Collision with conventional wisdom
The latest Collectible Auto mag came in the mail. A compendium article on Cars of 1929 ran through familiar material until this paragraph collided head-on with my conventional wisdom:

Two automakers that specialized in hearses and ambulances, Cunningham and Sayers&Scovill, continued to offer passenger cars to the general public, albeit very few and primarily through undertakers -- which must have done wonders for weeding out idle tire-kickers.

CRASH!

Think about that in two ways.

(1) You hear that Graves Mortuary has a snazzy new Sayers Six for sale. You look at it, decide it's nothing special, but pick up a prepaid funeral for your mother-in-law while you're in the store, hoping that the preparation will speed up the Happening part of "If God Forbid Something Should Happen." The Six has served as a loss leader.

(2) You're arranging the rites for dear Uncle Zeke. Mr Graves is showing you the deluxe solid-oak caskets and cars. You select the strippo Parkwood Pine casket for dear Unc, who you didn't like much anyway, and the Sayers Glendale Eight for yourself. You deserve a fine car as a reward. The Glendale has served as a halo model.

Both scenarios are purely beyond modern imagination. This conjunction of consummation and combustion implies a much more familiar attitude toward death in the 1920s. After the 1918 flu epidemic, the unthinkable was all too easily thinkable.

I tried to trace down the surprising part but so far can't find much on the web.

This long article on Sayers & Scovill mentions the passenger models but doesn't say they were only sold by undertakers. Clearly the passenger models were initially made for use by undertakers as 'first call' cars. S&S continued as an independent hearse-maker until the 1970s; after several mergers, the name is still used on some hearses**.

An ad in Automobile Trade Journal for 1920 features the Sayers Six:


This ad was aimed at potential car dealers, not retail customers, so I wouldn't expect it to say that you're going to be competing with undertakers. It refers delicately to 'notable' vehicles.

Specs in another trade journal indicate that the Sayers Six was extremely typical of the early '20s: 'assembled' car with Continental engine, median length, median horsepower, median price. S&S offered these models for 10 years, so the quantities and profits must have been sufficient to amortize the sunk costs of design and tooling.

= = = = =

** Footnote: The starred sentence is a universal template. XXXX continued as an independent YYYY maker until the 1970s; after several mergers, the XXXX name is still used on some YYYYs. The 1970s were deadly for independent makers of EVERYTHING in America. Nixon's massive increase in enviro and "safety" regulations, combined with the shift from profit to share value, wiped out manufacturing. A few big merged companies held on for a while, keeping old names active without the old employees.

Labels: Alternate universe

  ¶ 4:18 AM