Junkyard Find: 1978 Chrysler Cordoba
We all make fun of the Cordoba now, but we mustn’t forget that Chrysler’s personal luxury coupe sold quite well back in the day, helping slow the company’s slide towards what appeared to be certain doom. I’m going to follow up yesterday’s junked early-70s personal luxury coupe with one built a little later in the decade.
Yes, the Cordoba was once a fairly common sight on North American roads. It was based on Chrysler’s venerable B platform, which means this car is a close relative of the General Lee and the Plymouth Superbird.
Of course, what we all remember about the Cordoba (which Chrysler’s marketers decided to pronounce with the stress on the second syllable, rather than the way the residents of its namesake city— Córdoba, Spain— do it) is Ricardo Montalban’s TV ads. Even if your parents weren’t even born when the Cordoba was new, you know about “soft Corinthian Leather.” Yes, that’s soft, not rich. You’ll win some trivia contests with that knowledge.
Speaking of soft Corinthian Leather, check out this comfy living room of a car interior! By 1978, the Corinthian Leather seats (technically an option, but I’ve yet to see a Cordoba with the base velour seats) in the Cordoba were a little less pimpin’ than the ’75 model’s deep-tufted buckets, but they still made shoppers in the Chrysler/Plymouth showroom feel they were being cheap for even considering the Fury and its cheapo vinyl upholstery. Yes, I went back and bought this car’s bench seat.
By the time of the Cordoba’s fourth model year, sales were declining a bit. Ricardo was still helping to move that iron, though!
360 cubic inches. How many horses? Who cares? Soft Corinthian Leather!
What happened to opera lights on Detroit luxury machines? Let’s import some opera lights from Detroit for the ’13 Chryslers!
That’s AM and FM radio right there. There was a time, believe it or not, when thieves would steal factory FM radios.
Including the steering wheel, fenders, door panels, and taillight lenses, I counted seven of these “golden” Cordoba medallions on the car. I believe there should be one more for the hood ornament, but this example (found in a Denver self-service yard) lacks that component.
Then there’s the Cordoba badging on the trunklid, fenders, and dash.
The original Cordoba “chronometer” was a mechanical-digital deal, but Chrysler found a source for an LED (or maybe green fluorescent) version. I might have to go back and get this fine clock for my collection, to accompany the beautiful digital clock I pulled from this ’80 Toyota Cressida.
“I know my own needs, and what I need from an automobile I get from this new… Cordoba.”
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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What helped sales was the Chrysler branding. To middle aged buyers in the 70's, it was same as Olds/Buick, and as "small" as they'd go. Calling the same car a Dodge Charger SE, merely 3 years after the Hemi was dropped, however, was dead wrong.
i would like to purchase a few items from this cordoba if you could contact me on my number thats would be easier for me on 309-644-0782 or comment back thank you!