As part of MotorTrend’s 75th anniversary, we look back at some of history’s most significant cars. A complete list would fill a book, so for each decade we select five notable vehicles that helped shape automotive history.
Introduction to the 1970s
Could the 1970s be the worst decade in American automotive history? Two energy crises, a reckoning with pollution, a flood of high-quality imports from Japan, and the rise of the Me Generation—all these influences collided, throwing the American auto industry for a loop as it scrambled to build cars that could meet new safety and emissions regulations and rapidly changing consumer tastes. Few truly great cars emerged from this troubled decade, but there were some significant cars that pointed toward the future—or held tight to the last strained links with the past.
1970 AMC Gremlin
The Gremlin? Really? Yes, really! While GM and Ford poured time and money into developing new compacts to rival the imports, strapped-for-cash American Motors Corp. dug into its parts bin to create the Gremlin, which achieved its unique shape through the weight-saving expedient of lopping off the car’s entire back end. The Gremlin was a surprise hit: It was simple and reliable, and it felt instantly familiar, offering small-car maneuverability and better-than-average gas mileage with a traditional big-car feel and none of the new-tech teething problems that plagued the Chevrolet Vega and the Ford Pinto. When OPEC shut the oil taps, Gremlin sales exploded (as opposed to the Pinto, where it was the car that exploded). The Gremlin would become the second-bestselling car in AMC’s history and a legend of 1970s design. It proved the domestic carmakers could compete on their own terms with German and Japanese imports—for a while, at least.
1973 Ford Country Squire
For decades, big wagons were America’s family car of choice. Ford’s LTD Country Squire, the penultimate version built between 1973 and 1978, represents the pinnacle of the type before it gave way to the minivan and the SUV. With a big V-8 up front and two-way “magic tailgate” out back, Ford’s full-size wagon was the ultimate do-everything vehicle: It could seat up to 10 (!) passengers, tow up to 7,000 pounds, and accommodate a 4×8 sheet of plywood in its cavernous cargo bay. Its trademark full-length “wood grain vinyl appliqué,” cheesy though it was, linked it to the beautiful wood-bodied station wagons of the classic era. The 1973 oil embargo slashed Country Squire sales by more than half, but as oil prices eased, Americans cautiously migrated back to big wagons. It took Chrysler’s seminal 1984 minivan to end America’s love affair with these utilitarian goliaths.
1975 Honda Civic CVCC
Domestic automakers complained that new emissions standards would force the use of catalytic converters, driving up car prices and limiting consumer choice—sound familiar? It seemed a valid argument until Honda introduced the Compound Vortex Controlled Combustion engine, which met emissions standards without a cat. While the system wasn’t perfect—MotorTrend noticed a tendency for the engine to flood when warm-started—it was an embarrassment to the rest of the auto industry. With sales boosted by the OPEC oil embargo, the Honda Civic introduced a broader swath of buyers to the company’s quality and durability, helping “Made in Japan” go from a phrase of derision to one of admiration. Like the Volkswagen Beetle before it, the Civic challenged America’s notion of what a car could be, eschewing extravagance for a more utilitarian transportation solution. The Civic helped increase the acceptance of imports in our market and marked the beginning of the success Japanese automakers enjoyed for decades to follow.
1977 General Motors Full-Size Cars
General Motors was known for swaying market forces rather than being swayed by them, but the 1973 OPEC oil embargo and looming federal fuel economy standards created outside pressures the likes of which Detroit had never been subjected to. GM made the momentous decision to downsize its cars, starting with the profitable full-size models—not just the low-cost models but every single car from Chevrolet to Cadillac, all at once. Compared to their predecessors, the cars lost an average of 10 inches and 800 pounds, yet they offered more interior space and clean, modern styling. This monumental risk paid off with huge sales and a MotorTrend Car of the Year award for the ’77 Chevy Caprice. As Ford and Chrysler rushed to downsize their biggest cars, GM was already introducing trimmer versions of its intermediates. When a second oil crisis hit in 1979, GM sales held steady, and the smaller big cars remained viable well into the 1980s.
1978 Dodge Omni/Plymouth Horizon
Chrysler was underwater and drowning fast, its showrooms littered with oversized early-70s relics, and then the L-body showed up: America’s first front-wheel-drive, transverse-engine subcompact car. Although they had European roots and bore a striking similarity to the Volkswagen Rabbit (early models even used VW-sourced engines), the Omni and Horizon managed to feel uniquely American. MotorTrend named the L-body twins Car of the Year for 1978, and the closely related Chrysler Horizon won European Car of the Year in 1979. The L-bodies showed Chrysler’s willingness to pivot in order to save itself, almost like a dress rehearsal for the K-cars that later turned the company around in the 1980s. Chrysler would ultimately rebrand the outdated twins as the Omni America and Horizon America, with a generous feature set and low prices that extended their relevance right through the next decade.
MotorTrend thanks Matt Anderson, automotive historian and curator of transportation at The Henry Ford Musem of American Innovation, for his assistance with our Most Significant Cars of the Decades series.
