Closing out a memorable 11-year run, the 1965 300L was the grand finale for the luxurious yet muscular Chrysler letter-series cars.
Introduced in 1955 with the C-300, the Chrysler letter series cars have often been described as early muscle cars. Well, sort of. They certianly weren’t lacking in muscle, but they were larger, heavier, and considerably more luxurious than the classic muscle cars of the ’60s. As the series marched up through the alphabet through the next 10 model years, the cars grew ever larger and more luxurious, and with the introduction in 1962 of a standard 300 model (no letter) the letter series lost a bit of its exclusivity. In 1965 came the finale for the original letter cars: the 300L.
As comfort-oriented as any of the previous Chrysler letter cars, the 300L featured an enormous five-passenger cockpit with a pair of roomy, vinyl-covered bucket seats up front. A wide center console accommodated the shift lever for the Torqueflite automatic transmission and a vacuum gauge, while buyers who selected the optional (at no extra cost) four-speed manual transmission got a real tachometer. A four-speed with three pedals would be an unusual choice for a plus-sized luxury car, but an enjoyable one, we imagine.
Power steering, power brakes, electric clock, and a host of other goodies were all standard. With a base price of $4,056, the 300L carried a hefty $603 premium over the vanilla 300 at $3443. However, there’s little exterior badging to distinguish the 300L from the standard variety—mainly a small medallion in the center of the grille and another between the tail lamps.
For ’65, the letter series lost its wild-looking ram-induction intake system that filled up much of the engine compartment (more on Chrysler’s ram induction here.) Now the sole available powerplant was a 413 CID V8 with a 10:1 compression ratio, a single Carter AFB carburetor, and 360 hp. In a 1965 road test, Motor Trend technical editor John Ethridge described the acceleration as “more than adequate,” though the quarter-mile e.t. was a liesurely 17.1 seconds, hobbled no doubt by 4460 lbs of curb weight. But he noted that even with its considerable bulk, the big cruiser could be “thrown around with good control.”
Despite its lack of a special engine and other flashy features, the 300L is respected by letter-series enthusiasts as a true member of the breed. It’s a sleeper, you might say. And perhaps a bit surprisingly, the last of the letter cars was also one of the best sellers of the model run : 2,405 two-door hardtops and 404 convertibles. Of them, 96 hardtops and 12 convertibles, reportedly, were equipped with the four-speed manual transmission.
One of the few times that Chrysler Corporation smartly got off the train before it crashed. The GTO and Mustang made full size muscle cars irrelevant. Chrysler tooled for 1966 C body Street Hemis with A/C, but didn’t bother selling them.
Among “the cars we should have kept”, one of my brothers and I had, at various times, three “letter cars”: two ’61 300G hardtops (375 hp ram induction 413 torqueflite), and a ’64 300K (360hp 413 4 speed). Without a doubt, high performance, luxurious, “touring” cars, in an era when America had no others to rival the Europeans, though certainly not “muscle cars” in the vein of 1/4 mile drag racers. The “K” was the first year for Chrysler’s own four speed, and the first year for a Hurst shifter factory installed, two factors contributing to it’s rarity, and two reasons it should have been retained. Sadly,
we all know how hindsight works.
I remember as a young “gearhead” visiting the local Chrysler-Plymouth dealership and seeing a red 300L sitting in the showroom with the top down. I still remember how disappointed I was on opening that wide hood and discovering a single 4-barrel carb atop that 413 V8. I loved the new styling, but at that time I wondered why they even bothered to have a 300L, it only seemed to cheapen the previous letter series cars.
A few years later, at the same C-P dealer, I traded in my 1957 supercharged Packard Clipper on a more powerful [compared to the 300L] MoPaR product that I could afford; a slightly used [12,000 mile] red 1966 Plymouth Fury convertible, equipped with the 440 4-barrel V8 [very few ’66 Plymouths had the 440]. My plan was to install a complete 300J/K crossram setup on the Plymouth, But when the gas crisis hit, I decided not to do so, as my commute was about 75 miles each way. I ended up selling the crossram when I learned it wouldn’t fit on the 440 engine anyway!