Swoopy For Sale: 1954 Plymouth Belmont

Oh man, did they really make cars this swoopy? Well, yes and no. What we have here (courtesy of Hemming's, the bible of car collectors) is a 1954 Plymouth Belmont. Yes, they made Plymouths in 1954, but Plymouth didn't make this one. The 1954 Plymouth Belmont was, sadly, only a concept car. This one off is, however, for sale.

According to Hemming's, the 1954 Plymouth Belmont show car was once " ... owned by a lovely woman in New Jersey." No, I don't know what that means either. But at the moment the 1954 Plymouth Belmont concept car seems to be in the hands of a Lotus dealership on Long Island and is for sale, naturally, on Hemmings.com.

I'm sure how the '54 Belmont ended up in a Lotus dealership is a story in and of itself, but that story is not related. What must be interesting is going out for a quick spin in a Lotus Elise, and then jumping into this behemoth. It must tip the scale at about twice what an Elise does, but going on in this vein is sort of like shooting fish in a barrel, isn't it?

1954 Plymouth Belmont showcased many Plymouth features from the time. The Belmont Concept Car, which the dealership rightfully calls "sleek", was built up on a Dodge Chassis and was motivated by a 241 cubic inch motor that cranked out 150 horse power. Also worth noting is that the Belmont was the first Plymouth ever built with a V8 engine.

The 241 cubic inch plant was mated to a Plymouth Hy-Drive three speed semi-automatic transmission. And by that, I assume they mean automatic tranny that you can shift into any one of its three cogs if you feel like it. Not a semi-automatic transmission like you can get on Ferraris nowadays.

The dealership states that " ... this experimental car was the first ever built with a lightweight fiberglass body." I'm taking that they mean it was the first ever Plymouth built with a lightweight fiberglass body, because Chevy had the Vetter out in 53, ad Kaiser had the Darrin out in 54.

Anyway, said lightweight fiberglass body was 192 inches in overall length and had a low-low height of just 32 inches at the door top. Which is really low and contributes to the swoopy. Your waistline is probably around 36 inches or so off the deck, and the top of the door is below that.

There's also other swoopy features besides the body design. There is a full set of racing instruments and the radio controls built into the center armrest, which gives it a nice rocket age feel. The Belmont Concept Car was shown at the New York Auto Show in 1954 as well as other noteworthy car shows and events around the world at the time.

The Belmont Concept Car also turned up in a few movies as well. "Bundle of Joy" with Eddie Fischer, yes, Princess Leia's dad. And it was also in "Mister Cory" with Tony Curtis. After those duties were through, the Belmont Concept Car was owned for many years by Virgil Exner himself.

Source: Hemmings