Now is the time to buy a new Chevrolet, we learn in this 1940 Jam Handy film.
It certainly wasn’t their mission at the time—they were simply trying to sell cars. Still, today we are grateful to the Chevrolet division of General Motors and Jam Handy Pictures for all the wonderful films they produced through the years and their valuable historical insights into the automobile and American culture.
In this 1940 Jam Handy film, entitled Now Is The Time, we discover how amazed Americans were at the time with the rapid pace of change, just for example in women’s fashion and in automotive styling. To illustrate, there are glimpses of the1913 and 1928 Chevrolets, then looking terribly quaint, followed by a trip to Harley Earl’s GM art and clay modeling studios to see the latest for 1940. That year, the emphasis was on aerodynamic design—or the most basic principles of streamlining, anyway.
Chevrolet was indeed the style setter for 1940, in the low-priced field at least, outselling rival Ford by more than 200,00 cars. Marketed in the $700 to $900 range, the model line included the Master 85, Master De Luxe, and Special De Luxe. While the Master 85 was the division’s price champion, the flagship Special De Luxe accounted for the greatest volume. You’ll note that in this production, there’s a sudden and dramatic jump from black-and-white to color, just like a far more famous movie from one year earlier, The Wizard of Oz. Enjoy the video.
Anyone know the brand of that “horseless carriage”? It’s not a Curved Dash Oldsmobile as I had expected. I’m guessing that it’s a Winton; most popular of its time. One would think a Buick or Olds would be appropriate but maybe they didn’t want to pay compliments to their sister brands. GM may not have even owned any of their older cars. People were forward-thinking and nostalgia for the obsolete wasn’t a thing.
And what of that cubbyhole that the 1928 woman uses when leaving the house? What is it for and what does she put in it? I’ve seen many old houses, lived in two pre-1700 homes, but I’ve never seen that setup.
I thought the transition to color was abrupt and not as effective as it could have been. But there’s a jump in sound at that point so maybe the transition was smoother originally.
For that matter, the color shot of the new car started fading out almost as soon as the complete side view came on screen.
The cubbyhole is a milkbox. You put your empty milk bottles in there, the milkman comes along, takes the empties and replaces them with your standard order of milk.
The milkbox in my grandparents’ house, built sometime in the ’40s, was an insulated cooler type box. The door had refrigerator-type seals. Theirs had a door on both the inside and outside of the house; they placed their empties and retrieved the milk from the kitchen without having to go outdoors. Helpful during Michigan winters.
In the film, you can just barely see that she’s placing a glass bottle.
“Jam Handy reminds you to keep your preserves conveniently positioned.” – MST3K
Company founder Henry Jameson Handy was quite a character. Olympic swimmer, lived to be 97.
Maybe I’m way off base here, but I never heard mention of Chevrolet nor saw a closeup of the Chevy logo.
There was a real Harley Earl hold my beer moment when the narrator said that the mission of the artist was to simplify and eliminate frills.