Swifty's Garage

Today's car of the day is Kidco's 1977 Dodge Monaco.

The Dodge Monaco was a full-size automobile built and sold by the Dodge division of the Chrysler Corporation between 1965 to 1978, and 1990 to 1992.

For more information and pictures of the real car please visit: Dodge Monaco

This is an interesting model from Kidco.  I've got a soft spot for the Dodge Monaco, and in the last few years we've seen the amount of small scale examples double with new additions from GreenLight, Johnny Lightning, Matchbox, and Charawheels.  What makes this Kidco interesting is it was the first licensed Dodge Monaco casting.  The Monaco debuted in 1965 and ended production in 1978.  In that timeframe the only small scale example was done in 1977 by Hot Wheels, and they altered it just enough to avoid licensing it (from the C-pillars back, the car has some Ford and Oldsmobile in it, but the rest of the car is unmistakably Monaco including the split grill and quad stacked headlights.  So this Kidco debuted in 1979- a year after the real car exited production.  That would be easier to understand if this were done as a tie-in with any of the television shows that were wrecking these cars by the dozen at the time (like "The Dukes Of Hazzard") but this was never offered as a Hollywood car.  Even more curious is that the casting is of a two door coupe, a bodystyle that would have seen very limited (if any) service as a police car.  It remains the only Monaco coupe in small scale to this day as the new examples are all of two cars- the 1974 sedan (thanks to the "Blues Brothers" & to a lesser extent "Hill Street Blues") and the 1977-8 sedan (thanks primarily to "The Dukes Of Hazzard" but it was also seen on "Hunter" & "The A-Team" among many others).  Sadly, no Monaco wagons exist in 1/64, and none of the 1965-73 models exist in small scale whatsoever.

The Dodge Monaco was originally intended to compete with the Pontiac Grand Prix model in what came to be known as the personal luxury market. Introduced on September 25, 1964, the 1965 Monaco was based on the Custom 880 two door hardtop coupe body. The Monaco received special badging, different taillight and grille treatment, and a sportier interior with a full-length center console, as well as a 383 cu in (6.28 L) 315 hp (235 kW) V8 engine as standard equipment. Larger, more powerful engines were also available as options.

Chrysler Canada Ltd. fielded a Dodge Monaco which was Dodge's version of the Plymouth Sport Fury in Canada. It was available in hardtop coupe or convertible body styles. However, Canadian Monacos were equipped with Plymouth dashboards in 1965 and 1966. Unlike the American Monaco, the Canadian Monaco could be had with the 318 cu in (5.21 L) V8 or even the slant six.

As a lingering result of the 1973-74 energy crisis, Chrysler decided to shift the Monaco nameplate to the mid-size B platform for 1977. The "new" 1977 mid-sized Monaco replaced the previous Coronet 4-door sedan, 4-door station wagon and Charger hardtop coupe. The Monaco Brougham replaced the previous Coronet Brougham 4-door sedan and Charger Sport hardtop coupe, while the Monaco Crestwood station wagon replaced the previous Coronet Crestwood. The Charger S.E., which at this point became the sole Charger still available, continued unchanged.

The "new" Monacos, for all of the marketing hype, were little-changed from the Coronets which had gone before. A revised front-end design with stacked rectangular quad headlamps gave the cars a resemblance to the contemporary Chevrolet Monte Carlo when viewed head-on. With Chrysler Corporation in dire financial straits during these years, there was little that could be done to give the cars a fresh look, so changes had to be minimal and as inexpensive as possible.

The 1977 and 1978 models can be seen as the police vehicles in the 1980-1985 seasons of The Dukes of Hazzard. Large numbers were bought and then suffered ignominious ends, destroyed in stunt crashes but due to the toughness of the design, were often repaired and reused repeatedly.