Cadillac Eldorado Brougham

:"seealso|Cadillac Eldorado"Derived from a Cadillac concept vehicle exhibited during the GM Motorama of 1955, the Eldorado Brougham models of 1957 through 1960 were designed to showcase Cadillac's abilities as a maker of luxury vehicles.

The Cadillac Eldorado Brougham was an example of the company's post-WW2 styling direction. While no single Cadillac stylist may be credited with the final design, the latter began on the drawing boards of Bob Scheelk, a new recruit to the GM Styling Section. Bob's work was supervised by Charles "Chuck" Jordan (who had taken over from Ed Glowacke), and by Chuck's assistant, Dave Holls.

On September 15, 1955, the Cadillac Styling Section moved from its old quarters in downtown Detroit to the new, more modern General Motors Technical Center in Warren, north of the Motor City. The move was meant to symbolize a new, lighter, and brighter design scheme (similar to that of the new headquarter buildings) for Cadillac.

The Eldorado Brougham was the product of several years of engineering and styling development. It was preceded by a number of experimental models, concept vehicles including, principally, the Cadillac "Orleans" (1953), the "Park Avenue" (1954), the "Eldorado Brougham" prototype (1955), the second Eldorado Brougham prototype and Paris show car (1955-56), and the "Eldorado Brougham town car" (1956).

The first production Eldorado Brougham (car #3) was shown at the New York Salon in January 1957. This car was featured also in a factory promotional film set in New York's Central Park, where it stole the limelight from another, specially-appointed Cadillac Sixty Special.

The Cadillac Eldorado Brougham is a rare automobile. In his authoritative "History of Cadillac", author Maurice Hendry of New Zealand said, "the biggest news for fans of mid-fifties gimcrackery and engineering innovation was the Eldorado Brougham..." The Eldorado Brougham introduced many features that were amazing for the time, some of which did not appear on other cars until the late 80's. A seat position memory feature recalled "saved" seat postions for different drivers, a switch in the glove compartment opened and closed the trunk lid automatically, the sun visors darkend in reaction to the brightness of the sun, and common to other Cadillac's of the time an electronic eye controlled the high-beam headlights, dimming them when oncoming light was encountered.

Its extravagant price tag (for the time) of more than $13,000 (roughly $88,348 in 2005 dollars) made it a low-production car, with 904 vehicles sold from 1957 to 1960. Today more than half the total number built have survived and are mostly in the hands of enthusiasts and collectors the world over. The majority of these vehicles remain in good to very good condition, despite 50 years of age.

Also see: [http://www.eldobrghm.com]