The 1955 and 1956 Dodge La Femme: "By Appointment to Her Majesty — The American Woman"

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There really was an American car that left the factory with a purse as standard equipment — the 1955 Dodge La Femme. Many people of car-buying age in the mid-Fifties never heard of it, so perhaps it's not surprising that more than a generation had gone by with hardly any mention of it...

Until my massive La Femme article in the February 1988 issue of Collectible Automobile. This site is that article, multiplied in size, many, MANY times over.

Yet the La Femme was significant because it mirrored the patronizing mid-Fifties phenomenon of offering women's versions of just about anything, in this case a production car designed specifically for "Her Royal Highness — The American Woman."

This site is the largest repository of La Femme information on the Internet, written and curated by Tony Lindsey... DodgeLaFemme @ gmail.com 

How It All Began

The La Femme's Show-Car Beginnings

The 1954 Chrysler La Comtesse ("The Countess") Show Car

The 1954 Chrysler Le Comte ("The Count") Show Car

The 1955 Dodge La Femme

The 1955 Dodges

The Dodge La Femme is Announced for Spring 1955

The 1955 Dodge La Femme Dealer Brochure

1955 Dodge La Femme Exterior and Interior Features

1955 Dodge La Femme Accessories

Who Made the Purse for Dodge?

1955 Dodge Dealer and Factory Options

The 1956 Dodge La Femme

The 1956 Dodges

The Dodge La Femme is Announced for Spring 1956

The 1956 Dodge La Femme Dealer Brochure

1956 Dodge La Femme Exterior and Interior Features

1956 Dodge La Femme Accessories

1956 Dodge Dealer and Factory Options

Additional Information

Conclusion: No More La Femmes!

The Story of My Own 1955 Dodge La Femme

Chrysler Corporation Did NOT Give Up On Women Buyers!

OTHER Cars, Made for Ladies

Miscellany and Hearsay

The La Femme's Show-Car Beginnings

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Click any image to see a larger version...

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The gestation period of the Dodge La Femme can be traced back to the early Fifties. By then, pent-up demand for new cars had been filled, turning the postwar seller's market into a highly competitive buyer's market. An exciting era was thus born, as auto companies unleashed a flood of new cars, loaded with new ideas to attract the attention of car buyers. 

In the process, designers were given more power and freedom to experiment than ever before. The stylists were fascinated with flashy lines, chrome, tailfins, swivel seats, and wraparound windshields — and apparently so was the American public. 

Exotic show cars appeared with great regularity from the major companies, almost always sporting new (and often highly impractical) styling and all sorts of doodads. But the car-buying public had an insatiable appetite for those "dream cars," which served as shiny bait to lure people into purchasing the more mundane (and practical) production-line cars.

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Pontiac Parisienne Show Car, Exterior 1

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Pontiac Parisienne Show Car, Exterior 2

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Pontiac Parisienne Show Car, Interior

In most cases, of course, the public never got to buy such snazzy features as turbine engines, power-assisted hoods, and rain-sensing convertible tops. However, there were a few examples of show cars that became production cars, such as the Cadillac Eldorado Brougham and Chevy's Corvette. 

Those cars are well known and coveted by collectors today, but they were among the very few show cars that made good, selling in small numbers and, more importantly, increasing their makers' prestige. More common is the tale of the show car that hit the marketplace and sank without a trace. 

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1958 Impala Martinique, interior.

This 1958 Chevrolet Impala convertible show car was nicknamed the Martinique. It was designed by Jeanette Linder (shown) for a 1958 GM Fashion Show that was held in the main exhibit hall at the GM Building. This show car was one of ten cars 'feminized' for this special fashion show. Note the lighted vanity mirror and the cosmetic case, which has been tucked into the dashboard.

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1958 Impala Martinique, Rear View

Actually, show cars designed with feminine appeal were fairly common back in the Fifties. General Motors fielded quite a few of them, such as Pontiac's pink-interior Parisienne, Chevy's Impala Martinique (which was only one of GM's ten "feminized" show cars of 1958), and Cadillac's Eldorado Seville Baroness, among others.

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The 1958 Cadillac Eldorado Seville “Baroness”: The late Suzanne E. Vanderbilt made her career as part of GM’s praised Creative Design Team. She was one of the original Damsels of Design – a group of eight skilled female designers that the famed Harley Earl hired during the early-1950s. 

She designed two special Cadillacs: the black-on-black Eldorado Seville coupe known as the “Baroness” (and available with a telephone and extra compartment space for driver and passengers), and the Cadillac Saxony convertible, offered in a unique grey-green metallic color. She also designed many other products, including the interiors for the Chevrolet Vega and Monza models.

But it was Chrysler Corporation that got the ball rolling in 1954 when it took the La Comtesse and Le Comte around the auto show circuit...

The 1954 Chrysler La Comtesse ("The Countess") Show Car

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La Comtesse was pink and pale gray, to appeal to the feminine sensibility, while the Le Comte sported bronze and black, very macho indeed. A Chrysler press release of the day described the lady's version thusly:

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Press Release: 'LA COMTESSE, Chrysler's exotic new plastic top car, presents a gorgeous two-tone exterior of dusty rose with a pigeon gray top. The interior is luxuriously finished in cream and dusty rose leather, with seat back inserts of platinum brocatelle fabric. Interior appointments are set off by specially-designed chrome hardware."

The 1954 Chrysler Le Comte ("The Count") Show Car

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The Le Comte, which glittered in chrome trim and rear quarter window shape, was perceived to be more masculine with its macho black-and-bronze exterior. Both rode a Chrysler New Yorker Deluxe Newport chassis. 

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Very little is known about Le Comte — it was said to be identical to La Comtesse in almost every way except for the color scheme. 

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Millions of people saw the two cars at Chicago, New York, and various other auto shows throughout the U.S. Public response seems to have encouraged Chrysler Corporation — and Dodge division in particular — to come out with more show and production cars with a similar feminine theme.

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The 1955 Dodges

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The long, clean, sleek styling of the all-new 1955 Dodge was part of what Chrysler Corporation called "The Forward Look," a design theme that began to wrest styling leadership from industry leader General Motors.

In fact, Dodge was so vastly altered for 1955 that it didn't seem at all related to its shorter and taller predecessors, which suddenly seemed antique. Dodge touted its styling as "Flair Fashioned." The front of the car was marked by two large horizontal bars that wrapped around from the front fenders into a divided grille cavity. A dummy scoop appeared at the front of the hood and flared outward, back to the rear fenders as an upper body molding with a "dip" in the rear quarters. 

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Cheaper Dodge models were two-toned at the beltline, and looked chunkier. Upper-priced models carried slim, chrome-plated tailfins, the embryonic expression of an idea of stylist Virgil Exner that would grow in 1956 and explode for 1957. The dashboard was asymmetrical and very stylish, with instruments and controls grouped on the left. 

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Plymouth ad, showing the 1955 Chrysler Corporation "Flite Control" shift lever. The knob on the end changed between Plymouth, Dodge, Chrysler, etc.

Cars equipped with PowerFlite were shifted via a novel, one-year-only "Flite Control" lever that stuck out of the dash to the right of the steering column. Like most everyone else in the industry, Dodge featured tubeless tires and a larger windshield, the latter a "New Horizon sweep-around" unit.

All Dodges rode a longer, 120-inch wheelbase for 1955. The model lineup was simplified: Coronet straight-sixes and V-8s, Royal and Custom Royal V-8's.

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1955 La Femme with Custom Royal Lancer-standard Super Red Ram engine.

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Two-door hardtops were subtitled "Lancer" along with the Custom Royal convertible, which topped the line at $2748. Dodge upped V-8 displacement to 270 cubic inches. The base 175-bhp Royal and Coronet V-8 employed poly-head construction, while the Custom Royal unit retained hemi heads and offered 193 horses in "Super-Powered" form.

Most of the 1955 Dodge lineup was introduced to the public on November 17, 1954. The top-of-the-line two-door hardtop and convertible Custom Royal Lancer were unveiled exactly one month later but the special trim models had to wait several months more.

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Dodge advertisements, owner's manuals, and press releases that year made extensive use of female models, portraying them in Paris-designed finery, fur coats, and stoles. Gloved hands were also frequently seen pushing buttons, twisting knobs, shifting dash levers, and inserting keys. 

This was obviously to demonstrate the ease with which the "weaker sex" could operate heavy machinery. Men were depicted in the owner's manual as shadowy figures, usually wielding gas nozzles or garden hoses. Was Dodge, so obviously targeting its sales approach to women, hinting indirectly that the La Femme was coming? The advertising line, "Expect the unexpected in Dodge for '55," suggested as much.

Note: There is no un-seeing this:

Now, don't the higher-priced 1955 Dodge Custom Royals look like they are wearing eye-liner, more than any other car ever made?

Tech Specs

All 1955 Dodge hardtops and convertibles were called Lancers, and all 1955 Custom Royals supposedly had the Super Red Ram Hemi-head 270.1 cubic-inch V-8 (I have personally seen Custom Royal Lancers with the lesser-model polyspherical heads installed at the factory). 

This engine started with 183 horsepower at 4400 RPM, and if you ordered the extra-cost "Super-powered Red Ram" package, you'd get 193 horsepower along with your 4-barrel carburetor and dual exhausts. 

There was a third, optional engine. The D-500.  Learn all about it here.

The 1955 Dodges still had the 6-volt electrical system, which was upgraded to 12 volts in 1956.

Custom Royal Lancer 2-door hardtops - 1955 / 1956

Model - D-55-3 / D-63-3 Weight - 3,485 / 3,520 Tire size - 7.10 x 15 / 7.60 x 15
Dimensions

Wheelbase - 120.0" / 120.0"
Tread
Front - 58.9" / 58.9"
Rear - 59.1" / 59.2"
Overall Length - 212.1" / 212.0"
Overall Width - 74.5" / 74.6"
Front seat:
Hip room - 62.5"
Leg room - 44.5"
Height - 13.4"
Rear seat:
Hip room - 62.8"
Leg room - 45.0"
(The above numbers are HIGHLY suspect: They would place the car in the same class as a 1955 Cadillac Fleetwood!)
Steering Manual ratio - 27.1 to 1 Power Steering ratio - 20.1 to 1 Turning circle - 39'7"

The Dodge La Femme is Announced for Spring 1955

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Dodge nonetheless moved cautiously with the La Femme concept by choosing to test public reaction to the idea at the International Salon in the Chrysler Building in New York City. Held from January 17-29, 1955, the Salon provided the setting for Chrysler's exhibit, "The Forward Look," which debuted the 1955 Chrysler 300. Also featured was "Dimensions in Color," a display of colors and fabrics as used in Chrysler's automobiles. 

As Old Timers News reported,

Another attraction at the exhibit was the premier showing of Dodge's 'La Femme' — a Custom Royal Lancer hardtop, appointed in the most feminine of pinks — which drew throngs of women visitors to the International Salon. The company's interior styling experts have gone all out in efforts to woo today's women.

They have designed a car interior specifically intended to 'please and flatter the modern woman' — who no longer is relegated to kitchen and household tasks from dawn to dusk. It's a woman's world inside the Heather Rose & Sapphire White 'La Femme.'

The La Femme finally arrived in the spring of 1955 as a $145.30 trim and accessory option for the $2543 Custom Royal Lancer two-door hardtop.

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Dodge dealers had been officially notified earlier, on February 7, via the following letter:

"TO ALL DODGE DIRECT

DEALERS AND DEALERS:

"The enclosed folder will introduce you to the La Femme, by Dodge, the first car ever exclusively designed for the woman motorist.

At the Chicago Auto Show, the La Femme received exceptionally enthusiastic response and it is enjoying similar response at special shows and exhibits in other parts of the country.

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Exterior color scheme of the car is Heather Rose over Sapphire White, and there is a gold La Femme name plate on each front fender, replacing the Royal Lancer name plate. The interior consists of specially designed Heather Rose Cordagrain bolster and trim. The materials used, of course, possess the usual qualities of durability, beauty, economy, and ease of cleaning.

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1955 La Femme rain hat, rain coat, and umbrella.

The crowning touches which personalize the La Femme are its special feminine accessories. Iwo compartments located on the backs of the front seats are upholstered in Heather Rose Cordagrain. The compartment on the driver's side contains a stylish rain cape, fisherman's style rain hat and umbrella which carry out the rosebud Jacquard motif. The other compartment holds a stunning shoulder bag in soft rose leather. It is fitted with makeup compact with powder, cigarette lighter, lipstick holder and cigarette case.

Available only in the Custom Royal Lancer model, the La Femme can now be ordered for March delivery. Naturally, a model of this type will initially be built in limited quantities and will be handled on first come, first served basis. To order, specify Trim Code #443 and color code #571-1.

I hope you will endeavor to see the La Femme at your earliest Opportunity. I believe you will agree that this unusual car has great appeal to women, and that it gives Dodge dealers a 'drawing card' enjoyed by no other dealer group."

Very truly yours,

L.F. Desmond

General Sales Manager

Dodge Division

The 1955 Dodge La Femme Dealer Brochure

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The 1955 La Femme sales brochure described the interior trim as leather, but all La Femme owners agree that the seats and doors of all '55 La Femmes were trimmed with pale pink vinyl, which was not the Heather Rose color mentioned in the brochure, which also neglected to mention the rain hat, umbrella sleeve, and purse accessories. It further showed an all-pink dashboard, which in production was black on top, pink on the bottom. 

The rhetoric from the 1955 brochure included lines such as: "La Femme by Dodge — in mood and manner a distinctive car for the discriminating, modern woman." And, "Now for the first time anywhere, a car glamorously, Personally Yours." 

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The mood-setting prose continued: "Never a car more distinctively feminine than La Femme — first fine car created exclusively for women! In this superbly designed car, Dodge brings together luxurious, delicately-toned interiors and ultra-fashionable appointments — every sophisticated touch your heart could desire! Here is, truly, the ultimate in fine motoring. And just to make sure no one misunderstood, the key line on the front of the brochure read, "By Appointment to Her Majesty, the American Woman."

Likewise, the white taillight area turned to pink as production got underway. All in all, a typical sales brochure — long on theory, short on accuracy.

Front

Inside

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