--- Mike & Sharon Higgins <clearcreek@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
> In the papers given to me from the Chrysler
> Historical Society I received some advertising for
> a "Diplomat"; a Plymouth with a De Soto Grille, or
> maybe a De Soto with a Plymouth Body. I remember
> the Canadien Model as being a Dodge Front end and a
> Plymouth Body, but not the "Diplomat"
> Any historical buffs to fill me in?
Dave Duricy covered this very well indeed, but didn't
mention where Diplomats were sold. They were not sold
in Canada but were sold in Mexico and apparently
anywhere else Chrysler had an export presence. (Wonder
if someone in Detroit thinks New Mexico is part of
Mexico?)
This includes U. S. territories, which Alaska and
Hawaii still were at the time. Jim Benjaminson
supplied pictures of a '58 Diplomat Custom (Belvedere
equivalent) convertible to the All-Par web site,
http://www.allpar.com , which was apparently sold new
in Hawaii, and has left-hand-drive and a mph
speedometer.
The Diplomat, and the similar Dodge Kingsway line
(which looked very similar to the Canadian
Plymouth-based Dodges but had different series names
and some mechanical differences) were made to provide
Dodge and DeSoto dealers outside North America with
Plymouth equivalents. This was also the reasoning
behind the DeSoto and Fargo (sold by Chrysler-Plymouth
dealers) versions of the Dodge truck line.
In Canada, Chrysler had two dealership chains instead
of the three most of the rest of the world had, and
since Canada's DeSoto-Dodge dealers already had the
Plymouth-based Dodges and the Dodge truck line, the
DeSoto variations were deemed unnecessary for that
market; however, in an attempt to keep things somewhat
equal, Canadian Chrysler-Plymouth dealers did sell the
Fargo truck line until 1972, at which point they
started selling Dodge trucks with no rebadging. (The
Canadian DeSoto-Dodge dealers had become
Chrysler-Dodge with DeSoto's demise.)
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