1957 Golden Hawks

[SaskGoldenHawk]

Can anyone give me the break down of how many Golden Hawks were built with manual (standard) transmissions?

How many GH's were built in the color white?

What colors were offered on the 1957 GH's? (I have seen Gold, Black, White, any others?)

I am trying to see if my White Golden Hawk, with Standard Transmission, White Interior, Radio Delete, No Power Steering or Brakes is a rare Golden Hawk, I know only 4356 were made, I would like to know how many were built like mine. It appears that this was made for going fast, probably to beat the Corvettes and T-birds.

[BobPalma]

That research has been done on 1958 Golden Hawks, Larry: The extensive results were published in the September 2007 Turning Wheels. However, AFAIK, that research has not been done on 1957 Golden Hawks, so your specific questions must remain unanswered for the time being.

I was one of the three principals (with cousin George Krem and our friend Larry Swanson) who culled all the 1958 Golden Hawk production records, one car at a time, to gather the statistics for Cousin George's September 2007 Turning Wheels article. Also, several years earlier, I had helped 1957 Golden Hawk 400 expert Tom Lawlis go through all the 1957 Golden Hawk production records, looking for 1957 Golden Hawk 400s.

Tom and I had only one day to scan all those 1957 records, so we did not have time to accumulate all the data for 1957 Golden Hawks. To give you an idea of the time it takes, George, Larry and I spent two full days at The Studebaker National Museum to gather that data on all 878 1958 Golden Hawks.

Keep that number of man-hours in mind: Three people, roughly eight hours per day for two days, for 878 production orders.

Now, imagine how long it would have taken Tom lawlis and I (two people) to cull that information from 4,356 1957 Golden Hawk production orders! You get the idea that without material being in a computer-scannable format (and it isn't), the job is daunting.

However, having looked at the 1958 Golden Hawk production records carefully and having at least scanned all the 1957 records, I'll make these general statements:

1. I believe the proportion of overdrive Golden Hawks to Flightomatics remained about the same from 1957 to 1958. You can thus determine the approximate percentage and number of 1957 overdrive Golden Hawks with simple math.

2. The cited Turning Wheels article reports the number of 1958 Golden Hawks painted each color. I believe a solid Parchment White 1958 Golden Hawk would not be as rare as a solid Arctic White 1957 unit because more '57s involved Tiara Gold one way or another. So, percentage-wise, a white 1957 Golden Hawk will be rarer than a white 1958 Golden Hawk. (Again, reference the September 2007 Turning Wheels for 1958 figures, from which you can extract percentages and interpolate those to overall 1957 Golden Hawk production. But keep in mind, I believe the percentage of solid white 1957s will be lower than 1958.)

3. An anomaly I noticed in 1957 Golden Hawk production was the increasing percentage of low-option cars being built toward the end of the model year. That is, 1957 Golden Hawks with few options, more likely overdrive cars, were being built toward the end of the model year. If yours is a high serial number car, Larry, it may have been one of those.

4. Regarding #3, above: I noticed the same thing about 1962 Gran Turismo Hawks toward the end of the 1962 model year run when reseraching 1962 V8 production orders looking for 1962 Lark Indianapolis 500-tagged Pace Cars and Festival Cars many years ago for yet another article George did on 1962 Pace Cars, which included serial numbers of all those so identified.

I couldn't help but notice the number of fairly plain 1962 Hawks being built for stock against no firm dealer order toward the end of the 1962 run. Perhaps a little of that was going on toward the end of the 1957 model year as well. (By 1962, all the V8 Production Orders are stored by sequential serial number, so you are "forced" to look at Hawk POs if you are looking through 1962 records for Lark "Pace Cars.")

Over & out. BP

[SaskGoldenHawk]

Thanks! I appreciate your time.