Final Parking Space: 1971 Chrysler Newport Custom 4-Door Hardtop
An interesting way to look at automotive history through a junkyard lens is to follow the evolution of a model over time. This is fairly easy with a model that sold well decade after decade, like the Chevrolet Malibu or Honda Civic, but how about a model that was built sporadically from 1940 through 1981 and went through roller-coaster sales highs and lows during that time? The Chrysler Newport is such a car, and today we’ll follow up the 1963 Newport sedan we admired a few months ago with one of its hardtop successors from the following decade.
Chrysler redesigned its full-sized C-Body cars for the 1969 model year, giving them what was known as the “Fuselage” look.
The Newport was the most affordable of the big Chryslers for 1971, slotted beneath the 300 and New Yorker in the prestige pyramid. The Imperial also lived on the C platform at that time, but it was its own more exclusive marque and not given Chrysler badging until the 1984 model year.
This car is also a platform sibling to more affordable Dodge- and Plymouth-badged machines, the Monaco, Polara and Fury.
The Custom trim level was one step above the base 1971 Newport, with an MSRP of $4990 for the four-door hardtop (about $38,908 in 2024 dollars). The base Newport’s price tag was $4709 for the four-door post sedan ($36,717 in today’s money).
There was quite a bit of overlap involving the prices of the various C-Body cars for 1971, and a heavy hand with options could result in a lowly Fury that cost more than a Newport or even a 300. For example, the mechanically nearly identical 1971 Dodge Monaco four-door hardtop started at $4362 ($34,011 after inflation). This same sort of prestige line-blurring was taking place at Ford and GM, too.
That said, the 1971 Newport was a lot of luxury machine for the money. The problem for Chrysler Corporation, then as well as now, was that the Chrysler brand itself didn’t come with a huge amount of snob appeal.
The ’71 Newport Custom came with a high-torque 383-cubic inch big-block V-8 (that’s 6.3 liters to those of you laboring under the cruel lash of the metric system) rated at 275 horsepower as standard equipment. Pay an extra 208 bucks (1622 bucks today) and you’d get a Newport with a 440-cubic-inch (7.2-liter) V-8 rated at 335 horses.
Now let’s talk about what you didn’t get as standard equipment in your new 1971 Newport. First of all, even a single-speaker AM-only radio cost $92 ($717 now). Air conditioning started at $426 ($3322 today), and an automatic transmission set you back $241 ($1879 in 2024 dollars), although late-model-year 1971 Newports got the slushbox instead of the base three-on-the-tree manual at no extra cost. Even power steering was $125 ($975 after inflation). We’re all spoiled by the standard features we get nowadays!
The build tag says this car was built at the Jefferson Avenue plant in Detroit, where Chalmers and Maxwell cars were built starting in 1908.
It appears to have been sold new in Dallas, Texas.
Early in its driving career, this Chrysler moved to Denver. It now resides in a self-service yard across town from the long-defunct shop on the southeastern side of the city where its service was performed.
Just about every receipt affiliated with this car going back to the middle 1970s was still inside. It appears to have had one owner since at least 1978 and maybe earlier.
There were handwritten notes about maintenance and parts purchases spanning more than 35 years.
High Plains Colorado has a climate that kills padded vinyl roofs in a hurry, but the rest of the car is very solid. It could have been put back on the road without too much trouble, but that didn’t happen.
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Harry Truman’s last ride, the car is still on display at his home in Independence Mo, though Harry’s is a 1972 in this same color combo and it is a pillared sedan, none of that hardtop nonsense….. it has a personalized tag 5745, VE day date May 7, 1945. It was driven by Bess Truman until 1982 when she passed.
The car only has 19,000 miles on it.
https://www.nps.gov/hstr/learn/historyculture/the-truman-car.htm
Chysler brand sold 240K (give or take a few) cars in 1972, not a failure and in line with their norms. The fuselage Chrysler brand cars suffered from a content thrifting, especailly in 1969, that dented the sales recovery of their 65 – 68 cars. Plymouth and Dodge fared worse, and could be also considered plain (e.g., 69 Plymouth). I remember going with my dad for a new car in 69. We got a Town and Country, not much more than the very plain Plymouth, but even then I thought some areas (door trim panels) were not worthy of the brand.
Years ago a buddy came home with a ’71 Newport. We were gawking at it that night and one of us said: “That trunk is big enough to land an airplane… Then another guy said: It’s an Airport! So, I went out and found the lovely Bel Air script from a ’67 Chevy, and we cut off the ‘new’ from the name and the ‘Airport’ was born. Loved that car.