1959 Cadillac Coupe DeVille

This car, Lot 520, sold for $47,300, including buyer’s premium, at Auctions America’s sale in Fort Lauderdale, FL, on April 1, 2017.

A vintage Cadillac is always special, but in the world of big iron, the 1959 Cadillac reigns supreme.

Love it or hate it, the smooth, sweeping body style that debuted for ’59 represented a turning point for Cadillac. It’s not the legendary fins — those were reduced to vestigial folds by 1961. The 1959 Cadillac showed the way towards the slab-sided designs that would dominate the next four decades of Cadillac history. Depending on your point of view, the ’59 Coupe DeVille was either the first modern Cadillac, or the last one worth looking at.

If you walked into a Cadillac dealership in 1959, the top of the line was the Eldorado. However, the DeVille line was not far behind. An Eldorado in this era got Cadillac’s best engine and every box checked in the option list. The DeVille got the standard engine, and you could pick your own options.

The standard Cadillac engine was no slouch. Displacement was raised from 365 to 390 cubic inches for ’59, and you got 325 horsepower and 430 pound-feet of torque. Engine power passed to the rear wheels through a 4-speed Hydra-Matic automatic transmission, and you had your choice of two different rear-end ratios: 2.94 (standard) or 3.21:1. Ordering the car with factory air also got you the 3.21 rear end.

The Eldorado engine was exactly the same as the standard 390, except you got three Rochester 2-barrel carburetors instead of a single 4-barrel Carter. That was enough to yield 20 more horsepower and 5 additional foot-pounds. The Eldorado engine could be ordered on any 1959 Cadillac for just $134.30, so it was a popular option.

Apart from the engine, the Coupe DeVille offered the same standard equipment as the base Series 6200, plus power windows and two-way power seats. Power steering and power brakes were standard across all 1959 Cadillac models. The option list included features such as cruise control, air-adjustable suspension, power windows and locks, automatic headlight dimmer, tinted glass, whitewalls, radio, and even a power trunk lid.

The price for a new Coupe DeVille in 1959 was $5,252, plus options. Cadillac built 21,924 of the 2-door hard-top coupes that year. That made the Coupe DeVille the most popular style of the Series 6300 DeVille line, although combined sales of the two Sedan DeVille models were higher.

A pink peacock

Our subject car is a delightful example of a ’59 Coupe DeVille. According to the seller, it has undergone a complete restoration, and that certainly shows in the photos.

Restorations are opportunities to put things right, but they’re also a time when originality can be lost. A little research on this car’s body plate turned up some interesting facts, and the same research (which takes less than an hour on the Internet) should be done on any car that’s been through a restoration.

First, the car in question is indeed a real Coupe DeVille. The cowl tag says the type is 59-6337, which simply decodes as 1959 Series 6300 (DeVille) and the 37 indicates a Deluxe Coupe DeVille. The FW body code indicates the body was made at the Fleetwood factory.

Farther down the cowl tag, the trim code is 46, which means the original interior was medium green, and paint code 40-12 indicates the original color scheme was two-tone, Gotham Gold with a white roof. This makes sense, as Cadillac offered nothing like this new shade of pink in 1959. Changing the interior to black and white was a smart move, as the green would not have been harmonious with the new exterior color.

Also on the cowl tag, this car was ordered with E, H, K and Y options. Those stand for “EZ Eye” tinted glass, a heater, an air conditioner, and the six-way power seat, respectively. Radios were optional in 1959 but did not generate a cowl-tag code.

Icon status

It’s worth saying that none of this number sleuthing really matters very much on this car. This is not some ultra-rare-engine-code muscle car or factory lightweight racer. The point of a 1959 Coupe DeVille, especially in today’s bland styling world, is to stand out, and as Bruce Springsteen sang, to “ride just like a little bit of heaven here on Earth.” With the fender skirts and period-correct wide whitewall tires, this car surely achieves all those goals.

The sale price of this car reflects the work that has gone into the restoration, and while it was not the cheapest ’59 Caddy you could buy, it doesn’t come close to the prices commanded by some top-shelf cars. So all things considered, if you were in the market for a look-at-me piece of Americana, it’s not a stretch to say this car was both well bought and well sold.