Cimarron (pronounced sim-uh-ron, sim-uh-rohn or sim-er-uhn)
(1) A Maroon (an African or one of African descent who
escaped slavery in the Americas, (or a descendant thereof, especially a member
of the Cimarron people of Panama).
(2) In Latin America (1) feral animals or those which
have returned to the wild, (2) rural areas (campestral) and the inhabitants there
dwelling & (3) wild plants.
(3) A name used in the US for both rivers & as both a
localities.
(4) A not fondly remembered small "Cadillac", built between
1981-1988.
1840–1850: From the Colonial Spanish cimarrón (a maroon (used also casually of feral animals, wild rams etc),
from the Spanish and thought likely equivalent to the Old Spanish cimarra (brushwood, thicket), the
construct being & cim(a) (peak, summit (from the Latin cȳma (spring shoots of a vegetable), from the Ancient Greek + -arrón
(the adjectival suffix). Most etymologists
appear to accept the Spanish cimarrón
was a native Spanish formation from cima
(summit, peak), referring to slaves who escaped to seek refuge in the mountains
but the alternative theory is that it was a borrowing from Taíno símaran (wild (like a stray arrow)),
from símara (arrow). The feminine was cimarrona, the masculine plural cimarrones
& the feminine plural cimarronas. The verb maroon (put ashore on a desolate
island or some isolate and remote coast by way of punishment) dates from 1724
and was from maroon (fugitive black slave living in the wilder parts of Dutch
Guyana or Jamaica and other West Indies islands) which has always been assumed
to be a corruption of the Spanish cimmaron
& cimarrón. Cimarron is a noun & proper noun (the adjective
cimarific (based on Cimar(ron) + (horr)ific) was sardonic; a slur relating to
the Cadillac); the noun plural is Cimarrons.
The Cadillac Cimarron, 1982-1988
The path of the reputation of the unfortunate
Cadillac Cimarron was unusual in the more it was upgraded and improved, the
further it seemed to fall in the estimation of the motoring press. Despite the impression which seems over the
decades to have become embedded, the early critical reaction to the Cimarron
was generally polite and even positive, while acknowledging the inadequacies of
the original engine-transmission combinations.
The journalists may however have been in a mood to be unusually
forgiving because in 1981, when the first examples were provided for press
evaluation, that a Cadillac was for the first time since 1914 fitted with a
four-cylinder engine and one with a displacement smaller than 2.0 litres (122
cubic inch) for the first time since 1908 was a sign how much the universe had
shifted; not even ten years earlier every Cadillac on sale used an 8.2 litre
(500 cubic inch) V8. The ripples of the oil shocks of the 1970s would see the big-block V8 twice downsized (before being driven to extinction) but so much had the rising
cost (and threatened scarcity) of gas (petrol) scarred consumers that even
Cadillac owners wanted more efficient vehicles.
They still wanted to drive Cadillacs and while demand for the full-sized
cars remained, it was obvious to General Motors (GM) the segment was in
decline and the alternatives proving popular were not the traditional Lincolns or big Chryslers (the Imperial of old by then a memory) but the premium brand Europeans, Mercedes-Benz, BMW and (as a
niche player), Jaguar.
The Europeans
produced very different machines to the Cadillacs and it would have taken much
time and money to match them in sophistication but what could be done quickly
and at relatively low cost was to make a Cadillac out of a Chevrolet and that
was the path chosen, the long-serving Chevrolet Nova re-styled, re-trimmed,
re-engined (with the 5.7 litre (350 cubic inch) Oldsmobile V8) and re-badged as
the Cadillac Seville. On paper, it didn’t
sound promising but on the road it actually worked rather well, essentially
because Chevrolet had done a creditable job in making the Nova drive something
like a Cadillac with some (vaguely) Mercedes-Benzesque like characteristics. So, the task for Cadillac’s engineers wasn’t
that onerous but they did it well and the Seville was a great success,
something especially pleasing to GM because the thing retailed at some four times
what Chevrolet charged for Novas. That
made the Seville one of the most famously profitable lines ever to emerge from
Detroit which was good but what was not was that most people who bought one
weren’t conquests from Mercedes-Benz or BMW (and definitely not from Jaguar)
but those who would otherwise have bought a Cadillac. Still, the Seville did its bit and
contributed to brief era of record sales and high profits for GM.
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By the early 1980s however, Cadillac decided it need to do the same thing again, this time on a smaller scale. A second oil shock had struck in 1979 (this one triggered by Persian ayatollahs rather than Arab sheikhs) and this time the US economy wasn’t bouncing back as it had in the mid-1970s; the recession of the early 1980s was nasty indeed. One market segment which was a bright spot however was what was called the “small executive sedan” dominated then by the BMW 3-Series, soon to be joined by what would become known as the Mercedes-Benz C-Class, compact, high-quality and high-priced cars being bought by what to Cadillac would be a most attractive demographic: the then newly defined Yuppies (young upwardly-mobile professionals). Cadillac had nothing which appealed to this market and their plans for an entry were years away even from the initial design phases. The economic situation of the time however had made the matter urgent and so, at a very late stage, Cadillac was appended to GM’s ambitious programme to use the one “world car” platform to be used in the divisions which produced cars in the planet’s major markets (the US, UK, Europe, Japan & Australasia). This one front-wheel drive platform would provide a family sized car in Japan, the UK and Europe, a compact-sized entrant in Australasia and a small car in the US with the highest possible degree of component interchangeability and a consequent reduction in the time and cost to bring the lines to production.
The longevity of the GM “World Car" (the J-Car (J-Body the US nomenclature)), the last produced in 2005, attests to the quality
of GM’s fundamental engineering and over the decades, over 10 million would be
sold as Vauxhalls (UK), Opels (Europe), Holdens (Australia & New Zealand),
Isuzus, Toyotas (Japan) and Chevrolets, Buicks, Oldsmobiles, Pontiacs
& Cadillacs (US). By the standards of
the time they were good cars (although they did prove less suited to Australian
driving conditions) but they could not, and certainly not in the eleven months
available, be made into what would be thought of as “a Cadillac”. To do that, given the technology available at
the time, ideally the platform would have been widened, a small version of one
of the corporate V8s (perhaps as small as 3.5 litres (215 cubic inch) fitted
and the configuration changed to accommodate rear-wheel drive (RWD) and
independent rear suspension (IRS). The
J-Body could have accommodated all this and, thus configured, coupled with the
lashings of leather expected in the interior, GM would have had an appropriately
sized small executive sedan, executed in an uniquely American way. Like the Seville, it may not have made much
of a dent in the business Mercedes-Benz and BMW were doing but it would have
had real appeal and it’s doubtful it would have cannibalized the sales of the
bigger Cadillacs. Additionally, it would
have been ideally place to take advantage of the rapid fall in gas prices which
came with the 1980s “oil glut”. Alas, such ideas would have been fanciful, such a thing taking too long to develop and it would have been such
an expensive programme Cadillac would have convinced the GM board they may as
well accelerate the development of their own small car. So, needing something small to put in the
showrooms because that’s what Cadillac dealers were clamouring for, the decision
was taken to gorp-up (the term "bling" not the in use) the J-Body.
That, for the 1982 model year, was
exactly what was done. The Cadillac
Cimarron was nothing more than a Chevrolet Cavalier with a lot of extra stuff
bolted or glued on. Apparently, the name
“Cimarron” was chosen because it had in the US been used to refer to the wild horses which once roamed freely in the American West, the company
hoping to add the idea of an “untamed spirit” to the (even if by then slightly
tarnished) reputation for luxury and elegance once associated with Cadillac. Whether much thought was given to the name’s
association with slavery isn’t known.
That aside, the spirit wasn’t exactly untamed because the already anaemic performance of the Chevrolet was hampered further by all the extra weight of
the luxury fittings which adorned the Cimarron, something which was tolerated (indeed
probably expected) in what Chevrolet was selling as an “economy car” but luxury
buyers (paying much more) had higher expectations.
Most would conclude it made things worse. Had it been sold as the Chevrolet Caprice II or a Buick something, the Cimarron would probably have been a hit and while there would have been the same criticisms, in a car costing so much less, they would have been less pointed. However, that would have meant the Cadillac dealers not having product to put in their showrooms which was of course the point of the whole Cimarron venture. As it was, sales never came close to Cadillac’s optimistic projections, numbers influenced presumably by the Seville’s stellar performance a few years earlier and this time the mark-up was less, a Cimarron only twice the cost of a Cavalier. That wasn’t enough however and nor were the constant upgrades, the most notable of which was the introduction of the Chevrolet’s 2.8 litre (173 cubic inch) V6 in 1985 and that did induce a surge in sales (though never to anything like the once hoped for levels) but it was short lived and after production ended in 1988, Cadillac offered no replacement and they’ve not since attempted to build anything on this scale. While not exactly "another Edsel", memories of the Cimarron remain Cadillac's warning to itself and, according to industry legend, one of the company's later product directors kept on his desk a framed picture of one, the caption reading: "Lest we forget".
In the era, there was another footnote to the success of the Seville. The Lincoln Versailles (1977-1980) was model hastily concocted by Ford, the corporation impressed the Seville had proved “Cadillac people” were prepared to pay high prices for a machine much smaller than what had for decades been the marque’s signature product. Although based on the compact (in US terms) Chevrolet Nova platform (X-Body 1974-1979), the Seville had benefited from extensive re-engineering by GM (General Motors) and, although afflicted by some of the flaws of “malaise era” cars, was regarded as an accomplished product. By comparison, the Versailles was a Q&D (quick & dirty) make-over of the Ford Granada (with roots in the Falcon which had appeared in 1959) with few fundamental changes beyond the addition of much gorp and some buyers may have been disappointed by the performance after, in a well-publicized pre-release road-test, Mechanix Illustrated magazine reported the “final prototype” recorded a standing ¼ mile (400 m) ET (elapsed time) of 15.5 seconds; the versions which appeared in the showrooms took were much less lively, taking at least three seconds longer. The Versailles sold in not even a third of the volume Cadillac achieved with the Seville but according to the authoritative site Curbside Classic, because it was built using commerce’s most prized formula (low cost of production; high price) it was a most profitable line so while the US motoring journalists (still obsessed with Lancias and such) may have been laughing at it, Ford was laughing all the way to the bank.
In English, malaise was an unadapted loanword from the French malaise (ill ease), the construct being mal- (bad, badly) + aise (ease). It was used to describe (1) a feeling of general bodily discomfort, fatigue or unpleasantness (sometimes associated with the onset of illness), (2) an ambiguous feeling of mental or moral depression (the sense tending more to “melancholy” than “angst”) and (3) ill will or hurtful feelings for others. The US cars of the years between 1974-1984 (some say it went on a bit longer) came to be called “malaise era” cars, the name from the thoughtful but perhaps unfortunate “Crisis of Confidence” address Jimmy Carter (1924-2024; US president 1977-1981) delivered in July 1979. Carter’s years of malaise remains emblematic the America of the late 1970s (a time of stagflation, oil-shock induced energy price-rises & shortages, high interest rates and general gloom) but the details have become blurred. The use of the word “malaise” emerged from a retreat the president had convened at the Camp David retreat after concluding neither he, his advisors or the entire machinery of government could come up with solution to the nation’s many problems. Attended by notables from the clergy, academia and other realms including the governor of Arkansas, BillClinton (b 1946; US president 1993-2001), the curious event prompted one historian to describe it as “…the most remarkable exercise in presidential navel-gazing in American history…” but what did lodge in Carter’s memory was an observation by the pollster Patrick Caddell (1950–2019) that after some fifteen years of trauma including assassinations, race riots, the war in Vietnam and Watergate, the nation was experiencing a “malaise” and the president decided this notion would be the centrepiece of his address to the people.
An emblematic malaise era machine, twenty-first century viewers would be surprised to learn it was possible for a relatively small, light car with a 302 cubic inch (4.9 litre) V8 to deliver such anaemic performance. However, the Mustang II (1973-1978) was the the right car for the right car (debuting some weeks before the first oil shock) and was a great success.
The word “malaise” wasn’t included in the text of Carter’s speech but, replete with phrases like “…strikes at the very heart and soul and spirit of our national will…” & “…crisis of confidence…”, the tone was clear and almost universally the press called it the “malaise speech”. Despite what has long been the popular perception, at the time the speech was not a political disaster and was well-received, Carter’s approval ratings surging; it was only as the year unfolded he came to be damned by his own words and if any single term is now associated with his unhappy single term, it's “malaise”. As was customary for presidential addresses of this nature, the speech was nationally televised live by the three major commercial networks (ABC (American Broadcasting Company), CBS (Columbia Broadcasting System) & NBC (National Broadcasting Company)) and simultaneously broadcast by many radio stations, the total audience estimated at some 65 million (there was then no FoxNews but it's not difficult to predict what the nature of that commentary would have been). Given the coverage, it’s certain the address contributed greatly to the eventual public disillusionment with the president and may thus have been an example of videomalaise (a term from late 1990s political science which linked voters’ decreasing trust in politicians with depictions of the latter on televised news).
Available only on the Firebird (Formula or Trans-AM) in 1973 & 1974, the SD-455 was one of the few bright spots of the malaise era although it did need slightly to be detuned for commercial release, its original 310 (HP) horsepower configuration able to pass the EPA's (Environmental Protection Authority) emission tests only if a devious "cheater" device was installed (shades of Volkswagen's later "dieselgate" although Pontiac got off with nothing more than a "slap on the wrist" rather than the billions it cost the equally guilty Germans). The production version was rated at 290 HP which was still enough to make it the powerful US car of its time.
The "malaise era" cars were so named because compared with the previous generations, they were heavier, slower, thirstier and less pleasant to drive, a collection of characteristics which weren't the fault of President Carter but he had the misfortune to be in the White House at the same time. They were of course safer and less polluting but those advantages were hidden while the ugliness of the battering-ram bumper-bars, reduced power and sometimes tiresome driving characteristics were obvious. When speaking of these mostly unlamented machines, the phrase “Malaise Era” is believed to have been coined by writer Murilee Martin (the pen name of Phil Greden) who used it first in 2007 on the website Jalopnik.
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