Topic: Solved TGF-192: Packard Clipper limousine 1941, by Fitzjohn.

[targhediferro]

Can you identify this quite well manteined car?  I want to know model and coachbuilder.

[ropat53]

1941 Packard Clipper, used to carry J. Robert Oppenheimer and others of the Manhattan Project.

"This original 1941 Packard Clipper transported physicists, senior officers, and dignitaries from the train station to Los Alamos ... and to the Trinity base camp for the testing of the first atomic bomb. In 2005, this limo was discovered in a Gallup, New Mexico salvage yard ... and restored in time for the Museum's Grand Opening in 2009."

The car today at the National Museum of Nuclear Science & History

[Bill Murray]

I was a bit late on this one, but was the body not built by Armbruster Stageway??
Bill

[targhediferro]

1941 Packard Clipper, used to carry J. Robert Oppenheimer and others of the Manhattan Project.

"This original 1941 Packard Clipper transported physicists, senior officers, and dignitaries from the train station to Los Alamos ... and to the Trinity base camp for the testing of the first atomic bomb. In 2005, this limo was discovered in a Gallup, New Mexico salvage yard ... and restored in time for the Museum's Grand Opening in 2009."

The car today at the National Museum of Nuclear Science & History

The car is a Packard Clipper, but I don't know if it is actually the one you describe...anyway similar;  but I want to know its coachbuilder.

I was a bit late on this one, but was the body not built by Armbruster Stageway??
Bill

not Armbruster Stageway.

[Bill Murray]

I am not trying to beat Ropat out of a point but I was pretty much on this one too but quit looking too soon.

Fitzjohn built ca 100 of these from what I can find out and I gather this is one of them.

[targhediferro]

Sorry for Ropat, the Bill answer is just what I found about this car.

[ropat53]

Yes Bill is right the body was built by Fitzjohn and the car is the Nuclear Packard

This is from the site of a very well known magazine.

"Evidently, this custom-built Packard limousine was used to transport the scientists working on the Manhattan Project from the train station to the Trinity base camp in Los Alamos. This Clipper was custom built by the Fitzjohn Coach Company, but was discarded when the project was completed. It ended up in a junkyard in western New Mexico where, after decades of sitting outside, the severe sun has taken its toll on its exposed body and interior"

[Wendax]

We had another Fitzjohn limo with a less exciting history before: www.autopuzzles.com/forum/index.php?topic=16087

[targhediferro]

I add another picture even it seems a similar job on another base car.