1953 Cadillac Le Mans

1953 Cadillac Le Mans in The Buddy Holly Story, Movie, 1978

Class: Cars, Proto / Concept — Model origin:

Minor action vehicle or used in only a short scene

Comments about this vehicle

Author	Message
MrCadillac ◊ 2007-02-01 15:41	It is indeed one of the four, special Cadillac "Le Mans" roadsters built on the 1953 Cadillac chassis (engine numbers 00002, 00003, 00004 and 91300 - engine #00001 was mounted in another prototype, the Cadillac "Orleans"). The one you see here was retro-fitted in mid-1959 with a Cadillac Eldorado "Q" engine and also underwent some major styling changes (compare this car with the original "Le Mans" design on these pages: http://www.car-nection.com/yann/Dbas_txt/Drm52-53.htm) Cadillac used to love sticking French city names on their cars (like Le Mans, Orleans, Calais, Biarritz...) Perhaps they thought they owed it to the well-known founder of Detroit, Antoine Laumet, aka DeLamothe-Cadillac, after whom the "Cadillac" is named.
bobberz ◊ 2013-12-03 16:34	I think that maybe Cadillac also chose the name due to Briggs Cunningham's successful LeMans effort in 1950. Tenth and eleventh place is a pretty respectable result for big, lumbering, American cars, even more so considering the starting grid featured 60 entrants!

Author

Message

MrCadillac

◊ 2007-02-01 15:41

It is indeed one of the four, special Cadillac "Le Mans" roadsters built on the 1953 Cadillac chassis (engine numbers 00002, 00003, 00004 and 91300 - engine #00001 was mounted in another prototype, the Cadillac "Orleans"). The one you see here was retro-fitted in mid-1959 with a Cadillac Eldorado "Q" engine and also underwent some major styling changes (compare this car with the original "Le Mans" design on these pages: http://www.car-nection.com/yann/Dbas_txt/Drm52-53.htm)

Cadillac used to love sticking French city names on their cars (like Le Mans, Orleans, Calais, Biarritz...) Perhaps they thought they owed it to the well-known founder of Detroit, Antoine Laumet, aka DeLamothe-Cadillac, after whom the "Cadillac" is named.

bobberz

◊ 2013-12-03 16:34

I think that maybe Cadillac also chose the name due to Briggs Cunningham's successful LeMans effort in 1950. Tenth and eleventh place is a pretty respectable result for big, lumbering, American cars, even more so considering the starting grid featured 60 entrants!

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1953 Cadillac Le Mans