Category: Checker

1980 or so Checker Marathon Wagon

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One thing became very clear to me when I researched this car, it is very difficult to tell what year it is. I see this particular Checker series went from 1960 all the way to 1982 with very minor changes in the body style. This car has obviously been semi-restored and so I don’t know if the body has been changed. For instance, there are no side lights on this car; were they removed when body work was done? To me, the semi-professional observer, the car seems to be from the later years based on the interior and the back-up lights, but who knows?

Anyway, this car is a great example of the classic Checker wagon. One other note, notice the cell phone cable on the front seat, this was clearly not an original offering.

If you do know what year the car is, please leave me a comment.

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I found this video on the Checker Wagon.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eo74UeLsQrE?feature=player_detailpage&w=640&h=360]

© Fred Winograd copyright 2009, 2013

Some Year Checker?

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I was listening to Car Talk on NPR a few weeks ago and actually answered the Puzzler they have on many of their shows. The question, to make a long story short, was what US brand name car had the same body style from the ’50s through the ’70s? The answer was Checker. So, I have no real knowledge of the year of this particular car I photographed near Tucson Arizona. It was sometime from 1958-1975 or so. Any ideas are welcomed. Please leave a comment if you know.

I found this information about Checker.

ace it: From the late 1950s to the early 1980s, American automobiles hardly changed at all. Sure, designs gradually evolved toward sleeker, lower cars; safety equipment came around; a few economy cars shook things up here and there; convertibles disappeared for a little while. But by and large, the slab-sided, carbureted, rear-wheel-drive, perimeter-framed coupes, sedans and station wagons remained just as big, just as chiseled, just as Neanderthal in their design for those three or four decades. The rest of the world called them Yank Tanks and we Americans never once thought of that as an insult.

Checker might as well have taken that phrase as its slogan and worn it proudly. The company took that lack of change during this period seriously, almost to the level of religious zeal. When the hottest trend in automobile design was glitzy chrome and sky-high fins, Checker didn’t change. When square headlamps replaced round ones, Checker didn’t change. When high horsepower and then lower emissions had the automobile industry in a frenzy, Checker hardly changed. But when the automobile industry began a wholesale change toward unibody, front-wheel-drive, fuel-injected econoboxes, Checker looked at its options and shut down the assembly line.

More Information, click here

© Fred Winograd copyright 2010