Glorious Cord: 1941 Graham Hollywood Supercharged
While Auburn, Cord, and Duesenberg offered premium American machines, Graham fell to the wayside and needed to jump back into the market with a great car. In comes the Graham Hollywood, which was a partnership that offered the Gordon Buerig designed Cord 810/812 to Graham which they fabricated a different front end for to make it their own. Scarce, rare, and hard to find, the Graham Hollywood was offered for a short period to which only 1,859 cars were built and only 1,108 of them were supercharged models. After spending many years in a barn, this hard to find the machine is up for grabs for an opening bid of $4,500. Check it out here on eBay out of Bogalusa, Louisiana. Thanks to reader Peter Rettig for this rare submission!
The Cord 810/812 is a magnificent styling achievement so starting with such a grand car made it easy for Graham to have an interesting machine. The Cord is glamorous and stylish, but I must say the Hollywood is equal to its sister in styling and grace. It is unclear but I hope this Graham has its original supercharged inline 6. The seller mentions that there are some “misc parts” included with the car, but there aren’t a lot of specifics offered in this listing.
If you desired to build a hot rod out of this Graham, there are enough parts remaining to build the wildest Hollywood of your dreams. The body is graciously covered with surface rust, and there are some dents and dings to be found. There is some rot in the rockers, otherwise, the body looks decent. Obviously, a restoration would be a dream come true, but then you dive into the rabbit hole of finding difficult to source parts, and a whole lot of money to revive this Graham to its once movie star glamour. Certainly, a neat project that is worth doing something with, but what would you do with this Graham Hollywood?
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Comments
One thing to note with these Graham’s is they are rear wheel drive. Where as the cord 810/812 are front wheel drive. The body shell is where the similarities end. I am leaning toward the restoration simply because of its rarity. I’d at least want to get as close as I could, but if you buy this, scrounging will be in your future. Where as a period restomod might make more sense. What I mean by that is you might want to use the drive line and interior out of a more common marquee that is from a post war car, which in could save you a lot of money. Like these better than their coffin nosed cousins simply because they are rear wheel drive. Great find.
who needs a parts car?
Well, apparently even though he has AMD on speed dial, Mark Harmon is filmed walking his ‘graveyard’ Which makes you wonder if the most used tool in his shop is the boxcutter?
ummm, what?
I would find a good running older Jag XJ6 with carbs and swap the drivetrain and the suspension….
These are surprising small. Very attractive. Not stunning like the cord. Would love to have it to restore.
You know, when we think of “supercharged”, images of flame belching top fuel dragsters come to mind, but I wonder what these were really like to drive. I mean, did the supercharger, on a 1 barrel, flathead 6, mind you, set you back in the seat? Or was it just a sales gimmick. I’d have to think the latter. Being the end of the line for Graham, people obviously didn’t buy it.
Supercharger served 2 functions: empty Graham’s sheves of unused inventory and modestly impress the buyer in a test drive. As far as reliability is concerned, you’re better off without the supercharger. The Cord was definitely more refined. Smoother riding, smoother running, and more powerful. Note the roof seams. Cord didn’t have the press and dies to make a one piece roof. Putting together smaller panels to make a roof was labor intensive. Cord could tolerate that cost. Graham/Hupmobile couldn’t.
Actually this is the beautiful body that put several companies out of the car manufacturing business. Very tricky, labor intensive to build. (Kind of like today’s Tesla Model 3 struggles). First Auburn Cord couldn’t make enough to meet the demand, then Hup couldn’t build them. Hup took the tool/dies to Graham and he built them. Again, they couldn’t build enough of them to meet demand. Then WWII came and Graham never made cars again. They made tractors and Rototiller (their brand). They also were in farming and real estate and at one time had a large interest in Madison Square Garden.
As far as the supercharger, it is actually a 2 barrel carb sitting on the supercharger. It makes maybe 4-5 lbs boost and took the hp up to about 120. So this was the fastest power to weight ratio car you could buy in 1940 and 41. Yes, it does move down the road, but in 1940’s world. The supercharger is extremely reliable and was used on previous Graham models in the 30s.
What was left of Graham-Paige after the war, was Joe Frazer’s contribution to Kaiser-Frazer. All the assets of G-P were absorbed in 1947 into K-F.
At the fathers day car show in Yountville, CA (June 17, 2018)
People would stop and be dumbfounded that a car in 1940 could be supercharged.
1940 Graham Hollywood Supercharged model VIN 700855
I like the front suicide doors. This would be one that if it could be brought back to original condition would be an impressive ride. Maybe it’s just me, but the front end sure looks to have a Willy’s influence in it’s design.
While 1854 is a limited number for cars, almost 60% got the supercharger which is a large percentage for something like that. How does that production number stack up against other models from other low production auto manufacturers at that time:?
What a perfect car to send to Kindig Design with a 6 figure budget. Love the front end.
About 20 years ago I saw one of these for sale at the Pomona swap for $1200. Body and frame only. The sheet metal was rusted into lace. I mean probably 60% air. I thought it looked pretty cool from the cowl forward, pretty ordinary from the cowl back.
There was a rumor about that the tooling is still in existence and in the possession of Totota. Assertedly they bought the tooling and took delivery just before WWII. If true, the Toyota firm must have had great appreciation for the design and no little courage in saving the fixtures and jigs from the smelters of Japanese war effort that was devouring all known supplies of metals.
I like pwtigers comment. But if the engine was intact WITH the supercharger, then a proper restoration would be in order.
If you read about the last Graham you all know what my ’55 Chev convertible did to two of these.
I like them a lot. Even without the boosting agent.
My father owned one of these in the 60’s, I drove it a few times and it always felt like the top was “chopped”. Another thing a remember is that on the speedometer at about 60mph the words “Danger Zone” were printed on the dial, how cool is that?
A very collectible car considering it has two too many doors……l
Huppmobile’s version was called the “Skylark”. I think even fewer were built than Graham’s Hollywood.