Pullman

Pullman (pronounced pool-muhn or pull-minn)

(1) A range of railroad sleeping cars produced by the Pullman Palace Car Company which operated in the US between 1867 and 1968.

(2) A generic term for up-market coaches and train carriages.

(3) A term used by certain automobile manufacturers to describe lengthened versions of their limousines; most associated with Humber in the UK and Daimler-Benz in Germany.

(4) A type of long, square bread developed to be baked in the small kitchens of rail cars.

(5) As Pullman case, a type of large suitcase.

(6) In architecture, a long, narrow room, a visual allusion to the interior of a railway carriage.

1867: From the name of Chicago-based US engineer and industrialist George Mortimer Pullman (1831–1897).  It was first applied to the luxury railway coaches the Pullman Palace Car Company introduced in 1867, first in Chicago, later used across the US.  The name became widely used in a number of countries, used to describe up-market coaches and train carriages.

Interiors of Pullman Train Carriages

Bristol Type 26 Pullman

The Bristol Pullman first flew in 1918, designated originally as the Type 24 Braemar Triplane, a four-engined heavy bomber.  Tests soon revealed performance deficiencies and, as the Type 25 Braemar II, a second prototype took to the air in 1919, now with four, more powerful straight-12 Liberty engines and though it proved satisfactory the end of hostilities meant the Air Ministry no longer required a long-range bomber so Bristol reconfigured the third prototype as the Type 26 Pullman, a fourteen-passenger transport.  The use of the Pullman name was an allusion to the luxury of trains although, weight of greater significance in airframes, the fittings were notably less extravagant.  Although exhibited to acclaim at the 1920 Olympia Air Show in 1920, the projected price was too high for the embryonic civilian airlines of the era and the Pullman never entered production, the sole prototype dismantled in 1921 but in a sense, it really was the first “modern” airliner.  The wildly ambitious Type 40 Pullman, an enlarged forty-passenger version, never advanced beyond the drawing board.  Whether the Type 25 it would have been an effective heavy bomber has been debated.  The top speed was claimed to be 122 mph (196 km/h) which was competitive with the fighters of the time and the service ceiling was said to 15,000 feet (4575 m), a height which even some of the early heavy bombers of World War II struggled to match but whether these numbers would have be matched when fully loaded, under combat conditions, isn’t known.

Mercedes-Benz 600 Pullman & Pullman Landaulet

A symbol of the post-war Wirtschaftswunder (economic miracle) in West Germany (Federal Republic of Germany (FRG), 1949-1990), Daimler-Benz first showed the Mercedes-Benz 600 (W100) in September 1963 at the Frankfurt Motor Show although deliveries didn’t begin until the following year.  Known as the Grosser (grand or greatest) Mercedes in the tradition of the 770K (W07; 1930-1938 & W150; 1938-1943)), it was what had by the 1960s become an automotive rarity, a genuinely new car with no carry-over components from previous vehicles and was a technological tour de force even eschewing (relatively) noisy electric motors for accessories like windows and sun roofs, instead controlling them via a swift and silent hydraulic system which extended even to automating the closing of doors and trunk (boot).  Powered by a 6.3 litre (386 cubic inch) single overhead camshaft (SOHC) V8, which powered it to a top speed of 128 mph (205 km/h) (124 (200) for the heavier Pullman), it rode on air suspension which, in addition to the expectedly cushion-like ride, permitted the 600 a competence in handling and roadholding exceeding many of the sports car of the era, some of which couldn’t match its straight-line speed.  Remarkably, this was achieved with the use of swing axles at the rear although years of refinement of the anti-squat, anti-dive geometry and a compensating device above the differential tamed the worst of the tendencies inherent in what was, even in the early sixties seen as an inherently flawed design.

600 SWB (left), 600 Pullman 4 door (centre) & 600 Pullman Landaulet with the "short" roof (right).  Although the factory would build the landaulets to the requested configuration, most of the 6 door cars used the "long" fabric roof which began above the front seats while on the 4 door cars, the metal roof extended mid-way into the rear-passenger compartment.  Although the long-roof cars are sometimes referred to as the "presidential", this was never an official designation.

With economies expanding on both sides of the Atlantic, Daimler-Benz had great expectations for the 600, predicting sales would soon exceed a thousand a year but, after an encouraging 345 were built in 1965 (the first full-year of production), demand waned and even that high-water mark was never again approached.  The increasingly onerous regulations being imposed in the United States meant that by 1972, the 600 had to be withdrawn from what had always been the most important market.  After that, although dictators in Africa and Asia remained fond of the things, there simply weren’t enough of them to sustain the line and the company concentrated on the UK, European and Middle Eastern markets and there were some encouraging signs until in something of an own goal, in 1972 Mercedes-Benz released the W116, the first model to be known as the “S Class” and, although in a different market segment to the grosser, it was so advanced and obviously modern that instantly it made the anyway rather baroque 600 look antiquated.  The final nail in the coffin was the first oil shock in 1973 and from then until the end of the line in 1981, production dwindled to a handful a year, availability maintained only because of the thing’s importance in the brand’s image and the lingering aura of having upon its release been lauded generally as “the best car in the world”, perhaps the last time about that there would be a consensus.

600 Pullman Landaulets: 4 doors with the short roof (left & centre) and 6 door with the long roof (right).  The factory built the Pullmans to order and there were many variations (one Pullman even built as a "family car" without the glass partition which normally separated the chauffeur from the passengers), most of the 4 door cars were fitted with "vis-a-vis" seating whereas the 6 door models usually had occasional "jump seats" which folded into the central partition.

The standard 600 was built on a wheelbase of 3200 mm (126”) while the Pullmans (and all but one of the landaulets) used a lengthened platform, extending this to 3900 mm (153 ½“).  Often (correctly but somewhat misleadingly) referred to as the SWB (short wheelbase), the standard car was 5540 mm (218 “) in length while the elongated Pullmans (LWB or long wheelbase) stretch this to 6240 mm (245¾”) and the weight varied, depending on configuration between 3000-3300 kg (6600-7275 lb).  Over the eighteen-odd years it was on the books, Mercedes built 2677 600s (including 45 “special protection” versions, a coupé and one SWB landaulet), the breakdown being:

6 door 600 Pullman Landaulet (left), 4 dr 600 Pullman Landaulet used by the FRG (Federal Republic of Germany; the old West Germany) for Queen Elizabeth II's 1965 state visit (centre) and 4 door 600 Pullman.

Few cars have ever so encapsulated an association with wealth and power which is why Pullmans continue to be sought be film directors looking for a prop which at a glance delivers the desired verisimilitude.  Additionally, being long and low-slung, unlike the traditional, upright Rolls-Royce Phantom limousines, the Pullmans always managed to convey something slightly sinister, thus the appearance in films of a certain kind although the use in The Exorcist probably was about money.  If the look alone isn’t enough, the ownership list included: King Khalid Bin Abdulaziz Al Saud of Saudi Arabia, Park Chung-hee, Josip Broz Tito, Nicolae Ceaușescu, Pol Pot, Enver Hoxha, Francois (Papa Doc) Duvalier, Jean-Bédel Bokassa, Emperor Hirohito, FW de Klerk, Leonid Brezhnev, Idi Amin, Fidel Castro, Robert Mugabe, Jomo Kenyatta, Daniel arap Moi, Ferdinand Marcos (who owned four, including a Landaulet and a “special protection”, Kim Il-sung (the Great Leader passing his two landaulets (along with the rest of the DPRK (North Korea) to Kim Jong-il (the Dear Leader) and Kim Jong-un (the Supreme Leader), Saddam Hussein, the last Shah of Iran who had several, Chairman Mao Zedong, Chen Yi, Deng Xiaoping (wife of Zhou Enlai), Deng Yingchao, Norodom Sihanouk, Léopold Sédar, Nicolae Ceauşescu, Idi Amin Dada, Enver Hoxha, Papa Doc Duvalier, Josip Broz Tito & Mobutu Sese Seko.

SCV 1, the 600 Pullman used as the papal car by the Holy See, 1965-1986.

The 600 Pullman landaulet presented to Pope Paul VI (1897–1978; pope 1963-1978) and used by the Holy See between 1965-1986 was the latest in a line of papal Mercedes-Benz which had included a 1930 Nürburg 460 (W08) and a 1960 300d Cabriolet D (W189), both fitted with the throne-like, single rear seat, the same configuration used in “popemobiles” to this day.  It was one of the 45 “special build” 600s, using the long wheelbase platform but with the rear doors 256 millimeters longer and directly adjoining the front doors.  The roof of the Pullman landaulet was raised by 70 millimeters to provide adequate headroom, something necessitated by the floor being level in the rear, the transmission tunnel concealed underneath.  The car since 1986 has been on display in the Mercedes-Benz Museum in Untertürkheim, complete with the registration SCV 1 (Stato della Città del Vaticano 1 (Vatican City State No 1), the number one identifying the pope’s official car at any given time, much as the US Air Force call-sign Air Force 1 moves with the president).

Lindsay Lohan with 600 Pullman during the filming of Liz & Dick (2012).

A most unfortunate conjunction of imagery: Adolf Hitler on Berlin's newly opened East-West Axis in his 770K Grosser Cabriolet F open tourer (W150; 1939-1943) in a parade marking his fiftieth birthday, opposite the Technical High School, 20 April 1939 (left) and David Bowie in his 600 Pullman Landaulet, Victoria Station, London, 2 May 1976 (right).

The pop star David Bowie (1947-2016) understood he was an influential figure in music but on more than one occasion explained to interviewers: “I am not an original thinker”.  Trawling pop-culture for inspiration nevertheless served him well but he later came to regret dabbling with history slightly less recent.  Not impressed with the state of British society and its economy in the troubled mid-1970s, he was quoted variously as suggesting the country would benefit for “an ultra right-wing government” or “a fascist leader”.  Although he would later claim he was captivated more by the fashions than the policies of the Third Reich, the most celebrated event of this period came in 1976 in what remains known as the "Victoria Station incident".  Bowie staged a media event, arriving standing in an open 600 Pullman Landaulet, recalling for many the way in which Hitler so often appeared in his 770K.  Unfortunately, a photographer captured a shot in what the singer later claimed was “mid wave” and it certainly resembled as Nazi salute.  He later attributed all that happened during this stage of his career to too many hard drugs which had caused his interest in the aesthetics of inter-war Berlin to turn into an obsession with politics of the period.  All was however quickly forgiven and his audience awaited the next album which is an interesting contrast to the cancel culture created by the shark-feeding dynamic of the social media era.  Now, were a pop star to tell interviewers: “Britain could benefit from a fascist leader” and “I believe very strongly in fascism … Adolf Hitler was one of the first rock stars”, their future career prospects might be "nasty, solitary, brutish and short".