1960 Plymouth Savoy: American middle-class darling

The Americans immediately liked the Plymouth Savoy: the car quickly became popular with middle-income people, who were attracted not only by price but also by its good technical characteristics. 

Source: Barry Ritholtz

The brainchild of the Chrysler Corporation, this model was produced from 1954 to 1964 at a plant in Highland Park, Michigan. After its introduction in 1954, the model was ranked as a series of mid-level and moderate-priced vehicles and was located between the Plaza sedans and the Belvedere luxury flagships. In each subsequent year of production, changes were made to the model. So, in 1955, it received a new power steering, in 1956 – seat belts, and at the request of the buyer, a Highway Hi-Fi audio player was installed. In later versions, engines of various sizes were located under the hood of vehicles: from 3.7-liter to 6.5-liter. The automobiles belonged to the “full-size car” class and were produced with bodies of 4- or 2-door station wagons, 2-door coupes, and 4-door sedans.

The origins

Source: Wikimedia Commons

Throughout the 1930s and 40s, Plymouth was one of the most sought-after brands in the US and for a time even ranked third in terms of sales. However, by the beginning of the 1950s, the competition raged fiercely and the management of the department had to urgently decide how to increase sales, which began to plummet. The best solution was the creation of a new fresh-looking car. Chrysler’s chief stylist Virgil Exner managed to solve the problem. Also, the Italian design studio Ghia was involved in the development process. As a result, all departments of the corporation got several new models. Plymouth was no exception. The name Savoy adorned the Plymouth lineup in 1951: it was assigned to one of the versions of the popular Suburban station wagon. However, in 1954 Savoy became an independent model. The new full-size RWD sedan was called the Savoy Club Sedan in the brand brochures and had a 3.8-liter 110 horsepower engine in the basic configuration, and a three-speed manual gearbox. In addition, a coupe version also was mass-produced. Buyers also could receive an additional option – a two-step automatic transmission of the company’s design – Powerflite. In total, the 1954 model year was marked by the production of 25,396 sedans and, more remarkably, almost 30,000 coupe cars!

1960 model year

Source: Hemmings

As noted earlier, every year the brand tried to update its models. 1960 was no exception: the Slant-Six inline-six engine was a novelty. Clients were offered “corporate” designs taken from other divisions. For example, Plymouth offered 361 and 383 cubic-inch V8s in addition to their earlier versions. Remarkably, these options were not mentioned in the standard Chrysler catalog, but notes about them could be found in factory brochures. One of them claimed that both of these options were available for all Plymouth models except the Valiant. In 1960, the Plymouth models were restyled. The transition to a one-piece body was a major achievement in 1960. So the 1960 model year was marked by the fact that the model switched to a one-piece body which was considered one of Savoy’s major technological advances (6-cylinder automatic cars also had aluminum bodies). 1960 was also the last year in the use of generators: Chrysler simply stopped using them. In general, in 1960, the model had two modifications – 2-door and 4-door sedans. In the basic configuration, the automobiles were equipped with V8 engines weighing 3,490 and 3500 pounds respectively. This year, 26,820 two-doors were assembled and 51,384 copies of the four-door Savoy were sold.

Did you know?

Savoy was extremely popular with filmmakers. So the 1960 release appeared in such films and TV series as Topaz (1969), Police Squad! (1982), The Rundown (2003), The World of Henry Orient (1964), Advise & Consent (1962), Siempre hay una primera vez (1971), Crisis: Behind a Presidential Commitment (1963), Jacktown (1962), The Crossroads Crash II (1973), The Twilight Zone (1959-1964), The Take (1974), The Irishman (2019), Steel Arena (1973), Girl in Trouble (1963), etc.

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