Today marks half a century since the murder at the hands of ETA of Admiral Luis Carrero Blanco, president of the government, of the driver José Luis Pérez Mogena and of the police inspector Antonio Bueno Fernández.
The car was a Dodge 3700 GT, not a Dart as we repeatedly heard or read, a model manufactured by Barreiros in Spain between 1971 and 1977. But let's look back a few years.
Two brothers and a bicycle factory
In 1887, brothers John and Horace Dodge founded the Evans & Dodge Bicycle Company. A year earlier Horace had patented a revolutionary dirt-resistant bearing.
The bicycle factory operates successfully, and in 1901, the Dodge brothers launch what would be the largest machine shop in Detroit. Shortly after, in 1902, they already supplied engines, transmissions and axles to important customers such as Oldsmobile. The following year, in 1903, they began working with the newly arrived Ford Motor Company.
In 1914, the brothers decided it was time to part ways with Ford and create their own automobile. The first Dodge, built with an all-steel body (the first of its kind), rolled out of the plant on December 14 of that year, and within a short time 249 units had been built.
Just one year later, Dodge ranks third among best-selling automakers. World War I made the Dodge brothers focus their production on trucks, civilian and especially military, along with a 1,155 mm cannon recoil system for the Allied armies. In 1919, Dodge built its 400,000th vehicle, while also introducing the brand's first four-door sedan.
In 1920, the global flu pandemic that caused more than 550,000 deaths in the United States and more than 20 million worldwide in just one year, enters the Dodge household: both John and Horace die from it. At the time, Dodge was the second best-selling car in the United States.
During the 1920s, Dodge Brothers Motor Car Company opened its first Canadian plant, surpassed 200,000 vehicles manufactured in one year, produced its millionth Dodge automobile, and was acquired by Chrysler Corporation.
The dream of Eduardo Barreiros
In post-war Spain, we are talking about the difficult forties of the last century, Eduardo Barreiros from Orense began the transformation of truck gasoline engines into diesel ones. Work, intelligence and insistence lead you to success. And, in the mid-forties he founded “Barreiros Diesel” in his native land. And in 1952, he moved to Madrid, along with his brothers, where he took the big step by building a factory in Villaverde. Despite the setbacks of the INI and ENASA, success smiles upon them as manufacturers of trucks, buses, vans, tractors and industrial engines. But he wanted to go further, to launch himself into the manufacture of passenger cars, for which, in 1963, he reached an agreement with the American Chrysler to build the Dodge Dart, a popular model in the USA, in its fourth generation variant, and the Simca. 1000, since Chrysler has just become a majority shareholder of the French firm.
Twenty thousand Dart chassis-body assemblies were brought from the United States to be assembled in Spain where the in-line six-cylinder engine was manufactured. But the sales forecasts did not work out and in 1969 the Barreiros sold the firm to Chrysler. That year, a Dart was presented with several aesthetic modifications both inside and outside. This Dart 69 is easily identified by the large square headlights also used on some of the brand's trucks. And a 3700 GT version appears, with a national (non-American) four-speed transmission. The 3687 cm³ Slant-6 6-cylinder in-line engine had a double-body Carter BBD 4300 S carburetor and a different camshaft that allowed it to reach 165 HP of power. And it also equipped a braking system with self-ventilated front discs provided with Kelsey Haynes 4-piston calipers, and “Master-vac Bendix”z servo assistance, much more effective than that of the previous Dodge, and a front suspension with a different stabilizer bar. Inside, among other details, there was a dashboard and instrumentation different from the rest of the range.
This Dodge Dart “69” is selling better and serves to reduce stock. But now Chrysler finds itself with a dilemma. If you want to continue selling this model, you can no longer continue with the CKD assembly regime (with imported parts) since the Spanish administration only allows this system for certain initial production units of a model. But “nationalizing” the Dart, which on the other hand has an already outdated aesthetic, is not profitable.
The Dodge 3700 is born
So the solution is to launch a new one, but with the lowest possible expense. It is based on the available Dart frames (the so-called A Body or A Platform used by several Chrysler, Dodge, De Soto and Plymouth models from the sixties and seventies), but a new body is used. This does not come from the American Dodge, but from the Dodge Polara manufactured by Chrysler-Fevre Argentina SA, a subsidiary of Chrysler Corporation. It is a more modern design than the Dart.
In Spain, the bodywork is successfully modified by the prestigious engineer Mario Gamarra y Artaza (a key man in the history of Barreiros) who designs an attractive front with four round headlights and pilot lights at the corners, and a rear part very different from the of the Argentine model. The set has a very seventies feel, a real success.
The Dodge 3700, as it is named, measured 4.99 meters long, 1.80 wide and 1.39 high, with a huge trunk of 608 liters and a weight of 1,412 kilos. For comparison, the Dart was 4.98 m, 1.77 m and 1.38 m in terms of dimensions, and a weight of 1,325 kilos. The wheelbase of the 3700 was the same as the Dart: 2.82 m.
It inherits the engine from the 1969 Dart 3700 GT, which allowed it to reach 176 km/h, and its braking system. And it has the new ZF integral power steering as standard. Air conditioning and leather upholstery were options.
The new Dodge 3700 was presented in May 1971 at the Barcelona Motor Show and that same year it was chosen as “Car of the Year in Spain” by a jury of motor journalists gathered by the newspaper ABC.
The new Dodge initially has two versions: 3700 simply and 3700 GT. While the first had a three-speed gearbox with a lever on the steering wheel and a front seat, the GT had a four-speed gearbox with a lever on the floor and independent front seats. The GTs of this first series are easily distinguished because the “GT” logo was located on the rear wings and not on the rear roof pillar as in the following series.
The assassination car
The one owned by Almirante Carrero Blanco was one of the seventeen hundred 3700 GTs built in the first series. With the chassis number 2B9P001830, it was registered in the Mobile Park on December 30, 1971, with the registration PMM 16416: while the numbering of the plates of the government ministers started at 16,400 and following, the last three figures, “416”, were reserved for the president.
The 3700 GT used by Carrero Blanco had no difference compared to the one that could be bought at any dealership except for the built-in communication system (there was also a telephone in the back) and the corresponding flag (just one, not two as appears in some movie) that he wore on his right flipper. It was not armored either as has been said in some media. But how the lower part resists the force of the explosion (he raised it to 30 meters high and then fell ten meters to the lower patio of the Jesuit residence attached to the Church of San Francisco de Borja) says a lot about the quality of that car. And to remove it from the first floor terrace where it had fallen, an operation that began on December 28, the workers had to cut the car into several parts with an ethylene torch. There was a technical report for internal use in the house, which boasted how the 3700 had withstood the explosion and the fall, but it would be quickly withdrawn due to its inconvenience.
Beyond this triple murder, the story of the Dodge 3700 will continue. It should be noted that that same year, 1973, the automatic version had appeared and the 3700 with three-speed manual transmission disappeared (only a few units were sold). In October 1974, the color of the front grill changed and the front seats with headrests from the Simca 1200 were incorporated. In addition, a rear brake distributor was mounted.
A Dodge will also be the protagonist of another death, in this case accidental, of a member of the Council of Ministers. On June 12, 1975, Fernando Herrero Tejedor, minister general secretary of the Movement, traveled in a 3700 GT from Palencia. At the intersection of the Valladolid highway with the National VI, Madrid-La Coruña, the car driven by a driver from the Mobile Park, hits a truck. Herrero Tejedor and the driver are taken to Villacastín, where the minister dies. Unlike Carrero Blanco's Dodge, which has been preserved although his journey after the assassination deserves another article, Herrero Tejedor's would be scrapped.
In 1977, production of the 3700 ended after 9,959 units of this car were produced, part of the history of Spain, but also with its own history.
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