Hickory Corners, MI – General Motors was the largest corporation in the world in the 1950s and the Motorama show was taken to the general public to tantalize the audiences on how the cars might look in the future. The GM Motorama traveled each year from 1953 until 1962 to all the major cities and even some smaller ones in the United States.

From 1949 to 1961, General Motors’ traveling Motorama shows turned new-car introductions into Broadway‑style spectacle. Held in grand hotels and auditoriums across the country, Motorama combined concept cars, orchestras, singers, dancers, and dramatic lighting to immerse visitors in a vision of the future. Promotional films such as ‘Design for Dreaming’ carried this experience even further, using song, dance, and fantasy sequences to sell not just automobiles, but a complete modern lifestyle.

In an era before television, the internet, and social media, Motorama was how millions of Americans first encountered cutting‑edge automotive design and technology. The eight Motorama cars displayed here from the Joe Bortz auto collection—survivors of a show that was meant to be temporary—offer a rare chance to feel that excitement again. As you move through the exhibit, imagine the crowds, the music, and the spotlights, and experience these ‘dream cars’ as audiences did then: as rolling promises of the world to come.

Beginning in April 2026, and continuing for twelve months, the Gilmore Car Museum will present a special exhibition of eight original General Motors Motorama dream cars from the collection of Joe Bortz Auto Collection. Bortz invites today’s enthusiasts to step back into the 1950s and 1960s Motorama era and experience the same excitement and sense of wonder that greeted these futuristic automobiles when they first appeared under the spotlights.

The Eight Motorama cars
to be on display

1953 Buick Wildcat I

1953 Pontiac Parisienne

1954 Pontiac Bonneville Special

1955 Chevrolet Biscayne

1955 LaSalle Roadster & 1955 LaSalle Sedan

1960 Pontiac X-400

1964 Pontiac XP833 aka Banshee Roadster

Please check out the Motorama videos below to get a real feel for the theatrics that accompanied the presentation of the dream cars of tomorrow. 

6865 W Hickory Road,
Hickory Corners, MI 49060
(269) 671-5089
https://gilmorecarmuseum.org/

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Buick turned 50 years old in 1953 and celebrated its birthday in style. The company delayed the release of its new V-8 until this model year, improved the Dynaflow (which some had called “Dyna-slush”), updated its B- and C-body cars for the final time in that styling cycle and released the new Skylark, a sporty-looking, limited-production, factory-customized model.

Buick’s new “Fireball” V-8 displaced 322 cubic inches in its original form, and when installed in the Skylark or Roadmaster, it produced its maximum horsepower of 188 units at 4,000 rpm. For comparison, the V-8 for the Super series, equipped with a two-barrel carburetor and with a compression ratio of 8.0:1, was rated at 170 hp at 4,000 rpm. Performance of the Skylark-Roadmaster engine was better due to a four-barrel carburetor and a higher compression ratio of 8.5:1. The basic engine was used by Buick through 1966. Incidentally, the old 263-cid straight-eight still powered the Special, but it received an improved combustion chamber resulting in slightly higher horsepower.

A “Twin-Turbine Dynaflow” helped deliver 10 percent more torque to the rear wheels. It felt less “slushy” and was also quieter than the original design.

Styling refinements for the 1953 Buick line included a raised front fender and hood line and a taller deck. Oval headlamp bezels, much like those of the 1951 Buick XP-300 concept car, were also included.

The Skylark was inspired by drawings penned by designer Ned Nickles showing a customized 1951 Buick convertible. Buick’s general manager, Ivan Wiles, liked Nickles’ ideas so much he thought a special show car, which was dubbed “Skylark,” should be built for the 1952 auto show circuit. According to the book, “The Buick: A Complete History”, by Terry Dunham and Lawrence Gustin, the prototype was first shown to the public in July of 1952. The Skylark prototype, equipped with Carlo Borrani wire wheels, was claimed to be the “answer to the European sports car,” though how such a big car could be labeled a sports car seems beyond explanation today. However, most of the American public had little familiarity with true sports cars, which handled and performed far differently than any of the heavy “land yachts” of the era. The Skylark had some sporty attributes and evidently that was enough to justify the sports car label. 

A Buick press release said the Skylark would be put into production if there was enough interest shown in it. In reality, though, it was already scheduled for production. The model was announced in October 1952 and production commenced the following January. Deliveries to dealers began some weeks later. Along with the limited-production Oldsmobile Fiesta, Cadillac Eldorado and Chevrolet Corvette convertibles, the Skylark was the focus of its General Motors division’s display at the 1953 GM Motorama. These convertibles were show cars that people could actually take home, unlike the exotic dream cars also on display at the Motorama.

Based on the Roadmaster convertible, the body of the Skylark (Model 76X) received a “chopped” windshield instead of the wraparound type as found on the Fiesta and Eldorado, a lowered and notched beltline and radiused rear wheel openings. A “bomb sight” hood ornament was recessed into the hood and the now-traditional Buick “Ventiports” were deleted from the front fenders. The top of the front seat was lowered to align exactly with the beltline, resulting in a car that appeared dramatically lower as compared to other 1953 Buick models. Indeed, it was about 3 inches lower. Just as GM’s dream cars were predictive of future styling characteristics, the Skylark was, too, since Buick’s 1954 models would get radiused wheel openings and the sweepspear trim. The 1953 Skylark’s special body sat on a Roadmaster chassis with a wheelbase of 127 inches.

Enhancing the sporty look of the production version of the Skylark was a set of 40-spoke, chrome-plated Kelsey-Hayes wire wheels. (These wheels were an extra-cost option for other Buick models.) Its radiused rear wheel openings helped to show off the glittering wheels. Sweeping over the wheel openings was what advertising described as a “rapier styled sweepspear” molding unique to this model. The sweepspear would soon become a calling card appearing in one form or another on Buick’s cars into the 1970s. Its shape helped to highlight the fender line that flowed into the door and the hopped-up quarters.

In addition to the wire wheels, standard equipment for the Skylark included tinted glass, whitewall tires, leather upholstery with narrow pleats, special carpeting, foot-controlled signal-seeking “Selectronic” radio, tinted glass, heater, power brakes, power steering, power seat, power windows, power antenna, power top (which was of synthetic Orlon) and Skylark-scripted door sill plates along with the 188-hp 322 four-barrel V-8 and the Twin-Turbine Dynaflow transmission. Furthermore, the owner’s signature was sealed into the gold-colored emblem placed on the steering wheel hub. With a price tag of $5,000, the special model was priced nearly $1,500 more than a Roadmaster convertible and about $700 more than a Cadillac Series Sixty Special.

One prototype 1953 Skylark hardtop was built (though two have been claimed to have been built) by Buick Engineering in Flint. However, the roofline combined with the dipped beltline appeared awkward, and no production versions were forthcoming.

Sales for the 1953 Buicks were exceptionally strong. A total of 488,805 were sold, the second best output in Buick’s history and over 50 percent more than the number produced for 1952. Of those nearly half-million Buicks, only 1,690 were Skylarks. 

One of those, the car shown here, is owned by Rick Smith, of Longview, Texas. Rick is well-known among restorers of 1950s Cadillacs, though he recently retired from his parts supplying business and sold off most of his parts, parts cars and some of his collection of cars (including another 1953 Skylark) at an auction held in 2018.

Smith has owned this Skylark for more than 20 years, although the opportunity to finally restore the car occurred only about eight years ago. The car came from a Buick dealer in Alabama who drove the car in the 1970s.

The Skylark returned for 1954, but was based on a production body which helped to lower its price. The car’s rear styling was unique to the model, making it a standout. Only 798 were built and the proposed 1955 Skylark never went beyond the drawing board.

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This one-of-a-kind “proposal car” is an integral part of the Corvette story, with a fascinating history that dates to early 1953—well before the first production models rolled off the assembly line in Flint, Mich.

Prior to series Corvette production, which commenced on June 30, 1953, Chevrolet built approximately 15 hand-laid fiberglass Corvette bodies intended for experimental or Motorama use. These hand-built show cars were not assigned standard VINs, but were instead referred to by internal codes. One such code was EX-52, the first Corvette prototype unveiled to the public at New York’s Waldorf Astoria Hotel in January 1953. Like other General Motors experimental and factory custom cars, all of these show cars additionally received Shop Order (S.O.) numbers. Among the known S.O. numbers are those for some of the 1954 GM Motorama show cars based on 1954 Corvettes: the Corvair (S.O. 2071), Nomad (S.O. 1954) and hardtop (S.O. 2000). As documented in internal GM memos, many of these show cars were destroyed or reused for other projects and then destroyed. As a result, precious few of these Motorama-era prototypes survive today.

The storied past of S.O. 2151

The history of this unique Corvette originates with S.O. 2000, the pale-yellow Corvette hardtop prototype that debuted at the 1954 GM Motorama. According to accounts, at least two of these show cars were built and it is believed that one was retired in January 1954 so its body could be reassigned to a new project—S.O. 2151 (GM is known to have assigned a new S.O. number to a vehicle when it returned to the GM Styling shop).

This Corvette was returned to GM’s famous Art and Colour department overseen by legendary designer Harley Earl. In its new role, S.O. 2151 served as the department’s prototype 1955 Corvette proposal for GM management to review as it determined the look of next year’s Corvette.

During this process, the Corvette body was restyled to incorporate several notable proposed features: a decorative hood scoop, egg-crate front grille, bumper-exit exhaust tips and a distinctive trunk design much like the trunk seen on S.O. 2071, the fastback Corvair show car. Another prominent element of the new design was the slanted front-fender vents that were painted body color on the passenger side and trimmed with chrome on the driver side, thus giving GM executives two different looks from which to choose.

Similarly, the Corvette script was placed high on one side and low on the other. It also incorporated a large gold “V” to signify that the 1955 Corvette would be available with a V-8 engine. Once these changes were implemented, the body was repainted Bermuda Green, a beautiful jade-like metallic green used on production GM vehicles of the period, as well as another famous show car, the 1955 Corvette Biscayne (XP-037/S.O. 2249).

Photographed in GM’s design studio in March 1954, S.O. 2151 was mounted on a new 1954 Corvette chassis, powered by an experimental engine equipped with a high-performance solid-lifter camshaft. The 1955 proposal car was officially completed on July 30, 1954, as evidenced by the S.O. tag riveted inside the engine bay.

In the end, the 1955 proposal car’s unique features never made it to production. Facing stagnant sales and new competition from the recently announced Ford Thunderbird, GM executives decided to completely re-imagine the Corvette for 1956. Meanwhile, the 1955 Corvette was virtually identical to the 1954 model, albeit with a new, optional V-8 engine. That year, Ford dominated the market, its new Thunderbird outselling the Corvette 30 to 1.

A significant survival

As for S.O. 2151, it escaped the fate of most GM prototypes. Instead of being destroyed or rebuilt into a new show car, this one-off somehow slipped through the cracks and eventually made its way to California.

While little is known of its earliest whereabouts, by 1963, the Corvette had been sold to Auto Center, a car dealership located in downtown San Jose, Calif. In 1974, Richard Oldham, a Corvette collector and owner of Empire Chevrolet in Novato, Calif., acquired the car in “basket case” condition. Although most of the paint had been stripped from its bodywork, and many of its unique prototype features were missing, the Corvette still retained its signature fender vents, drivetrain and riveted S.O. 2151 tag.

The following year, Oldham advertised the Corvette for sale with an asking price of $3,000. This immediately attracted the interest of George F. Campbell, who purchased it based on the advice of his friend, noted Corvette historian Noland Adams. Over the next four decades, Mr. Campbell collected parts and researched the car’s history in anticipation of a future restoration.

Following Mr. Campbell’s passing, the Corvette was acquired by the current owner, an Indiana-based enthusiast with more than 45 years of experience in the restoration business. Although he has restored 15 cars for the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Museum and many significant and one-off muscle cars, the owner reports that this restoration was his greatest challenge, and he regards it as his “magnum opus.”

Throughout the restoration process, which consumed three years and more than 1,800 hours, the owner painstakingly researched the car’s history and studied period photographs to ensure that the restoration was as accurate as possible, including expertly re-creating any of the missing trim pieces. During the disassembly phase, evidence of the car’s S.O. 2000 origins were uncovered with sections of original pale-yellow and Bermuda Green paint found in several locations. The bodywork also possesses the telltale characteristics unique to the earliest Corvette prototypes—crude, hand-laid fiberglass construction; a one-piece body structure; and custom-fabricated brass trunk hinges. The chassis was also found to be remarkably original and intact, complete with its original shock absorbers, brake shoes, and experimental engine block, all numbered with appropriate early-1954 date codes.

Every effort was made to return the car to its authentic 1954 appearance with remnants of the original pale-yellow and Bermuda Green paint intentionally preserved in hidden areas, such as the trunk and behind the seats, to provide clear evidence of the car’s earliest days as a GM factory prototype. The body, including the doors, are original to S.O. 2151, also the brake shoes, shocks, frame and drivetrain sitting on original 1954 tires were all installed by the manufacturer in 1954. The car’s drivetrain remains original and numbers-matching.

Since its restoration was completed, S.O. 2151 has been shown just once, at The Amelia Concours d’Elegance, in March 2023. There, it was selected by Bill Warner to receive the prestigious The Founders Award.

Chevrolet’s earliest advertisements for the Corvette featured the tag line, “The first of the dream cars to come true.” That statement is most certainly appropriate for S.O. 2151, one of the few Motorama-era prototypes that escaped destruction to survive today. A fascinating and utterly unique piece of GM history, this magnificently restored Corvette design study proposal represents an exciting opportunity for any collector who appreciates this golden age of the American automotive industry.

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The most original, unrestored General Motors Motorama show car in existence is, without a doubt, the 1954 Pontiac Bonneville Special. The car still carries its original hand-applied bronze metallic lacquer paint finish, interior, engine and drivetrain. The fiberglass body is nearing 70 years old and carries the right amount of patina to validate its originality while retaining its show-car “wow” factor.

The accompanying photo-shoot was done nearly a decade ago at a location near Highland Park, Ill., that overlooks Lake Michigan, yet the car looks exactly the same today. With its scenic background overlooking the lake, it’s one of owner Joe Bortz’s favorite locations. Amazingly, Bortz drove the Bonneville Special about a mile from his collection to the lake-side location and acted as my “turn-style operator” when it was time to change the car’s position for the photo-shoot. However, it wasn’t the first time the Bonneville Special had been rotated for the cameras.

An exciting new Pontiac

The Pontiac Bonneville Special concept car (aka “dream car”) was unveiled at the traveling GM Motorama show in 1954. The GM Motorama was held from 1953 to 1961 and grew out of the 1949 GM Transportation Unlimited and 1950 Mid-Century Motorama shows, each launched by GM in conjunction with the annual New York Auto Show traditionally held the first week of January. At these events that preceded the GM Motorama, prototype GM cars, such as the forthcoming 1949 two-door hardtops and specially trimmed and painted production cars, were displayed alongside the production cars available to the public.

During 1951 and 1952, GM showed its prototypes and show cars at auto shows held in various cities across North America, but did not conduct its own shows due to curbed automobile production during the Korean War. The GM show cars that appeared at the 1951 and ’52 multi-make shows included the Buick XP-300 and the GM Le Sabre concept cars, both of which caused a stir that likely encouraged GM to field a much larger array of show cars at its own GM Motorama shows featuring only GM cars. Featured at the GM Motoramas were additional specially trimmed production vehicles as well as new futuristic concept cars with innovative design features intended to test public reaction and with experimental mechanical features that might just make it onto future GM vehicles.

For 1953, GM pulled out all the stops by hosting its GM Motorama at seven cities with six concept cars from its divisions. The thrill continued into 1954 at six stops with 13 new concept show cars—and that figure doesn’t include the specially modified production cars built into show cars! Among the concept cars displayed at the 1954 GM Motorama was the bronze Bonneville Special owned since the 1980s by Joe Bortz.

Building the Bonneville Special

The Bonneville Special is the first two-seat sports car prototype GM’s Pontiac division had ever produced. Reportedly conceived by the legendary Harley J. Earl, GM Vice President of Styling, and designed by Homer C. LaGassey and Pontiac’s chief designer, Paul Gillan, the Bonneville Special was a grand touring sport coupé that incorporated innovative styling features such as a Plexiglas canopy with gull-wing windows on a sleek fiberglass body.

The name “Bonneville” was meant to convey high performance, a new concept to GM’s Pontiac brand which had been known for building staid, reliable cars. The name was inspired by a trip Earl had taken to the Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah to observe speed trials there. The 1954 Bonneville Special was the first GM vehicle to carry the Bonneville name, which was subsequently given to the division’s full-size performance production car starting in 1957 and was then continuously used by Pontiac for 47 years on a multitude of body designs.

“The story goes that Harley Earl went to the Bonneville Salt Flats to watch the cars race and was so impressed that he decided to design a concept/dream car for the General Motors Motorama named after the Bonneville Salt Flat races, and decided to give it to the Pontiac Division,” Bortz says. Earl even requested that the state of Utah create “GM 000” license plates for the Bonneville Special.

Although named for a parcel of land hallowed by racers, the Bonneville Special design was actually borne from the air.

“One of the elements that was in play in the early 1950s was the fact that airplanes were now powered by jet engines rather than rotary-prop engines,” Bortz says. “Harley Earl designed the 1954 Bonneville Special to have it use many of the styling cues of a jet plane, including a realistic dome cockpit with wing doors and a back end… that mimicked the back end of the jet-plane fuselage with a spare tire cover that looks like the back end of a jet plane, and hubcaps that look like the insides of the jet turbine of a jet engine. Then the headlights were covered to make the car appear more aerodynamic. The instrumentation and even the floor mats were reminiscent of what would be the appearance of the cockpit of a jet-engine-powered plane.”

Two Bonneville Special prototypes were built; the first Bonneville Special was painted metallic bronze and the second an emerald green. The metallic bronze car debuted at the Grand Ballroom of the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in New York, the first stop on the 1954 GM Motorama.

The exterior design of the sporty Bonneville Specials mated a Space Age, twin-blade jet-plane tail with a sloping, Corvette-esque nose. As Bortz notes, the rounded front-end featured curved lenses covering the Bonneville Special’s recessed headlamps, which were integrated into front fenders that rose over the wheels and then fell back to the beltline. Six vertical chrome strips decorated the bottom of the grille opening. The rectangular, undecorated grille opening fed air to the radiator and formed the starting point for twin Pontiac “Silver Streaks” that ran over the hood to a pair of low air scoops near the cowl. The Silver Streaks were a body detail unique to Pontiacs manufactured from 1935 to 1956 where bright metal bands ran down the middle of the hood and, early on, the decklid. Born in the Art Deco style of the mid 1930s, the Silver Streaks were meant as a visual cue to help distinguish Pontiacs from their competitors, and to create the illusion of speed. On the Bonneville Special, a pair were used, which was the second time that two ribbed Silver Streaks appeared on a Pontiac; the first time was on the 1953 Parisienne, another Motorama concept car incidentally also owned by Bortz. In 1957, Pontiac discontinued the Silver Streaks.

The Bonneville Special’s rear fenders likewise rose over the wheels, then fell even with the beltline to form the rear blade-type rear fenders that Bortz notes were inspired by jets. Fully integrated between the rear fender blades was the covered rear spare tire with an exposed turbine-looking aluminum wheel matching the other four wheels. Large, round taillamps were incorporated into the back edge of the bladed rear fenders in a fashion similar to production Pontiacs in the only exterior clue that the Bonneville Special had come from Pontiac.

Body-side ornamentation on the Bonneville Special’s fiberglass body was relatively minimal. There were two aluminum ornaments machined to appear to be oil coolers behind each front wheel opening. The thin vertical front bumpers followed the rounded leading edge of the fender tip much like the Corvette bumperettes of the period, although the Bonneville Specials’ bumperettes lacked the horizontal component of the Corvette’s front bumperettes. At the back, the only semblance of a bumper was chrome built into the bottom of the rear tips of the bladed fenders.

Bortz’s unrestored Bonneville Special is amazingly well preserved, and sitting in the once-futuristic concept car is a trip back in time. It wouldn’t be accurate to say the bronze leather upholstery and chrome-trimmed interior show their age; rather, they have mellowed with time and to ever consider restoring them would be downright shameful. Upon settling into the driver’s seat, the details of the cockpit become more evident, such as the recessed door panels that increase elbow room and the car’s many jet-plane influences, from the instrument panel to the console.

The cockpit of the Bonneville Special features bucket seats split by a full-length console with a brushed surface extending from another ribbed oil cooler trim piece to beneath the full-width instrument panel. A small automatic gearshift handle, two vent controls and the ignition lock are centrally placed within the console. Instruments are laid out with a large speedometer in front of the driver and six more aircraft-type gauges horizontally spread across the instrument panel to in front of the passenger seat. A racing-style three-spoke steering wheel suggests Salt Flats-type performance—and predicted the steering wheel that would appear on 1956 Corvettes.

Entry to the Bonneville Special’s cabin was through conventionally hinged frameless doors and gull-winged Plexiglas panels integrated into its see-through canopy. A dramatically curved rear window completes the “bubble top” in back and provides excellent rearward visibility.

Design carry-overs from the Bonneville Special quickly made it into the next year’s production models, and in those to follow. Most conspicuous were the dual Silver Streaks, which appeared on the hood and rear fender tops of 1955 and ’56 Pontiacs, as well as Pontiac’s 1956 Club de Mer concept car. The Bonneville Special’s scoops were designed to channel cool air into the driver’s compartment from the front of the car and also appeared on the Club de Mer.

Like many GM concept cars of the era, the Bonneville Special was a fully functioning vehicle. Pontiac reportedly planned to fit it with its new V-8 engine, but the V-type powerplant wasn’t ready in time for production cars and so the Bonneville Special made do with Pontiac’s aged straight-eight, although with modifications. The most notable changes to the Bonneville Special’s high-output straight-eight was a quartet of side-draft carburetors, a long-duration cam and a chrome-plated cylinder head. These and other undisclosed engine modifications reportedly raised the engine’s original 122 hp to what Pontiac claimed was 230 hp. Sharing the “Silver Streak” name used for the flathead straight-eight that powered production cars, it was Pontiac’s most powerful engine to date. Painted bright red and detailed in chrome, the engine was coupled to a four-speed Hydra-Matic automatic transmission.

Landing the Bonneville Specials

Bortz doesn’t specifically recall seeing the Bonneville Special when it was new, but he was at the GM Motorama’s stop at the International Amphitheatre in Chicago from April 24 to May 2, 1954.

“When I was 12, I went to the International Amphitheatre, and I was there for the GM Motorama,” he says. “I was still kind of short and couldn’t see the cars through the crowd, so I would tap these tall guys and ask if I could get up on their shoulders, and some guys would let me do that. My biggest thrill would have been to get to the front row.

“I do remember being there and seeing the cars, and I kind of have a recollection of [the bronze Bonneville Special] being there on the stand. It was on the highest turn table; the Bonneville Special was their number one show car.”

In 1985, Bortz added the Bonneville Special to his growing concept car collection, which he had begun about five years earlier.

“Fran Roxas called me and he said, ‘Joe, you like those concept cars. Well, I got a story for you,’” Bortz recalled. “‘There was a guy that got a hold of the Motorama Pontiac Bonneville Special and he had it on display at the Detroit Historical Society, and it was on the main floor of their museum from the time he loaned it to them in 1958 until 1985.’

“[The museum] got a new curator and he said, ‘You can’t leave a display up for 30 years, people won’t come back,’” Bortz related. “And the owner said, ‘If you don’t put it back upstairs, we are going to sell the car.’ So Fran Roxas got word on that and I called the guy up and he told me about the car. He said, ‘The car is 100 percent original. Nothing has been touched. Most of the air in the tires is from 1954. [A previous owner] was some low-level GM executive and they signed the car out to him. So I quickly, quickly brought it home. I brought it home with my station wagon and an open trailer!”

The late GM designer Dave Holls, who respected Bortz for saving GM concept cars, researched the Bonneville Special for Bortz and told him GM records showed it was the only example built. Once Bortz’s Bonneville Special started to appear in magazines stating it was the only such car, Bortz received a phone call from the owner of a second Bonneville Special.

“In the late 1980s, I got a call from a guy and he said, ‘Why are you telling everyone you have the only Bonneville Special? I have one, too,’” Bortz recalled. Bortz suspected the caller’s car was a custom that was built to appear like his original Bonneville Special, but once he received a photocopy of a picture of the car, he realized there was, indeed, a second. A couple years later, Bortz bought that originally green Bonneville Special, too.

“The way the second one got built, by the way, was whenever they made a fiberglass concept car, they (GM) made a second body mold to put into storage. The reason was if they cracked up a fender, you could cut it off the spare body mold and glue it on. All of the dealers wanted it in their showroom and there was such a strong demand that somebody said, ‘Make a second one,’ and they did. That was the green one.”

By the time Bortz found the green Bonneville Special, it had been repainted white “with a broom,” he jokes. The car was in need of restoration, and Bortz’s friend, Roger Wilbanks, told Bortz that since he’d never restore it, he should sell it to him. Bortz agreed, and the green Bonneville Special has since been restored to its original green splendor.

The concept of a keeper

Among the many concept cars in his collection, the Bonneville Special remains particularly special to Bortz. Part of the car’s appeal to him is its originality—he’s only had to add air to the tires on a few occasions, so most of the air in its tires is truly from 1954. Last fall, the brake booster and master cylinder failed after 70 years and Bortz had them rebuilt. The original carburetors started acting up years earlier, so Bortz had them rebuilt to factory standards and repainted red, just as they originally were. Of course, the original battery has been replaced and the oil and other fluids have been changed, but the Bonneville Special otherwise remains so original, it’s the most original GM Motorama show car known to remain in existence. Bortz considers himself to be very lucky for owning this car and the many other concept cars in his collection.

“The idea that I could ever touch one, let alone own one, was unimaginable, and then you end up owning a whole lot of them—it’s like the kid winning the lottery,” he says.

The 1954 Pontiac Bonneville Special is currently on display at the Petersen Automotive Museum as part of the display “GM’s Marvelous Motorama: Dream Cars from the Joe Bortz Collection.” The display includes six GM Motorama show cars from the Bortz Collection including the featured 1954 Bonneville Special plus the 1955 LaSalle II Roadster, the 1955 LaSalle II Sedan, the 1953 Pontiac Parisienne, the 1955 Chevrolet Biscayne and the 1953 Buick Wildcat. Learn more at www.petersen.org.

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The post Car of the Week: 1954 Pontiac Bonneville Special GM Motorama show car appeared first on Old Cars Weekly.

The event, open to all, will be held between Sept. 22 and Sept. 24, at the historic Gilmore Car Museum where the event organizers expect that 500 cars will be on display. The show, which will be hosted at the Cadillac LaSalle Museum & Research Center, is expected to draw about 2000 people from all corners of the United States.

The show is celebrating GM’s Fifties Motorama, annual extravaganzas that displayed revolutionary concept cars and other halo models. Some of the featured cars on display will include:

• 1951 Buick LeSabre
• Three GM Firebird gas turbine cars
• 1956 Buick Century X
• 1959 Cadillac Cyclone

On display will also be a 2022 Celestiq, Cadillac’s latest limited production car, and other new Cadillacs. GM designers will present symposiums on the design and development of GM’s Motorama. Rides in collector cars and a chance to engage GM’s designers at “Dinner With Designers” on Friday evening. A number of personalities from the automotive industry, including acclaimed GM Designer William L. “Bill” Porter, will participate.

Car show participants, including GM cars from 1903 to 2023, will be arranged on the show field in 34 classes by year enabling the comparison of each GM brand with its siblings. A “Best In Class” prize will be awarded by peer judging for each class and GM designers will select the Best Cadillac, Buick, Oldsmobile, Pontiac, and Chevrolet.

“We’re thrilled for what will be the largest Cadillac Fall Festival in history, and we’re looking forward to having folks from around the country join us to celebrate their passion for automobiles,” said Bill Anderson, the president of the Cadillac LaSalle Museum & Research Center. “Every year we gather automotive enthusiasts from around the country, and this year, we’re expecting members from clubs nationwide that represent 60,000 people to be in attendance. We have a fantastic lineup of events for our valued attendees, and we couldn’t be more excited for our September event.”

There are three tiers of pricing for admission to the event.

1. General Admission Adult Day Pass: $25
2. General Admission Adult Day Pass and one car entry: $30
3. Full Weekend Admission and one car entry: $50

Additional car entries cost $25 each.
Children 10 and under can attend the event for free.
Tickets for the event can be purchased here.

About the Cadillac Fall Festival: The Cadillac Fall Festival celebrates Cadillac’s commitment to Innovation, Performance, and Design for more than a century. Each year the event brings together Cadillacs from its beginning in 1903 to the present day at the Cadillac Museum on the Gilmore Car Museum Campus. www.cadillacfallfestival.com

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There aren’t many concepts cars and show cars left to rediscover. Most were well-photographed and documented in newspaper articles of the day, and then in books and magazines of today. Yet we found one more.

While cruising old GM Motorama brochures in Walter Miller’s inventory, I stumbled across a non-descript bi-fold brochure with “Introducing GMC’s Bluegrass Runabout” and the profile of a horse on the cover. Copywriters must have thought a thousand words were better than a photo, because there were no images of the truck inside. From the text, it appears the brochure was handed out at 1956 GM Motorama shows alongside the Bluegrass Runabout pickup truck.

To find out what the truck looked like, we scoured the Old Cars archives, our own “GMC: The First 100 Years” book, miscellaneous image services and even General Motors Media Archives. So little-known is the truck that staff members of the GM archives hadn’t even heard of it, and when they searched for GMC Bluegrass Runabout, the staff came up dry. When we asked them to instead search for images of the GMC display at the 1956 GM Motorama, that’s when we struck gold.

Hidden within a few images from the Los Angeles and Boston stops of the GM Motorama is a 1956 GMC Suburban pickup behind stanchions with a couple unusual features: 1955 Oldsmobile “spinner” wheelcovers and an unusual emblem at the leading edge of the fiberglass bed. When one of the images is blown up, “GMC Bluegrass Runabout” can be read on the front license plate. Bingo!

Most of the details mentioned in the brochure aren’t visible in the surviving black-and-white images that picture the truck. Oddly enough, the brochure doesn’t mention those unique features that are visible (the Oldsmobile full wheel covers and special bed emblem.) Those features include the following mix of GMC options, aftermarket accessories and unique features:

• 316-cid Pontiac V-8 and Hydra-Matic drive
• Lexington blue and white exterior (Bluegrass Runabout only)
• GMC Road Shock Dampers and Kudu stabilizing bar
•  Honduras mahogany bed floor (Bluegrass Runabout only)
• Stabilized synthetic sailcloth bed cover that could wound up on a reel (Bluegrass Runabout only)
• Two-way radio on the dash (Bluegrass Runabout only)
• Ultronic electric door opener (Bluegrass Runabout only)
• A deep package tray mounted beneath the rear window (Bluegrass Runabout only)
• A concealed tool compartment built into the left rear corner of the cab (Bluegrass Runabout only)
• Deep-pile blue floor carpet (Bluegrass Runabout only)
•  Blue and white seat upholstery and door and roof trim (Bluegrass Runabout only)
• GMC radio, spotlight, clock, deluxe heater, cigarette lighter, right armrest, trouble light, tilting rear-view mirror
• Textured metal covering the inside steps behind both doors (Bluegrass Runabout only)
• Copper-plated grille (Bluegrass Runabout only)
• Special brake pedal (Bluegrass Runabout only)

The next year, GMC displayed a different show truck at select auto shows. That truck was the gold-and-white 1957 Palomino, and it, too, was based on the fiberglass-bed GMC Suburban pickup truck (the GMC counterpart to the Chevrolet Cameo). Like the Bluegrass Runabout, the Palomino was loaded with GMC options and unique trim components. The Palomino is known to survive.

GM sometimes updated its show vehicles with different features for the next show season and it’s possible the 1956 Bluegrass Runabout became the 1957 Palomino. However, there’s no evidence to confirm that possibility at this time.

Now that we’ve confirmed that the Bluegrass Runabout was built and shown, we’d like to know if it still exists. If not, perhaps there are other photos out there that better capture the truck’s unique features. (If you can add to the story, email us at oldcars@krause.com)

Watch for a feature story on this truck in an upcoming issue of Old Cars.

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After its Motorama duties it was sold to Ralph Poole of Albuquerque, NM. The current owner, John Baldwin purchased the car in 1996.

“We’ve been working on the ’57 Super Sport for the last few weeks and have it running nicely for the first time since the 1950s,” said owner John Baldwin.

This special Corvette debuted at the January 1957 New York Waldorf Astoria Auto Show and the Chicago Auto Show, but has not been seen by the public for the past 60 years. The engine is Chevy’s legendary fuel-injected 283CI/283HP small block V-8 mated to a “close ratio” three-speed transmission.

“This unique Corvette is practically unknown,” said Bill Warner, founder and Chairman of the Amelia Island Concours d’Elegance. “It was the cover car for the June, 1957 issue of Speed Age magazine and then it disappeared. It’s been hidden for its entire life. For it to be at Amelia is the sort of thing we dream of.”

About The Amelia Island Concours d’Elegance

Now in its third decade, the Amelia Island Concours d’Elegance is among the top automotive events in the world. Always held the second full weekend in March, “The Amelia” draws over 250 rare vehicles from collections around the world to The Golf Club of Amelia Island and The Ritz-Carlton, Amelia Island for a celebration of the automobile like no other. Since 1996, the show’s Foundation has donated over $3.0 million to Community Hospice of Northeast Florida, Inc., Spina Bifida of Jacksonville, The Navy Marine Corps Relief Society, Shop with Cops, and other deserving charities. In 2013 and 2016 the Amelia Island Concours d’Elegance won Octane Magazine’s EFG International Historic Motoring Event of the Year award.The 22nd annual Amelia Island Concours d’Elegance is scheduled for March 10-12, 2017. For more information, visit www.ameliaconcours.org.

Amelia Island Concours d’Elegance
3016 Mercury Road
Jacksonville, Florida 32207
www.ameliaconcours.org

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Courtesy of Joe Bortz and the GM Heritage Collection, there will be at least eight dreams in the form of concept cars greeting guests to the concours, to be held Aug. 17 in Monterey, Calif. It’s the first time since 1990 that such a gathering of concept cars has taken place at Pebble Beach, and there will be some firsts.

Joe Bortz is pictured behind the wheel of his 1953 Buick Wildcat dream car, which will be one of several concept cars featured at the 2008 Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance’s special GM Motorama display.

“I believe this will be the first time a featured car will be shown at Pebble Beach in its [weathered and] unrestored state,” said Joe Bortz, who is supplying six cars from his impressive dream car collection. That unrestored car will be the still salvage yard-fresh LaSalle II roadster, which Bortz saved from Warhoops Auto Parts in Sterling Heights, Mich., several years ago.

Bortz will also debut is the partially restored 1955 Biscayne dream car, another Warhoops escapee. Like the LaSalle II roadster, the Biscayne was cut into pieces in accordance with GM’s edict to destroy the cars, but has since been reassembled, as has the LaSalle II roadster. Bortz believes this is also the first time the exclusive Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance has ever shown a restoration that has not been finished. The concours will be the first public showing of the Biscayne and LaSalle II roadster since the Motorama and mid-1950s show circuit.

1955 LaSalle Roadster

Additionally, Bortz will show his 1953 Buick Wildcat, 1953 Pontiac Parisienne and 1954 Bonneville Special dream cars as part of Pebble Beach’s ode to the General Motors Motorama at this, GM’s 100th anniversary. (Bortz’ Pontiac XP833 will be in a separate display during the 2008 event.)

Pebble Beach took a chance in 1989 when organizers first arranged several concept cars to be displayed on the grounds of the prewar car-heavy event. Bortz said, “They didn’t know if the concept car display was going to bomb or not,” but the cars were a huge hit and were welcomed back the next year. Even though two of Bortz’ cars are unrestored and will be shown on the same field as the world’s magnificently restored automobiles in 2008, they are expected to be equally well received as his collection was first welcomed in 1989.

The LaSalle II roadster

Along with the Biscayne, the LaSalle II roadster has not been seen in public since Bortz retrieved it and its sister LaSalle II sedan from Warhoops Auto Parts. Like salt and pepper shakers, the LaSalle II’s were displayed alongside one another and showcased much more than their LaSalle-inspired good looks: they were a bevy of technical innovation.

1955 Biscayne

“The LaSalles were the only [GM] concepts car that had really advanced technology,” said Bortz. “The engines were completely and universally different than anything made by GM.” Those engines were aluminum-block, dual overhead cam V-6’s with fuel injection. The cars also featured independent rear suspensions, all in 1955.

“In the 1960s and 1970s, those advancements came in on European cars as great revelations of engineering, but GM had it in 1955,” Bortz said. He also cited that the 1960s and 1970s showed a turning point in which European cars solidified their reputations as engineering leaders using many of the feats employed on the LaSalle II dream cars.

There are 1960s amd 1970s European ‘revolutions’ sitting under these 1955 cars,” Bortz said. Following the tour of the LaSalle II’s, “General Motors totally overlooked [these innovations] and never used them on any other cars until much later. It wasn’t until the, Tempest and that didn’t last very long. So that shows you how somebody can have it in hand and not think about.

“History went in one direction but not the other,” he said. “All of those features had been employed in the 1960s, things would be very different today.”

The special display of General Motors’ visual and technical innovation will be joined by special displays of Lancia and Lamborghini automobiles. Hopeful attendees should begin planning now for this popular event.

More Information:
Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance
P.O. Box 222860
Carmel, CA 93922
831-622-1700
www.pebblebeachconcours.net

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