For  Sale
1953  Kaiser  Dragon
One Year Only Model – Less than 1300 Made

—   Wire Wheels and Spare  —
—   Replacement Rear Glass Included  —
—   Original Dash Plaque In Place – Built Expressly For “Boone Wilson”  1st owner of This Kaiser Dragon —

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Pricing  /  Availability

The car is located in Tampa, Florida and is available for purchase at $1,500

Contact  Geoff  Hacker  at  (813) 888-8882  or  Geoffrey.Hacker@gmail.com

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Description

The following information is taken directly from David Conwill’s article for Hemmings Motor News in August, 2024.  You can view the entire article via the following link:

Click Here To View The Kaiser Dragon Article Via Hemmings

Exposure to the exotic vistas of the Pacific stuck with a great number of World War Two veterans when they returned home in the mid-1940s. That affinity led to an explosion of interest in Polynesian culture and aesthetics that would lead to the rise of Tiki bars, Exotica music and the 1949 Broadway hit, South Pacific.

One area where faux-Polynesian did not make tremendous inroads was automobile design–with one notable exception. In the immediate postwar period, of course, it was easy to sell anything with wheels to a car-starved public. After that, jet aircraft and space themes predominated with the tech-heavy automakers. But what if you were a newcomer to the auto industry without a huge R&D budget for things like V-8 engines and whiz-bang automatic accessories?

That’s exactly the conundrum Kaiser-Frazer faced when the Big Three rolled out their first new postwar offerings in 1949. The automaker’s slab-sided designs that had looked so fresh in 1947 when compared with the 1942-style pontoon fenders still being produced by most other manufacturers suddenly seemed very dated. Once a glut of overproduction was cleared out from 1950, with the last few disguised as the final Frazers, it was time for a daring new Kaiser design.

Famed designer Howard “Dutch” Darrin created a longer, lower and wider body shell with a prominent “sweetheart” dip at the top of the windshield and rear window, reminiscent of the neckline on an elegant woman’s dress. The restyle, billed as “Anatomic” design, featured the lowest beltline in U.S. car production for 1951. The result was a success, and Kaiser sales rebounded from a mere 15,228 examples in 1950 to 139,452 cars in 1951–besting the likes of De Soto and Hudson.

With no V-8 on the horizon, Kaiser would continue with the Continental-produced 226-cu.in. L-head straight-six engine that it had used since 1947, albeit revised to produce 115 horsepower. A few months after the new 1951 models debuted, Kaiser doubled down on styling to retain the momentum, introducing an alluringly different trim package for its Deluxe models in the late fall of 1950.

The star of the package was a simulated reptile hide made from vinyl and billed as “Dragonleather.” That moniker inspired the name of the Dragon package, which was soon expanded to include a padded vinyl top in yet another faux-lizard skin called “Dinosaur.” The package was tweaked twice more in 1951 and then dropped when the 1952 models came on the scene with the Dragon’s role as a premium Kaiser filled by a new trim level called Manhattan, a nameplate previously used by the top-of-the-line Frazer.

The Dragon returned on Halloween Day 1952, however, as a stand-alone model above the 1953 Manhattan. In addition to the special upholstery and padded top–now in a grass-patterned “Bambu” vinyl and Laguna cloth, a heavy-duty Belgian linen with overlapping patterns. A few cars had vinyl seat inserts instead of cloth.

The Bambu vinyl extended to the interior door panels, interior walls, package shelf, seats, padded dash and even the interior of the glovebox and interior walls of the trunk. To give the Dragon a luxurious feel above and beyond an ordinary Manhattan, the car used almost 200 pounds of insulation to quiet the ride and give it a sense of additional heft.

On the exterior, 14-karat gold was used on the hood ornament, trunk handle and deck and fender scripts. A gold engraved medallion with the owner’s name was also installed on the glovebox door. Furthering the luxury, the standard accessory package included everything in Kaiser’s “100 options” package such as a GM-sourced Hydra-Matic automatic transmission, E-Z Eye tinted glass, a radio with rear speaker, white sidewall tires, Deluxe wheelcovers, a windshield washer, heater, defroster, center armrests in front and rear, trunk courtesy lamps, a glovebox lamp, full carpeting both in the car and in the trunk, backup lamps, power steering and a lighted cigar receiver. So full was the standard equipment that the only real options of note were wire wheels, fog lamps and a spot lamp.

The Dragon, which sold for a price equivalent to a contemporary Buick Roadmaster, was in some respects a comparative bargain, as its sticker price represented essentially the cost of adding all its standard features to a regular Manhattan sedan as options–with the special upholstery and top thrown in for free. Alas, all this tropical splendor was not enough to make up the difference between the Dragon’s humdrum engine and the Buick’s new 188-horsepower, 322-cu.in. V-8. Dragon sales were a lackluster 1,277 units.

The folks who did buy a Dragon, though, got quite a vehicle. It was loaded, of course, exotically stylish and provided an enormously plush driving experience. The Dragons, like all Kaisers and Frazers, are also supported by a strong club network, meaning that expertise and parts are relatively easy to find.

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This  Car

• Unrestored
• This Kaiser Dragon is one of 1277 built from September 1952 thru May/June of 1953.  Few remain today.
• Included: Dragon and Kaiser script, replacement rear glass, fender skirts, rear quarter panel patch panels
• Car sold with bill of sale

Kaiser  Dragon  Magazine  Article  

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