been compiled into this vast reference work intended for
hobbyists, collectors and admirers of Cadillac and La Salle automobiles. It is, in
particular, for those who, like me, are more interested in the styling of their favorite
marque and models, rather than in the mechanical marvels under the hood. It is also
for those who write about Cadillac and La Salle automobiles and who want to be as accurate
as possible in their writings. Finally, it is for all absent-minded Cadillac
and La Salle aficionados who, again like me, can never remember precisely in which
book, magazine or factory catalog they saw the photo of that V16 Town Car with the French
body, or read that article about a special Cadillac "Dream Car". More
specifically, The (new) Cadillac
Database© is intended for the many repositories of what my friend and automotive
writer Roy Schneider rightly refers to as:
The Sacred Heritage
Getting the bug
My interest in Cadillac automobiles and history goes back to 1955. I was
in my mid-teens when I first became fascinated by the sheer size and flamboyant styling of
American automobiles in general, compared to the tiny, drab cars of my forgotten childhood
in Scotland's industrial west coast just after WW2.
I was born in 1939. Jock, my late father, married Maman, in Paris,
in 1937; she was a 19-year old French beauty whom he had met in Vienna where both were
studying German. Dad taught French and German in Scotland before he was recruited,
in 1947, as a translator by the newly formed United Nations. He gave me my love of
languages ...and of American cars.
In 1947 the family moved from Balloch, on the bonnie banks of Loch
Lomond, to Geneva, Switzerland, seat of the U.N.'s European headquarters.
Dad's only means of transportation up to that time had been his own two feet (ma ain
twa feet - as he used to say) and an old Raleigh bicycle he had bought second-hand
when he was still a young student-teacher in Scotland. But on a late summer's day, in
1948, he was captivated - as I would be some 18 years later - by an impressive American
car on one of Geneva's used car lots. It was a 1934 Chrysler CB-6 convertible sedan. He
bought it not for its gracefully flowing fenders and bullet-shaped headlights but rather
for its capacity to accommodate our then 7-member family. Dad didn't know it at the time,
but he had just bought himself a rare and desirable automobile, only 450 units having been
built in total.
This is NOT a Cadillac !
Left: the Saunders
family in Divonne, fall 1948.
Right: the French side of the family in Clamart (near Paris), fall 1949;
even my
great-grandmother was present (she's the white-haired lady in
the wool cardigan (center)
My brother and I in Geneva, on the
occasion of my 70th birthday, in 2009; we found
the car sitting outside a garage near Geneva's restaurant, "La Perle du Lac";
Dad had paid $450 for the Chrysler in 1948; the current owner wants $90,000!
Repainted from silver-gray to
baby-blue, she is nearing 80 years of age (2014) but is still going strong.
[ Photos (left): Yann
Saunders collection; (right) © and courtesy J.-P. Schindelholz, Switzerland ]
|
Was it the many enjoyable rides I had on the back seat of the Chrysler, or -
unknown to my father - the secret driving lessons my older brother André (then aged 10)
used to give me (then aged 9) at its wheel? At any rate that first American car in
my childhood probably was instrumental in guiding my choice of automobiles in later life.
In 1952, I went back to school in Scotland where I attended the Vale of Leven Academy,
then Dumbarton Academy. As a matter of interest, so did F1 racing legend Jackie
Stewart, born just a couple of weeks after me! I mention him here because we have more in
common than just high school; like me, Jackie too moved to Switzerland ...but for
different reasons! He and wife Helen moved into beautiful Clayton
House in Begnins, overlooking Lake Geneva, about 20 miles east of our own
[former] Eldorado in Chambésy. I used to bump into
Jackie, with his sons Paul and Mark, at the Geneva Auto Show held every year in March.
Sir Jackie's wife, Helen (from Helensburgh!), and my sister-in-law, Thérèse,
shared the same obstetrician. One day, Thérèse (then expecting my nephew, Chris) and
Helen (expecting her younger son, Mark) got talking in the waiting room (at that time
Helen's French was almost non-existent and she was glad to get help from Thérèse to fill
up some medical forms). While chatting they found out that their respective husbands
hailed from Dumbarton. Helen said that her husband was "...in cars."
Thérèse replied that her husband sold earthmoving equipment [Caterpillar] and inquired
if Helen's husband might be a "car salesman". Helen laughed; she
said "No, actually my husband is Jackie Stewart..." To which lovely,
blonde Thérèse [who knows as much about F1 racing as I know about nuclear physics]
retorted, "I'm pleased to meet you; my husband is Alain Saunders..." Helen
was very impressed!
Some time after retiring from F1 racing, the Stewarts sold their home in
Begnins to singer-showman Phil Collins and his third wife, a local Swiss lass.
Jackie and Yann, a pair of
Dumbarton Academy FPs, 40 years on
[ Photo (left) © Richard Martin, SIPA Press, (right) © Yann Saunders ]
|
Anyway, during the next eight years [1952-1960], fruitless attempts were made
to "edikate" me. But I remember mainly the summer and winter vacations
spent with my family in Switzerland. It was during such a school break, at
Xmas 1955, that I stumbled across "my" first Cadillac. There it was, all
two tons of it, a beautiful, claret-red 1956 Sedan De Ville depicted in a colorful
magazine ad. It sat in a snow-covered driveway in front of a lighted porch,
somewhere in suburbia. Inside, under the Xmas tree, Dad was handing Mom the keys to
the new Cadillac. The ad read: "The Xmas they'll never forget". I still
have that original ad (below) ...as well as some 2,000 others accumulated over the next 45
years.
The Cadillac ad from National
Geographic, December 1955
that started it all: the 1956 Sedan de Ville
The gal
riding the front fender (below, left) is Christiane; we were married, briefly, in the
sixties; we divorced because she thought I was too carefree!
Well, I later met Gita, my wife since 1972; nobody could be more carefree than Gita; I guess that's
why we get along so well!
BTW, the small parking lights below the headlights (center photo)
were mandatory on this model, in Switzerland.
Far right, the Caddy parked outside my Dad's apartment,
at 61 rue de Montbrillant, Geneva, in 1967
This one (could it be OUR former car)
resides in Geneva (CH), half a century later
|
Six months later, in June 1956, I got to ride in a Cadillac for the first time.
It was a black 1949 Series Sixty Special sedan owned by the then U.S. ambassador to
the United Nations. His son sometimes got to borrow it to drive a bunch of us
teenagers to memorable summer parties by the lake. I remember being fascinated by the
car's comfort, performance and better-than-state-of-the-art passenger conveniences. I
remember also being impressed by its fully automatic transmission as well as its
hydraulically-operated windows and radio antenna.
1949 Cadillac Series 60 Special sedan,
like the one in which I first rode
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In the fifties, Cadillacs were a common sight around the U.N. in Geneva.
However, they were rarely seen in the west of Scotland. One of the first and only
ones I ever saw there, on a bleak, misty morning in early 1960, was the tail-end of a
shiny black 1959 Coupe de Ville. It was only a
fleeting glance but, for me, it was love at first sight! I swore that one day I would have
one like it ...even if I had to wait a quarter of a century!
I worked in London, then Paris before going back to Switzerland in 1963 in
search of a more challenging job opportunity. It was there, in Geneva, in December
1966, eleven years after admiring that 1956 ad, that I "blew" my entire month's
pay on my first old Cadillac, a 1956 Sedan De Ville just
like the one in the ad. It was a Xmas present to myself that I will never forget!
The '56 Sedan De Ville was the first of a
number of old Cadillacs I was fortunate to own and enjoy ...and on which I lavished also
large amounts of hard-earned bread. Back in the good old days, i.e. before children,
dogs, inordinately high mortgage payments, we had lots of fun with old cars. Cadillacs
were cheap at the time. Nobody wanted those so-called gas-guzzlers. But I was
prepared to ride my bicycle all week just to enjoy driving a few miles each weekend at the
wheel of one of my favorite old cars.
The year I met Gita (1971) we traded her '69 Beetle and my '67 Mustang for a
more spacious '64 Cadillac hardtop Sedan de Ville, the
4-window model with the Vicodec roof covering. The '64 was a strong runner, a
stately black sedan formerly owned by the Danish Consul in Geneva. It took us to
such ordinarily inaccessible places as the Palazzo Quirinale, i.e. the Italian
Parliament in Rome (where I worked briefly as a translator/précis-writer before Gita and
I were married), as well as the elite Cap Estel hotel at Eze-Bord-de-Mer on
France's Côte d'Azur [used as the back-drop in a bespoke ad for Britain's elite Range
Rover!] ...but that was only because I had followed a post-graduate
course in Hotel and Catering Management with the owners' daughter, Mireille, in 1959 and
1960. You may read more about that princely hotel in a short story I wrote entitled
"59 SHARK" that relates a trip I took to Monaco,
in the eighties, to purchase a 1959 Cadillac Series 62
convertible.
|
Left, front clip of our 1964 SdV; right,
the rear clip of the same car sporting dual, oval country ID stickers.
"CH" does not stand for "Chwitzerland" but for Confederatio
Helvetica, i.e. the Confederation of Swiss cantons.
The "ECOSSE" sticker is seen often on Scottish-licensed cars that tour
the Continent (i.e. Europe outside
of the British Isles). Lower left, the sumptuous interior of our car
[ Photos: © 1972, Yann Saunders ]
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In the Spring of 1972 we acquired a 1960 Eldorado Seville
from a truck driver in Berne, Switzerland. He had inherited the car from an uncle
who had bought it second-hand from a Geneva used car lot. I later found out the
car's history. In 1963, it had been imported from Florida where it had been used on
vacation, for three seasons, by its original owner, Ms. Elsie De Reuter, wife of wealthy
Argentinean banker and financial genius, Carlos De Reuter; both were residents of Cologny,
Geneva's Beverly Hills, since 1953. Elsie passed away in September, 1969 and her
husband some ten years later. They left ten million Swiss francs (circa $5,000,000) in a
Geneva-based Foundation for Medical Research.
Anyway, the truck driver did not like the color of the car! It was painted
Heather Poly, i.e. metallic lavender (code #99) with matching metallic lilac
leather and cloth upholstery and the very rare bucket seat option (trim code #58B). The
Eldorado became our wedding car that very summer. It was with deep regret that we
parted with this low-mileage beauty when our second child was born. In the late
eighties its value as a collectible had climbed from the $1800 that we had paid to circa
$40,000! You may read more about this superb automobile by clicking
here.
This is how the Seville looked when it left the
factory in the late fall of 1959. It still looked
very much the same when Gita and I bought it, in Switzerland, some thirteen years
later
(Left), my BFF, Tony C., drives Gita and
her Dad to the family church in Trélex, 15mi east of Geneva;
(Center), the lilac Seville awaits the bride and groom outside the church;
(Right), off to the wedding reception at the home of my in-laws, then we'll
take a cruise ... on lake Geneva
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After changing hands five or six times, this rare and beautiful Eldorado
Seville (with under 20K miles when we sold it) has been rotting away on a
private lot in Geneva's Chêne-Bourg area, since the mid-eighties. Downright shame
for such a rare and beautiful example of Cadillac's Golden Years!
Much later we got a white 1959 Coupe De Ville
with a black roof. Yes, it had been 25 years (a quarter of a century!) since I
had first glimpsed that one in Glasgow, in 1960!
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(Left) The '59 Coupe de Ville at the Chapelle des Cornillons, in Chambésy,
Switzerland;
she cost $4500 in 1983; today, one as nice as this will cost 10 times as
much
Our children, Jamie (right) and Kelly (left) loved
the 1959 Cadillac rocket-ship;
believe it or not, "baby" Kelly now has three grown children of
her own!
This tribute to the 1959 Cadillac hung for many years
above the garage of our home
in Switzerland. It featured working tail-lights, reversing lights and
license plate lights.
At night it could be seen from planes landing at nearby Cointrin
airport. When we
decided to emigrate to the USA, I sold the ensemble to a friend and keen Cadillac
aficionado, Jean-Michel Roux. After it was gone, one Swissair pilot is quoted as
saying:
Whatever happened to that night-club in Chambésy?
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We did not keep the '59 very long. A desperate young Swiss man made us an
"offer we could not refuse". In any case, at that time, I was looking for
a '59 Eldorado Biarritz. But the prices of the
latter were going over the moon! I had my eyes also on a '57 Eldorado
Brougham [car #251]; that particular Brougham is
reported to have been owned by Fidel Castro before it was brought to Switzerland by
the then Swiss Ambassador to Cuba, His Excellency Giacomo Menasce. However, judging
from the asking price at the time, the Swiss businessman who owned the car in the
mid-seventies must have thought it was made of solid gold! More on this car may be
found in the section of the Database that deals with the Cadillac Eldorado
Brougham.
So Gita and I settled for a 1960 Eldorado Biarritz
that we bought, sight unseen, from a not-too-honest vendor in Portland, OR, who assured us
that this was a two-owner, totally rust-free car ...as may readily be seen in the photos,
below! In addition, the DMV [Department of Motor Vehicles] whom I contacted in Oregon,
sent me a list of at least seven previous owners!
When we got The Pink Lady, she had been
re-painted powder-blue by the lady-of-the-night who had owned the car in the late sixties.
When the car was stripped to bare metal, we found traces of the original color
- Siena Rose (metallic fuchsia), code #98 - on the firewall and behind the
inner door panels (photo). We decided to repaint her the original hue.
In 1983, we bought this "totally rust-free" 1960 Eldorado
Biarritz in Portland, OR, for $5000 on the strength
of the RH photo; rust-through was found in the front compartment, under the rear seat and in the trunk area
Gita points to "non existent" rust holes
in the floor area
The original Siena Rose color was found on
the firewall and on the inner door when the car was
stripped for paint (above); The Pink Lady was reassembled in
1989 by François-and-François,
friends from Laval whom we met in 1987 during a 2-week classic car
"raid" in Morocco
I prefer the lines of the 1960 Eldorado models; I consider them much prettier, if somewhat less emphatically styled than
their
1959 counterparts; the '60 convertible was repainted the original Siena
Rose color (Code 98) and had all white leather upholstery
and top; the hard boot was missing but (I refused to pay one fifth the price of the car just
to put on for that finishing touch!
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For a while also we had a white 1976 Seville
with blood-red leather upholstery (below, left). Although a plain-Jane, daily driver,
nonetheless this car had belonged to one of the many wives of Saudi-Arabia's King Fahd, a
part-time resident of Geneva. I got it from her chauffeur, to whom she had given
the car when she had tired of it.
At the same time we had briefly a white 1976 Coupe De Ville,
the one with the 8.2 liter power plant! At only $200 (yes, two hundred U.S.
dollars!) it was the "cheapest" of all our Cadillacs, simply because the
previous owner had left a dog inside, unattended for too long, and it had
"played" with the car's blue, velour upholstery. Unfortunately, we had to get
rid of this car when we found out that customs duty was unpaid in Switzerland and would
have amounted to about ten times the cost of the Cadillac! In Switzerland, customs
dues on automobiles [and on most other merchandise for that matter] are calculated on
weight, irrespective of the car's value or condition.
|
Above row: the 1976 Cadillac Seville, once the property of a Saudi
queen (one of many)
Below: the '76 Coupe de Ville in "sad" condition (not worth
restoring; it wend to a collector in France)
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From 1963 to 1983 I put together also a unique collection of 750 Cadillacs
covering the model years from 1903 to the present. Where did I store them all, you
ask? Simple: in a glass case ...because they were scale-model toys and
replicas! Yes, collecting Cadillac, toys and miniature replicas was a cheap way to
fuel my bad habit!
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These are photos of what was once
the "largest collection in the world" of Cadillac and LaSalle scale models,
replicas and toys; they ranged in size from 1 inch to 3 feet (the red '67 Eldorado
at right, above)
made by Ichiko;
Yep! That's me with my 40th birthday
present from Gita: a tinplate 1968 Cadillac Fleetwood Brougham;
the frilly, orange shirt is from London's Carnaby street in 1969; I used to wear
it for band work (right)
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Collecting Cadillac toys turned out also to be a rather good investment.
Indeed, the sale of the collection - which weighed in at about 150 lbs. - allowed us
to acquire Gita's Ark, a second-hand SSDY1, built in Holland in 1982, that measured more than 47
feet and displaced ...18 tonnes! Click here to read about
the toy collection in greater detail.
____________________
1
Single-screw diesel yacht
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Converting a 150lb toy collection into a a
10-ton diesel yacht
(Left) As a UK citizen, I had the boat
registered in Glasgow, Scotland, hence the red ensign aft; our "home base"
was the marina at Mâcon, on France's river Saône
(Right) Later, we moved the Ark to Yvoire, on Lake Geneva, half of
which is in France, the other in Switzerland; here we are steaming past
Montreux en route to Chillon castle)
(Left) Summer: below the fortifications of
Château de Chillon
(Right) Winter: Christmas in the marina at Yvoire, with Xmas tree and
lights!
The finest teak was used on the interior
fittings
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But life was not always this good. A job-related downturn in the
mid-eighties had me facing a loss of half my retirement pension. No longer could we afford
to live in luxurious Switzerland, the country that had been my permanent home since 1963.
In 1995 we were compelled to sell our home, our boat, all our possessions and to emigrate
to the USA to start a new life in sunny South Carolina. There, we learned, we could buy a
decent home for less than one quarter what similar accommodation cost in and around Geneva
at that time.
It was a tough decision leaving behind our young adult children as well as
giving away our two dogs. Yet it turned out that our decision to relocate to the USA
was not all that bad. The sale of all our belongings in Switzerland enabled us to pay cash
for a cozy new home in South Carolina, leaving enough change to pay for all the
furnishings and to indulge in two full-sized Cadillac "toys": a stately 1942
Cadillac Fleetwood, style 7519F formal sedan licensed 1 OF 65 [because
only sixty-five of them were made that year] and a slushy-plushy '64 Fleetwood Sixty
Special sedan licensed E BAY B
[because we found her on E-Bay, the well-known Internet auction site].
The toys bought the yacht, the yacht bought
the house
... complete with the Classic Cadillac (below)!
The
Black Pryncess
The Black Pryncess, our 1942 Fleetwood,
Series 75, style #7519F formal sedan for five passengers
is one of only sixty-five such models built that year, hence the personalized number plate: 1
OF 65;
Generals Eisenhower and MacArthur used the same model during WW2; ours is one of only four known survivors
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" E
- BAY - B "
E BAY B was an
"accidental" purchase on Ebay; Gita had gone to Geneva for a week ... just
long enough for me to have fun on the computer;
our
1964 Fleetwood Sixty Special sedan epitomized Cadillac's owner-driver luxury
cars of the sixties; It was our second 1964 Cadillac
|
Late Extra (Spring 2004): We
moved to a town house closer to the water, that comes with a boat slip and winter
boat storage. We sold the big Cadillac toys and reverted to boating, which left me
more time to devote
to the The (new)
Cadillac Database©.
~~~~~
The
(new) Cadillac Database© is Born
On the topic of man's IQ, James Q. Wilson, professor of management and public
policy at UCLA once said: In no field of knowledge is there a wider gap between what
the experts know and what the media report. The situation seems to be much the
same with automobile history, although, like my friend Ron Van Gelderen, twice President
of the Cadillac La Salle Club, Inc., the more I
know about Cadillac and La Salle cars and history, the less I consider myself to be an
expert. Yet in collector circles my predilection for Cadillacs quickly earned me the
nickname Mr. Cadillac. It was under that alias, in 1983, that I took
over from Hervé Antoine, in Paris, editorship of the Cadillac-LaSalle column in
the bi-monthly Bond, the French-language journal of the then 2000-member strong American
Car Club de France (ACCF)]. My
articles, in French, in that glossy magazine sparked a lot of reader interest.
Questions about Cadillacs started pouring in.
Advancing senility combined with an understandable penchant - as a Scot - for
golden-hued usquebaugh (the "water of life", i.e. whisky) my brain cells
gradually were being destroyed and I was having to cross-check often my facts and figures
before I could quote them with any kind of assurance.
Many of the answers were to be found - after much rummaging - somewhere among
the piles of books and magazines littering the Cadillac Room at home. Without
a proper reference system, finding a specific Cadillac photo or fact was like searching
for the proverbial needle in the equally proverbial haystack. Some semblance
of order was needed! But where to find the time?
For economic reasons Gita and I had begun riding 125cc motorcycles to save on
gasoline. One day in May 1987, on my way back to the office after lunch, I was hit by a
car driven by a "blind" Korean diplomat and left partly disabled for five months1. With Gita's help, I made the most of the
succeeding long period of convalescence to put some order in my Cadillac literature
collection. And with the advent of computer technology I was able gradually to discharge
my failing memory onto more reliable magnetic discs.
__________________________________________________________
1 Had
this accident occurred in the USA, probably I would have become a millionaire. In Europe,
however, injury law suits do not provide for huge settlements; my opponent's insurance
company covered only the cost of the broken bike, the broken bones and the effective
loss of earnings during the time I was off work
 
 
Top: samples of Cadillac sales literature and
books on Cadillac cars.
Below: sample Cadillac magazine ads, Cadillac toys and Cadillac
memorabilia from Yann Saunders' collection
 
Here, made of stiff card, with plastic wheels, by
model-maker "artiste" Bernard Gervais
is an exciting 1:8 scale replica of the Paris Opera coupe by Grandeur Coach Corporation
there is so much detail that even the the car keys hang on a tiny
key-fob in the ignition
|
I had noticed also that much material published about Cadillac and La Salle
cars is not always accurate nor complete. For example, in a so-called automobile encyclopaedia
published in 1998, a photo of a 1932 Cadillac coupe was identified as a 1928 model, a 1955
limousine as a 1953 and a 1975 Eldorado as a late-sixties
model. Another well-known publisher whose magazine is described (by them!) as The
definitive publication for enthusiasts, collectors and dealers, lists the Cadillac
V-16 all-weather phaeton, as well as some other V-16 convertibles and three town cars, as
Madame X models. In fact, that appellation applies only to
certain closed body styles on the V-16 chassis built from 1930 to 1933.
This gave me one more reason to compile The (new) Cadillac Database©.
It was time to try to set the record straight. Of course, the accuracy of the Database is
a reflection of the accuracy of the inputs from the various sources where I gleaned the
information; errors, therefore, are inevitable. With your help, nonetheless, we may
gradually cancel them out.
In addition, in 1993 I was approached by Fabien Sabatés, a French automotive
writer, who proposed that we co-author a book on Cadillac styling for the French publisher
Auto-Collection. But Sabatés did not keep his word; he reneged later on our
gentleman's agreement ...and left me in a rather embarrassing situation vis-à-vis the
many people - including the Cadillac Motor Car Division
of General Motors Corporation (GMC) - who had supported
the book project and supplied material for it.
I started to compile The (new) Cadillac Database©
with that intended book in mind. It was done with relative haste and in the midst of
the other urgent, professional and domestic preoccupations (some of them described above).
Therefore, I don't preclude errors and omissions. I am counting on users to point
them out, as also to provide me with additional facts and information considered worthy of
inclusion here. Also I would welcome any suggestions how to improve on the style and
layout.
Space in plenty has been donated kindly for The (new) Cadillac Database©,
by long-time CLC member Glen Houlton from Hawaii. However, this
may not allow simultaneous publication of the thousands of images in my collection.
I have tried to be as representative as possible in my selection. Not all
Cadillac and LaSalle models currently are shown although at last count there are more than
40,000 of them ... more, in fact, than in ALL Cadillac books published to date!
Users who would like to see a specific model [1902-2002] not currently included
here may contact me by Email.
I shall do my best to accommodate such requests.
Tu peux m'écrire en français
Du kannst mir auf Deutsch schreiben
Puedes escribírme en Español
[...but I
may answer you in English!]
Hard-copy inputs may be sent also by
snail-mail to my home address, below:
Yann
Saunders
114 Seafarer Lane
Columbia, SC-29212 / USA
Only rarely was I
unfaithful to the Cadillac
FORD
My
first non-Cadillac American car was this 1967 Mustang coupe; I loved that
car as much as I loved my wife (left); sadly, I kept the car longer!
With a minimum of tools I was able to
double the tail-light pods; a guy in Canada did the same with better results
(right)
CHRYSLER (DODGE)
This 1978 Dodge D200 "2+2" truck, with
removable camper shell were something I "created" after being told
such a rig was "not allowed" on Swiss roads, without major modifications; an
estimate from Streag (the
Chrysler dealer in Zürich), in 1977, put such a rig at a whopping CHF53,000;
however, by purchasing
the truck in Baltimore, MD, and having the shell custom-built in Elkhart,
IN, in 1978, this rig ended up costing us
"only" CHF19,000 ... and we sold it a year later to a couple from Canton de
Vaud for CHF27,000! I believe we
were the first owners of such a rig, in Switzerland; it required TWO road
licences: one when being used as a
pick-up truck, the other when being used as a "camper" ... I tell you, ONLY
IN SWITZERLAND!
BUICK *)
The profit from the sale of the Dodge
camper went into this "raspberries-and-cream" 1968 Buick Electra
225
convertible; she is seen here before the impressive, wrought-iron gates
to the estate of of the late Baron Edmond de Rothschild;
his son, Benjamin, is now in charge; he is a car collector in his own right
and owns a few Classic Cadillacs
Here is "Der Pink Panzer" at Lignières
care-track, near Neuchâtel
on the occasion of a meeting of the American Car Club of Geneva in 1979
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*) Although my heart
still belongs to Daddy Caddy, since moving
to the USA in 1997-98 Gita and I have come to appreciate the
reliability of our BUICK "daily drivers"; we have had four,
so far, and still run two of them. Our first was a 1995
Le Sabre Custom that we gifted later to the daughter of
some friends of ours when she turned 18. Before that, we had
bought a 1990 Century wagon when daughter Kelly came
over to stay with us for 3 months; it was so reliable that
we kept it for another two years, finally succumbing to the
call of a larger wagon, a 1994 Roadmaster Estate; I
had seen a white one on a mall parking lot and had left my
business card on the windshield; the lady owner called back
... 2 years later; we bought the car with "only" 110,000mi
on the clock. Meanwhile, on a tip from a friend in
Alabama, we bought a SECOND 1994 Roadmaster Estate
with fewer miles on the clock (45,000); this one is teal
colored. In 2002 Gita inherited from her step-Mom the
latter's 4-cyl. 1995 Pontiac Grand-Am ... with only
20,000mi on the clock; that one ought to last at least
another 10 years.
"Nothing too big, too bright and never too
much chrome.
Cadillac never skimped on
styling.
Check the true classics
and read about them.
Cadillac will always be
Cadillac"
Trivia: In reviewing the book Automotive Web Sites
by Todd A. Jensen, the late Tom Bonsall asserted ...there may be a zillion
automobile sites out there on the Web, but surprisingly few of them are heavy hitters
worth taking seriously. I wonder if he or Mr. Jensen ever visited The (new) Cadillac Database ©? In all
due modesty, I have yet to see another single-marque Web site as broad-based as this one
and replete with so many related images and photos as this one!
(traduction française, © 2000,
Philippe Ruel - avec ajouts de Yann Saunders en 2005)
Avant-propos
Comment tout a commencé
Généralités
Cela
fait une centaine d'années que l'automobile a vu le jour … le temps qu'un volcan met
pour éternuer. Dans dix mille ans, des archéologues déterreront peut-être les restes
de l'une d'entre elles, un vestige de nos moyens de transport individuels des XXème
et XXIème siècles. En la comparant avec sa capsule personnelle à gravité
inversée déjà démodée, il considèrera sans doute nos "voitures" comme des
objets tout à fait saugrenus. Et pourtant, nous voyons en elles l'un des plus admirables
machins jamais construits par l'homme … jusqu'à épuisement des réserves
pétrolières mondiales !
Parmi toutes les voitures du
monde, j'ai le sentiment que certaines ont toujours été à part. La "(new) Cadillac
Database" [NBDC], comme vous l'avez deviné, est
exclusivement consacrée à ma marque préférée.
L'objectif
de la rédaction de ces archives électroniques est de regrouper quelque part, comme
référence pratique, les milliers de faits, de chiffres et autres gâteries que j'ai pu
glaner à propos de ces voitures pendant les quarante-cinq dernières années, depuis
qu'à Noël 1955, une publicité dans un magazine pour la Sedan
de Ville 1956 a
déclenché mon intérêt pour la marque phare de la GM.
Par
nature, une base de données n'est à jour qu'à la date de ses dernières modifications
et ajouts ; cette date apparaît entre crochets à gauche en tête de chaque chapitre,
partie, section ou page. L'exactitude du contenu ne vaut que par l'exactitude de ce qu'on
y met. A cet égard, j'ai remarqué des "faits" parfois contradictoires d'une
source à l'autre. Je n'ai donc placé ici que les "faits" provenant des sources
qui m'ont semblé les plus fiables. C'est à vous, utilisateurs, de noter les erreurs,
omissions ou incohérences que vous rencontreriez, de sorte qu'ensemble, nous puissions
améliorer cette base de données et par là même servir notre passion commune.
Les
sujets, les mots-clés, les dates et la matière de la NBDC proviennent d'une multitude de
livres, de revues, de coupures de presse ou de documents du constructeur qui ont alimenté
depuis 45 ans ma collection de documents se rapportant aux voitures Cadillac et La Salle.
Ils ont été compilés dans ce vaste travail de référence destiné aux amateurs,
collectionneurs et admirateurs des voitures Cadillac et La Salle. Il est destiné en
particulier à ceux qui, comme moi, sont plus intéressés par le style de leurs marques
et modèles préférés que par les merveilles mécaniques qui se cachent sous le capot.
Il est aussi destiné à ceux qui écrivent à propos des voitures Cadillac et La Salle et
qui veulent produire des écrits aussi exacts que possible. Enfin, il est destiné à tous
les aficionados distraits de Cadillac et La Salle qui, encore comme moi, ne peuvent jamais
se rappeler exactement dans quel livre, quelle revue ou quel catalogue ils ont vu cette
photo de coupé de ville à carrosserie française, ou lu cet article à propos un
"dream-car" Cadillac. Plus spécifiquement, la NBDC est faite pour les nombreux
gardiens de ce que mon ami l'écrivain automobile Roy Schneider appelle l'héritage
sacré.
Comment
j'ai attrapé le virus
Mon
intérêt pour les voitures Cadillac et leur histoire remonte à plus de quarante-cinq
ans. J'étais un adolescent quand les dimensions généreuse et le style flamboyant des
voitures américaines en général ont commencé à me fasciner, surtout comparées aux
petites autos ternes de mon enfance oubliée sur la côte ouest industrielle de l'Ecosse
dans l'après-guerre.
Je
suis né en 1939. Feu mon père, Jock, épousa maman à Paris en 1937; c'était une
beauté française de 19 ans qu'il avait rencontrée à Vienne où ils étudiaient tous
les deux l'allemand. Papa enseignait le français et l'allemand en Ecosse avant d'être
recruté en 1947 comme traducteur pour les toutes jeunes Nations Unies. C'est lui qui m'a
donné l'amour des langues… et des voitures américaines.
En
1947, la famille quitta Balloch, sur les rives du Loch Lomond, pour Genève, en Suisse,
siège européen des Nations Unies. Jusqu'alors, l'unique moyen de transport de papa avait
été ses pieds, ainsi qu'un vieux vélo Raleigh acheté d'occasion quand il était encore
jeune étudiant-enseignant en Ecosse. Mais par un matin de printemps 1948 il fut séduit
– comme je devais l'être quelque 18 ans plus tard – par une impressionnante
voiture américaine sur un parc de voitures d'occasion de Genève. C'était une
décapotable 4 portes Chrysler CB-6 de 1934. Il l'acheta moins pour la grâce du mouvement
de ses ailes et ses phares en obus que pour sa capacité à loger les 7 personnes que
comptait alors notre famille. Papa ne le savait pas à l'époque, mais il venait de
s'acheter une voiture rare et désirable, n'ayant été construite qu'en 450 exemplaires.
Etait-ce
les nombreux et plaisants voyages que j'ai effectués sur la banquette arrière de la
Chrysler, ou les leçons de conduite que me donnait en cachette de mon père mon frère
aîné André (10 ans) ? Quoi qu'il en soit, cette voiture américaine de mon enfance a
probablement contribué à guider mes choix automobiles par la suite.
En
1952 je retournai étudier en Ecosse à la Dumbarton Academy … en même temps que la
légende du sport automobile Jackie Stewart, né quelques semaines après moi ! Les huit
années suivantes furent peuplées de tentatives pour faire mon éducation à
l'écossaise. Mais je me rappelle surtout les vacances d'été et d'hiver passées en
famille en Suisse. C'était pendant l'un de ces congés, à Noël 1955, que je tombai sur
"ma" première Cadillac. Elle était là, du haut de ses deux tonnes, une "Sedan
de Ville" année 1956
bordeaux décrite dans une publicité de magazine toute en couleurs. Elle stationnait dans
une allée enneigée en face d'un porche éclairé, quelque part en banlieue. A
l'intérieur, sous le sapin de Noël, papa tendait à maman les clés de la nouvelle
Cadillac. La publicité disait : "le Noël qu'ils n'oublieront jamais". J'ai
toujours la publicité originale (voir photo) … et quelque 2000 autres accumulées
pendant les 45 années qui ont suivi.
C'est
six mois plus tard, en juin 1956, que j'ai voyagé à bord d'une Cadillac pour la
première fois. C'était une berline "Sixty Special"
noire de 1949 appartenant à l'ambassadeur des Etats-Unis aux Nations-Unies. Son fils la
lui empruntait parfois pour amener notre bande de jeunes à des soirées mémorables au
bord du lac. Je me souviens avoir été fasciné par le confort de cette voiture, ses
performances et les commodités qu'elle offrait à ses passagers bien au-delà du
nécessaire. Je me souviens aussi avoir ... [traduction malheureusement interrompue, faute
de temps !] ...
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