Wagoner

[Hydratech®]

Dad used to be head of styling for the Buick Division many years ago and e-mailed this sketch over this morning:

[V8TV]

Nice. What projects did your dad work on at Buick?

[Hydratech®]

I'm waiting to hear back from him and will let you know what some of the more notable ones where. He retired in '88 to the best of my recollection, so there may be some cool ones somewhere in the list. Before his Buick involvment, he was with the Cadillac design staff...

[Hydratech®]

Confirmed with dad that he had a hand in the following noteworthy designs:

* The nose of the '68 Pontiac Firebird

* The "streamers" coming off of the wheel openings and drafting rearward on the '69 Chevrolet Camaro

* The '76 Cadillac Seville (which was suprisingly a Camaro under its Cadillac wreath)

* The '79 - '85 Buick Riviera T-Type

* The '83 - '87 Buick Regal T-Type / Grand National

Makes me wish I had gone to work with him more back when I was a kid! I only remember some limited stuff from those days - huge lifesize clay models, fullsize sketches everywhere, one off concept cars like the Questor... And what a hit the Reatta was supposed to be

What's most interesting is that he predicted GM was going to experience some serious troubles many years ago, and while a little too incredulous to believe at the time, I have to say all this time later that he was actually spot on with everything he prophesized.

He is one of the guys that really did get to live the American dream! Now he's just goofing off in the deserts of Arizona

[tt69camaro]

Hi Paul,
PM sent

[ProTouring442]

Originally Posted by Hydratech

And what a hit the Reatta was supposed to be

I never really understood why Buick didn't release the Reatta as a convertible from the start.

We actually owned a '90 Reatta convertible for a few days. Great little car that got very good mileage and was quite luxurious. Fortunately it was also quite safe as I was rear-ended by a semi before I ever got the car home.

Another interesting tidbit about the Reatta is that it was built in the Oldsmobile plant in Lansing. It seems that the Olds plant was the only one capable of building what was pretty much a hand-assembled car.

Shiny Side Up!
Bill