I’m going to be honest with you: I always kind of thought the Plymouth Barracuda had a dumb trunk setup. This was mostly because I always felt that its fastback shape was wasted by not having some sort of hatchback or at least an opening rear window. I was so smug in my evaluation that I was blind to the reality staring me right in the face, at least metaphorically: the Barracuda actually had a pretty clever trunk solution! Even without a hatchback! Let me explain.
You see, you can sort of think of the Barracuda as a car with a pair of cargo areas, sort of like a Volkswagen Beetle: an enclosed trunk and an open luggage well. Like the VW, the Barracuda could fold down the rear seat, making the interior luggage well larger, but still separate from the trunk.
But in the case of the Barracuda, a “security panel” can also be raised or lowered, connecting the interior cargo volume with the external trunk volume, creating a space that can contain all kinds of large, long, oversized objects like lumber or skis or six-foot party subs or long salamis or mastadon bones or whatever. Here, look:
So, the result is a car with enclosed, lockable storage that can co-exist with a large interior loading platform and can be easily adapted to hauling huge stuff! It’s clever, even in its hatchlessness. A seven-foot long bed is a seven-foot long bed, even if it’s only, what, 18 inches high at the tail end? Still, impressive, and, more importantly it is “fully carpeted anything space.” The best kind of space!
This car named for a fish has opened my eyes to the error of my ways. I guess I have a lot of growing up to do.
I grew up riding in the back of dad’s 1965 Barracuda. As kids we’d go to the drive in movies and my sister and I would be in sleeping bags with the rear seats folded down. We’d watch the Disney movie and fall asleep pretty quickly after and mom and dad would watch the James Bond or whatever feature after. They’d leave us sleeping and drive home.
Chrysler had a long history with extendable trunks, all the way back to 19xx Chrysler Taveller: https://s1.cdn.autoevolution.com/images/news/gallery/this-1950-mopar-anticipated-the-future-chrysler-traveler-the-double-duty-beauty_14.jpg
Also, you forgot the best part of that whole arrangement – the chrome-plated fuel filler tube that cut through the package area just ahead of the security panel.
Being a car of the 60s it had all that cargo room and a full size spare tire. How quaint.
1969, I had a 65 Plymouth Sport Fury and my girlfriend had a 65 Barracuda, whenever we went to the drive-in movies we always took her Barracuda wink/wink, hers had the slant six with automatic. Fun car to drive.
My early 70s Israeli 1:43 die-cast model of a Barracuda had the folding seat, and IDF paint for some reason.
I had one of those, two. And my late 60’s babysitter had a white-over-red ’65, bought from my family’s C-P dealership that was the first car I fell in love with.
The 66 and 67 Charger had the same trunk arrangement, but since it was a larger car you could get more stuff stowed or just sleep better!
And some (maybe all) had a console that went all the way back in between the rear seats. That an the open area to the fastback made for a really open and cool looking interior. I still want one.
Somewhat similarly, the 4th-gen F-Bodies (Camaro / Firebird), while liftbacks, also had a ‘security panel’ that separated the liftback shelf area from the more vertically oriented trunk space.
A ’66 Chrysler (as sold in Canadian Plymouth and Dodge dealerships) Barracuda is the car I should never have sold. My dad bought it new off the showroom floor for my mother after I pointed it out (I was 11). Once my mother got behind the wheel, she wouldn’t get out until my dad bought it. It had one-year-only front clip and rear quarters, and was a cool, very dependable car. I sold it with 140,000 easy miles on it. It was still going strong and looked almost new, but I had my eye on a ’79 El Camino SS 350 with four-on-the-floor. I never should have sold that one either.
A friend’s mom had a Barracuda. She would put it in the maximum cargo configuration to transport us, and we would roll around in the back (it was the early seventies, so this was crazy safe by the standards of the day). Of course, even with the AC at full blast, the sun blazing through that giant backlight felt like something akin to sitting under the heat lamps at a Howard Johnson’s.
This bit of trivia only underscores what I consider to be one of the biggest car-casting whiffs in Hollywood history, and in one of my favorite movies even:
If the title character of “Big Fish,” who spoke in fish-related puns and figures of speech all the time, is going to be depicted in the middle of the movie as a traveling salesman in the 1960s driving a fastback Mopar muscle car, why is he in a Charger and not a Barracuda? (Or even an AMC Marlin?) Especially since he is shown sleeping in the back of it in one scene?
If they had gotten this one right, we might have all learned this factoid 20 years ago at the movie theater.
What do you do with a 7 foot bed? Sleep in it!
As I recall in the late 60s, you will occasionally see people sleeping in these in the parking lots of ski areas in the spring. Very under the radar compared to a station wagon or van.
I slept in the back of my ’99 A6 (RIP) with the seats folded down the night before a backpacking trip out of Mineral King in Sequoia Nat’l Park, legs in the trunk. It was serviceable, but this Barracuda would have been much more comfortable from the looks of it.
When I returned to the car a few days later, marmots had serviced my speedo sensor wire and various other electronics. Drove the 6 hours home to Santa Cruz with no speedo, the dash lit up like a christmas tree and stuck in 3rd gear.
The closest I ever had to this was the lockable trunk floor in my Volvo 745 wagon. The storage down there wasn’t too usable though because it shared space with the spare tire. But remove that, and you could fit a fair amount hidden under the floor.
My ’92 had even less space in that compartment, since it had the third row, but there was still room for a small purse or some other relatively compact contraband.
Those wagons may have been more capacious than you thought, since they also had a “bootlegger’s compartment” on either side of the lockable seat/spare tire trunk – the carpet panels could be removed to reveal spaces in the car’s “buttcheeks” that could, and indeed allegedly may have, accommodated a “handle” (1.75L) of liquor, taxed or otherwise. (The rear washer pump lived in the left side, taking up a good chunk of space, but the right side was empty from the factory. I usually kept a set of tools in there as well as what I had left of the factory toolkit in its little nook above.)
Yeah, I knew about all of those. I was just thinking in terms of the examples given above. The underfloor thing was long and wide. But not that tall.
I had a ’66 Formula S that I fully restored, upgraded brakes, suspension, etc., and swapped in a 340 for the 273. Lots of fun!
In 1973 my brother and I convinced our Dad to buy a new ’74 Duster 360 for my Mom. It had the same fold-down rear seat and security panel as the Barracuda. Awesome grocery-getter, especially with that Thermoquad howl when the lid of the air cleaner was flipped!
“You think you’re so cool with your surf board and your surfing. I bet you can’t do it while balancing a basket on your head like this.”
I had a ’67, with the 273-inch V8. I also had vague plans to enter it in One Lap of America, with a co-driver. We would run it with one driver at the wheel and the other trying to sleep in the back. Did you know these cars had an 18-gallon fuel tank? What I didn’t have was the time or money to make this happen.
I’ll sign up to be a co-driver for that adventure! I’ve always been fascinated by the ‘Super Commando’ 273 – a wee-bitty V8 with a rowdy solid lifter cam and headers from the factory in a lightweight 4 speed car just screams ‘repeated dopamine hits’ for me. 🙂
For a long time that ’64-’66 Barracuda rear window was the largest single piece of glass to be found on any passenger car. If there had been an opening hatch, it would have needed some serious gas struts to help lift it. Not to mention increased risk of breakage.
IIRC, that record was broken by another MoPar product, the 2-door variants of the L-body, sold under several names by Dodge and Plymouth. And it was a hatchback, but pneumatic hatch struts had improved a lot in 15 years.
These are cool. The first gen is the best Barracuda
Taillights and trunks. Always taillights and trunks. I’m curious: the first time you ever set eyes upon your future wife, was she walking away?
COTD
All women are walking away from Torch.
Exactly! What about Dagmars, why no interest in them ! 😉
His favorite kinds of cars has the trunk in the front though…
Nothin’ wrong with a little spare tire up front. That’s just part of getting old. Er, classic.
It’s the ideal vehicle for use waterskiing scuba enthusiasts
A similar trunk divider was one of the features Nissan touted on the new 2007 Sentra as well. I suppose it theoretically could be used the same way, although not nearly as long a load floor there. I don’t think the feature lasted past the 2009 model though. So, twist that into some kind of trivia question on what a Barracuda and a Sentra have in common other than 4 wheels and tires.
Finally a car that can take me to my everyday Scuba Waterskiing and also have space for my Golf and Bowling vacations!
Thank god I will now have space for things like my scuba gear!
Hey, if I can’t scuba, then what’s this all been about?
I had a 64. You could drop that panel and make a bed. The best position was with your head to the rear. That way the morning sun didn’t wake you. However, that large window would cook you if you over slept. Unfortunately, it was a one person deal. It was a 225 slant six with the push button automatic. Wish I still had that car.
How often did you wake up and accidentally bash your head into the trunk lid?
I think I would put my face in the rear bubble instead of the metal face shield but glad it worked for you.