Junkyard Find: 1957 Chrysler Windsor

Murilee Martin
by Murilee Martin

It has been a while since I shared any photographs from the Brain Melting Colorado Yard, so let’s return to the amazing yard near Colorado Springs that gave us the Horizon Blue ’49 Kaiser and the ’41 Nash Airflyte. Here’s a ’57 Chrysler that’s destined to be shipped to Sweden in the near future.

The Swedes love big American cars with lots of fins and chrome, and so this car and many others near it will be dismantled and shipped to Scandinavia by a couple of Swedish restorers who make a yearly pilgrimage to the Brain Melting Yard.

The proprietor of the yard asked me to refrain from opening the hood on this car, because the hood hinges are rusty and it might be impossible to close the hood without bending the sheet metal. That means I can’t tell you for sure what engine is in this car, though I’m pretty sure it should be a 354 Poly.

Everyone thinks about Cadillacs when they picture dramatic tailfins of the late 1950s, but Chrysler made some of the wildest fins of the period. Check out the thickness of these things!



Murilee Martin
Murilee Martin

Murilee Martin is the pen name of Phil Greden, a writer who has lived in Minnesota, California, Georgia and (now) Colorado. He has toiled at copywriting, technical writing, junkmail writing, fiction writing and now automotive writing. He has owned many terrible vehicles and some good ones. He spends a great deal of time in self-service junkyards. These days, he writes for publications including Autoweek, Autoblog, Hagerty, The Truth About Cars and Capital One.

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  • GS650G GS650G on Sep 17, 2012

    I've looked at one of these every day for 8 years, in my neighbors driveway. It can start but doesn't drive. Sometimes it is covered but most times not. He is some days convinced he will restore it, other days not willing to sell it because he is convinced it is worth a lot of money. Post contact information for the Swedes. His is in much better shape than the Brain Melting Yard example and if they could offer him enough money I am sure he would change his mind.

  • Jerry Curler Jerry Curler on Jun 17, 2013

    Does anyone know the name of this yard? Looks cool enough just to walk around.

  • Mike Beranek To have any shot at future relevance, Cadillac needs to lean into it's history and be itself. That means investing real money into differentiating them from the usual GM "parts bin" strategy.Build big cars with big, bespoke engines. Build a giant convertible with suicide doors. Build Escalades that aren't just Yukons with bling. Bring back the CT6, but make it available at a more reasonable price, to balance out the halo models.Build cars that famous people want to be seen in. That's what made Cadillac what it was.
  • Wolfwagen Cadillac's naming scheme makes more sense than Lincoln's ever did
  • Redapple2 Cadillac, Acura and Infiniti have very tough rows to hoe.
  • Redapple2 First question: How do you define Sales Success?1 they ve lost more than 35% of all dealers in the last 5 years.2 transition to BEV will cost Billions. No money for new designs3 cars for #2 above have already been designed in BEV form and wont be redone significantly for - what- 10 years? 3b-Lyric and whatever its called are medusa level ugly. How could this design theme be fuglier than arts and science? Evil gm did though4 the market is poisoned. 1/3 of folks with $ would never consider one/ridicule the product. Under 40 yr olds dont even know the brand exists.It is dead and doesn't know it. Like a Vampire.
  • Redapple2 Focus and Fiesta are better than Golf? (overall?) I liked the rentals I had. I would pick these over a Malibu even though it was a step down in class and the rental co would not reduce price.
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