Some pre-war American automobiles were true masterpieces. The Graham Hollywood was one of them and if you haven’t studied up on this great car, you should! The Graham brothers had been building cars and trucks for a long time before the Hollywood came along, but it could be one of their finest creations. They liked to go fast and this sleek four-door sedan delivered. The development of the car is interesting so keep reading to learn more and be sure to checkout this project here on eBay where bidding started at $1. It’s located in Saint-Philippe, Quebec, Canada and is currently disassembled. These don’t come up to market very often though so it’s definitely worth a look.
The Graham brothers built their business during a turbulent time. They started out building trucks following the first world war and ended up selling it to the Dodge brothers. They then moved into automobile manufacturing after buying the Paige-Detroit Motor Car Company. Somehow they made it through the depression and even cranked out a few race cars during that period. Times were still tough though so they struck up a deal to build Hupp Motors to build their Hupmobile Skylark. Hupp owned the Cord dies so besides utilizing them for the Hupmobile, they also allowed Graham to use them.
So, they took the rear half of the Cord body and made a few changes. The drive wheels were switched from the front to the back and the nose was given a distinctive look. That all sounds simple, but the modifications were more extensive than it sounds. They didn’t stop there though. As I had mentioned, the Graham brothers liked to go fast so they offered a supercharged version of the car for those who shared their affinity for speed. They had been playing with forced induction for many years so they were easily able to extract an extra 29 horsepower from their inline-six just by strapping a supercharger on it.
Unfortunately, the Graham name didn’t survive the war. The assets were sold after less than 2,000 of these cars had been produced. Most were supercharged and many were raced, leaving the Hollywood an interesting legacy. Unfortunately, this particular example has seen better days itself. It’s too bad that people get a hold of special cars like this only to completely disassemble them. Luckily, that jewel of an engine is still there, but you can be assured that many pieces have gone missing. They always do when this happens and even if by some miracle everything is accounted for, good luck getting it all back together right. These cars can fetch big money at auction though, so it will sell and hopefully to someone with the resources to make it right.
The quickest way to destroy value in a car besides lighting it on fire is to completely disassemble it. There is something about the assembled picture that doesn’t jive with the other picture.
On a related note, the supercharged version was the fastest American production car 0-60 in 1940. Of course you got to 70 and the motor was ready to explode.
How does one restore a car without disassembling it?
That really is hard to believe.
I’ve restored cars for 25 years it’s the best ways to get rid of all the rust.
Taking off doors and hoods and seats snd cutting out rotted floors is all part of restoration.
I like that model would be a nice project.
I probably didn’t word that statement as clearly as I should have. A car undergoing restoration has a value curve that starts at point A, proceeds in a negative direction as it is disassembled and then as the restoration proceeds will in theory go in a positive direction past the starting point of A. The absolute lowest point of value is when it is completely disassembled. That is a bad time to decide to sell.
I don’t see any restoration work. I see a completely disassembled car with extra parts.
When fully restored they are gorgeous. –
http://www.schmitt.com/viewimage.asp?ID=3727
They want 80k for that one.
My folks had told me that my grandfather had a Graham. I’ll have to spend some time with the old family photos to see if it was captured on film (they did take a lot of pictures, so there’s hope).
Same grandfather owned a Dodge Brothers dealership during the mid-20s in Elkhart, Indiana, and I KNOW we have pictures from that!
Slick looking body style. I love the speedo. Once you exceed 50 MPH you’re in the “Danger Zone”.
Here’s a photo for reference. Maybe they should put a “No Texting Zone” on speedos today!
I’m in!!
And highest bidder (currently…..long way from the Daytona I’m trying to buy…LOL)
Alan F
Good luck Alan! Let us know if you win it. We would love to feature progress updates on this one!
Looks like there are 300 photos of the this Graham at http://www.1940graham.com, many parts are in duplicate. Someone could resell what they don’t use for more than the current bid of $6750,
I helped a friend do a complete frame-off restoration of a ’54 Cadillac. It was difficult to put everything back together even though we took it all apart just a month before…I can not IMAGINE what it would be like trying to assemble a disassembled car that you’d never even SEEN before!! If I was crazy enough to take this on, the first thing I’d do is find the closest owner of one of these and get permission to spend a few hours taking pictures. Lots and LOTS of pictures!!
Now now, don’t exxagerate. I’ve restored many cars/trucks that other people took apart and I put back together. Every parts only fits in one place so no big deal. You’re just missing the experience.
Mark you have to love a puzzle, imagine doing this 30 years ago, no internet! I think the fax was around lol
I agree lots of photos the parts manual the Internet and help from fellow enthusiasts and a little puzzle solving skills.
I wonder what the reserve price is ….
Big rule of restoration is a lot of pictures, and label all your ziplock bags of parts, I bet not done on this. I can imagine a couple hot rodders with a Cord that had a totalled front end, let’s put a modern looking front clip on it, and we’ll have to have rear wheel drive, said Mr Graham, and Mr Paige said OK, let’s do it. Think of it as a giant jig-saw puzzle, and your mission, should you accept it, is to put it back together, I know I would be tempted, if I didn’t have so many Mustang, Reatta, Catalina, & TR8 projects lined up.
Jesse, was that a production speedometer? Cool either way. I have a friend in Ft Wayne IN that had a Graham coupe, around a 1937? the local club members would drool over it.
Graham-Paige had a model before 1940 called the Crusader. By 1937 it was obsolete, and Graham needed capital – so they sold the all rights to the design, the actual production lines, as well as the engine to Nissan Motors in Japan. Everything was packed up here in America – and shipped to Japan to be reassembled there. Graham-Paige also supplied Engineering Talent to teach the people at Nissan how to build the car, how to cast the engine blocks and machine them etc etc etc.
Thus the first Automobile to bear the NISSAN Brand name – was actually a Graham-Paige Crusader. Nissan called it the Model 70. Nissan also built a truck designed by Graham-Page and used the same Crusader in-line six cylinder in the truck. Matter of fact, Nissan produced and used that engine up into the 1960’s.
The largest customer for the large cars and trucks that Nissan had – was of course the Imperial Army. They used the Nissan Model 70 as staff cars and of course the trucks carried the Imperial Army and its supplies.
The Graham Hollywood was a huge advancement in Styling for Graham..
The Crusader..
Actually, Graham Paige DID survive the war. Joseph Frazer took over as president in 1944 and announced plans to build the post-war Graham Paige Frazer. He then partnered with Henry J. Kaiser and the Graham Paige name was dropped from the project. IIRC some of the earliest Frazers were actually badged or registered as Grahams.
Graham Paige then went into real estate. They bought Madison Square Garden and changed the corporate name to Madison Square Garden corporation in 1962.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graham-Paige
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_W._Frazer
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaiser-Frazer
If I remember right,the body die stamps were sold to Russia and there was some confusion that they may have been lost at sea when the ship was sunk.I worked on one of these 52 years ago.
I will say this is a well done auction. Lots and lots of pictures. Graham also built a few convertible versions. There is a single 5 passenger known, single 2 passenger and one Hupp version of the 5 passenger.
Looks like the reserve has been met and now this has become an unreserved auction, sold to the highest bidder!. Any guesses what it will close at?
I’ve seen restored ones from 30000 to 80000.
If you look at all the photos you can see a lot of extra parts, the ad says 9 doors, 2 rads, 2 gas tanks, 2 sets of gauges, 2 steering wheels , 2 hoods, must be 4 sets of interior window cranks and lots of extra glass and extra supercharger,2nd front axel ….. List goes on and on.
In my opinion this is definitely worth the investment, I think there must 7000 in extra parts alone, I’ve seen a singe door on sale for $900, how much is a super charger worth?
“If you’re going to restore a classic, this one is worth the effort” that is written in the description and very true, I’ve seen people sink tons of money into cars that will never appreciate in value, a Supercharged Graham is a true classic, that you can restore with the peace of mind that you’re not throwing your money into the toilet! Not to mention the thrill of reviving an a true American Classic.
I might talk myself into bidding on her!