The pillarless hardtop body style was a sales leader in the Motor CIty for decades. Buick got the ball rolling in 1949 with the Roadmaster Riviera.

A while back at Mac’s Motor City Garage, we told the story of how Chrysler inadvertently created a pillarless hardtop with the 1946 Town & Country, but without capitalizing on its significance. (See the feature here.) It was left to General Motors to seize the opportunity a few years later when the Buick Roadmaster Riviera was officially introduced in June of 1949.

How the Riviera Hardtop Coupe came to be is a touchstone in Buick lore. Chief stylist Ned Nickles had been working with the idea since 1945, and when Buick executive Ed Ragsdale showed a design study to his wife, Sarah Ragsdale, early in 1948, she took notice. Like many Americans at the time, she drove convertibles for their styling and image, even though the tops were seldom if ever taken down. Mrs. Ragsdale assured Mr. Ragsdale that if Buick offered a such a body style, it would surely be a winner. Ten years later, Buick presented Sarah Ragsdale with a new Buick Electra 225 in recognition for her contribution.

Americans got their first look at the pillarless hardtop Buick at GM’s Transportation Unlimited show at the Walforf-Astoria in New York in January of 1949. However, the press had gotten a heads-up a few months earlier. As the New York Times reported on November 18, Buick would be introducing a “solid top custom coupe with the lines of a convertible” called the Riviera in its 1949 product line. Cadillac also displayed a prototype hardtop at the Waldorf, but with a different greenhouse and roofline than the production Coupe de Ville that appeared some months later. At the same show, Oldsmobile presented its hardtop, the 98 Holiday.

On June 25, Buick announced that Riviera production was underway, while Cadillac and Oldsmobile followed some weeks later. All three hardtops shared the same basic convertible-based body shell, which the Fisher Body division called a Special Sport Coupe. Their common greenhouse featured a small rear quarter glass, two-piece windshield, and three-piece backlite, though variations would follow over the next few years.

The production Riviera was remarkably similar to the Waldorf show car, with a more subdued nterior and different bright metal side trim, as the trademark Buick sweepspear replaced the straight trim used on the early pilot cars. Standard features included Buick’s Dynaflow automatic transmission, introduced one year earlier, and GM Hydro-Lectric power windows and power seat. The price was originally announced as $3,476, then reduced to $3,203—around 50 bucks more than a Roadmaster convertible.

Due to the short production schedule, only 4,343 Rivera 76R Hardtop Coupes were built in ’49, but it was clear enough that Buick had a hit on its hands. For 1950,a Super -based Riviera was added, and there was a Roadmaster Riviera post sedan, too. The seemingly contradictory term “hardtop convertible” entered the lexicon of American motorists. Pillarless hardtops were sales leaders for decades in the Motor City, until they were ultimately rendered obsolete by side-impact and rollover safety standards.

Thanks to Buick historians Terry Boyce and Tom Gibson for their valuable input.