Worth another look

The Automotive Driving Museum located in El Segundo California (near the LAX airport) has several spectacular nineteen thirties luxury cars, including this Weymann bodied 1930 Stutz Monte Carlo, a four-door sedan produced decades before Chevrolet’s coupe of the same name. We featured this car several years ago, but it’s worth another look.   

This four-door Stutz Monte Carlo Sedan is powered by a 287-cubic inch "Vertical Eight" 8-cylinder engine mounted in a chassis equipped with four-wheel hydraulic brakes. This car one of three built sold for $4,495 when new in 1930.

The Weymann body was a patented design system that used a jointed wood frame covered in fabric. It was popular because the body system reduced the usual squeaks and rattles of metallic bodies and improved performance because of the body's lighter weight.  

After World War I French test pilot Charles Weymann who held dual American and French citizenship (both his parents were American citizens) used his knowledge of aircraft manufacturing techniques learned when he worked for Nieuport  and developed a patented system for fabric covered automobile bodies. 

He opened his first factory in Paris in 1921 and through the roaring twenties the market for Weymann fabrics bodies grew quickly and Weymann licensed his system to many of Europe's most prestigious manufacturers. Weymann opened a factory in Indianapolis Indiana in 1928 that was devoted to building custom bodies for Stutz automobiles.

Early in the new decade of the nineteen thirties, the automobile buying public tastes shifted to high-gloss painted bodies and the Weymann fabric bodies with their matte finish fell out of fashion. Weymann's Paris factory closed in 1930 followed by the Indianapolis factory in 1931 making this 1930 Stutz one of the last of its breed.

All photos by the author