[Diego]

....

[David Brown]

Sounds like a dealers sales gimmick. I live in south Florida, and various dealers offer the "Palm Beach Edition", or "the Sunshine Edition" or something like that. Some of the western dealers offered Rocky Mountain packages, but I never heard of that Catalina.

[stevep]

Agree with David. In 1960 Van Winkle Pontiac had a 1960 Pontiac 'Mustang". In the Boston area in 1970, we had a special edition Lemans Sport called the LeMans 24, for the 24 dealers in the zone.

[Ben M.]

Sounds like a gimmick. Tinted glass was part of the air conditioning package, so basically they sold a car that had air conditioning, a rear defroster, and a block heater. Not exactly items that were hard to come by in 1970 on a full size car. Slap a dealer sticker on it and you've got an instant markup of 5% because it's "special" to Chicago, when anyone across the country could get the same thing by going to their Pontiac dealer and telling the salesman what they wanted.

[jmt455]

That's creative marketing.

[north]

You'd think they'd kick in a Safe-T-track!

How about snow tires?

[Jeff Hamlin]

Never seen this one before, but did find a newspaper write up.
I too would have thought a Safe-T-Track would be part of the package.
Wounder how many went out.






http://archives.chicagotribune.com/1...ago/index.html

[north]

Speaking of winter! Last weekend was sunny but cool, 2 hour bike ride in the morning and last Pontiac ride of the season.

But everything changed Sunday night, the old car season ended suddenly yesterday!
sorry it's upside down but it actually felt that way

[supcarbob]

I remember the 'CXL' Catalina from selling them at our dealership. It was a marketing promotion from the Chicagoland Pontiac Dealers Association. From what I found in my records we received/sold 18 of them plus 1 more we received in a dealer trade. All came in late December 1969 to mid January 1970. They were all a special brown metallic color, we were told was a 'Riviera or Buick' color' . I believe it was 1970 Buick Burnished Brown code#65. Pontiac charged $63.19 for 'special paint' on invoice. They all had Sandlewood vinyl interior and cordova vinyl tops. All were equipped with options that were regular options on any Catalina-4002bbl,decor group, fender skirts, rear window defogger. Interestingly, they had power drum brakes, not power disc like we normally ordered on 'option' equipped Catalina stock. They had 'CXL' emblems that were sent to us to be installed on the sail panels behind rear quarter glass. I have attached a photo of emblems-they sent extras back then.

[camerjeff]

Bob,

Thanks for Posting that. The Color was probably Burnished Saddle, the same color my old 70 GS Stage 1 was. It would be interesting to see if 1 survived, but being a pretty basic car advertised for winter driving I am sure the winters did them all in by 1980.
Interesting trivia.

[Lightfoot]

'CXL' is an interesting play on roman numerals.
Chicago Forty
Catalina Forty
10 per the forty-four Chicago Pontiac dealers (guess that one doesn't figure out mathematically)

The article states a heavy duty automatic trans. I wonder if TH-400 was standard in Catalina w/400 2bbl?

[north]

nope, 3 on the tree.

[Racer81x]

Nobody probablly has never seen any now because they probablly have rotted away being Chicago area cars.

[north]

Funny, makes me think of what happens when I go through my PHS collection of GTO's...

Whenever you see a car that was equipped from the factory with artic wipers the prognosis for its survival was grim! In the salt slush soup the day you bring her home from the dealer

RIP

[supcarbob]

I agree, they all rotted away. I sometimes sit with a stack of invoices and run title inquiries in Illinois and there all junked. A lot of cool cars , seems like the average life was between 8-12 years - and then gone.

[blubomber]

growing up in the 60's and 70's in Missouri and Illinois you just didn't see many old cars. The winters and the road salt ate them alive. Zeebart was a popular service back then.
I just acquired a set of arctic wipers as another option for my car. First pair I have ever seen. Similar to the type you can get at an Auto Parts store now. Now at 50 accessories on my '69 Bonneville convertible. I will be using the arctic wipers for display only.

[chicagoland]

When I was in HS, 1977-79, 1970 cars were cheap and affordable. Could get a good running one for $500-1500. If garage kept, could avoid most rust issues, but still, cars didnt last as long.

[Keith Seymore]

Growing up in the Flint/Detroit area we replaced our cars every four years.

K