Junkyard Discover: 1969 Chrysler Newport 4-Door Sedan

Chrysler redesigned the massive C-Physique automobiles for the 1969 mannequin yr, calling the vaguely airplane-ish curved-panel look the “Fuselage Fashion.” Though the prole-grade Fury and middlebrow Dodge Monaco appeared distressingly much like their upscale Imperial and Chrysler New Yorker/300/Newport siblings within the 1969-1973 Fuselage period (additional blurring the Snoot Issue dividing traces among the many Chrysler divisions), these automobiles supplied loads of Detroit metal at an excellent price. Right here’s some of the inexpensive Chrysler-badged C-Our bodies obtainable through the first yr of Fuselage Styling, present in a Denver-area car graveyard.

On the high of the 1969 Chrysler C-Physique pyramid (the Imperial was its personal marque throughout this era) stood the New Yorker, which got here with all types of Michigan Plushitude and high-tech features. Under that got here the 300, after which a number of increasingly-affordable variations of the Newport. Immediately’s Junkyard Discover is a bottom-of-the-food-chain Newport four-door put up sedan.

MSRP on this car began at $4,252 (about $31,240 in 2021 clams), which compares favorably to the $6,772 sticker on the very comparable Imperial LeBaron however looks like a huge price soar over the additionally-very-similar $2,744 Plymouth Fury I. Positive, you bought an amusingly underpowered Slant-6 engine and three-on-the-tree column-shift guide transmission in your Fury for that price, however the two automobiles would look practically similar from a block away.

Just like the Fury, the Newport features phony “stitching” molded into the plastic of the sprint and door panels.

Nevertheless, this car has the upscale power-seat choice, obtainable in idea within the Fury I however nearly by no means ordered; surprisingly, the unique purchaser didn’t get the power-window choice as effectively.

Smoker vent home windows went away from the Newport after 1970.

Air-con was a $406 choice (shut to a few grand at the moment), and this AM radio obtained rung up for $92 (about $675 now). Even in one other yr with nuttin’ to do, the hip Newport purchaser desired refrigerated air and driving music.

No lowly six-cylinder or small-block V8 was obtainable within the 1969 Newport. The bottom engine was the 383-cubic-inch (6.3-liter) big-block V8, rated at 290 optimistic gross horsepower. Your Chrysler seller in all probability might have organized to have the New Yorker’s 350-horse 440 put in in a Newport, however it could have made extra sense to only purchase a New Yorker.

The 1969 Newport’s manufacturing facility brochure lists the three-speed Torqueflite automated transmission as an choice, which means that the bottom transmission was a three-on-the-tree guide. I’ve a tough time believing that any big-block/three-on-the-tree ’69 Newports ever noticed the sunshine of day, however stranger issues have occurred within the automotive world.

That is the “elegant sheath of Jacquard-weave cloth-and-vinyl upholstery” gushed over by Chrysler’s enthusiastic copywriting crew, 52 years later.

I don’t recall seeing factory-applied decals referring to Public Regulation 89-563 on every other automobiles in my travels.

A Guarantee Validation sticker from the day Georgia authorised the nineteenth Modification will go to The Crusher with this car. These stickers have been utilized by sellers after performing warranty-mandated repairs.

This starship’s days of cruising the galaxy are over, sadly. Non-hardtop Detroit sedans of this period don’t get rescued by fanatics.

Doug Sanders drove a ’69 Newport, and its interior matched his golf sneakers and socks; only a yr after he did this commercial, he achieved lasting renown for lacking a three-foot putt on the 1970 Open Championship. Doug handed away final April.

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