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Car and Driver shows off awesome 1960s ads

Someone must have recently rediscovered the keys to the archives at Car and Driver, and the access has been put to good use. Following last month's fantastic look at automotive ads from the '50s, there's now a new gallery running from March 1960 through December 1969. This collection provides a great overview of a decade full of iconic cars. If you're a fan of Carroll Shelby, particularly his Mustangs, then there's a lot to love among this group. One ad from July 1965 aimed to sell the GT350, but with an ocean of text and a tiny picture, it probably could've used a once-over by Don Draper's team. By December '65, the copywriters ironed out the problems with a spot proclaiming boldly "Shelby GT350 is 'Son of Cobra.'" The company offered some great accessories, too. For those into European motoring, there's a humorous attempt to sell the Alfa Romeo Giulia as both a racecar and family hauler. Toyota also boasts about the winning record for the 2000GT. Among the best text comes from BMW for lines like: "What's BMW got? The most advanced high-performance engine in any production car, for a cruising speed of 100 mph." Of course, Volkswagen's famous "Lemon" ad for the Beetle also gets its due here. Separately, each of these ads is fascinating, but taken together they tell the story of a great decade of motoring. Go give them all a read at Car and Driver. Related Video: News Source: Car and DriverImage Credit: GM Heritage Center Marketing/Advertising Read This Alfa Romeo BMW Ford Toyota Volkswagen shelby alfa romeo giulia shelby gt350 toyota 2000gt

Here are a few of our automotive guilty pleasures

It goes without saying, but I'll say it anyway. The world is full of cars, and just about as many of them are bad as are good. It's pretty easy to pick which fall into each category after giving them a thorough walkaround and, more important, driving them. But every once in a while, an automobile straddles the line somehow between good and bad — it may be hideously overpriced and therefore a marketplace failure, it may be stupid quick in a straight line but handles like a drunken noodle, or it may have an interior that looks like it was made of a mess of injection-molded Legos. Heck, maybe all three. Yet there's something special about some bad cars that actually makes them likable. The idea for this list came to me while I was browsing classified ads for cars within a few hundred miles of my house. I ran across a few oddballs and shared them with the rest of the team in our online chat room. It turns out several of us have a few automotive guilty pleasures that we're willing to admit to. We'll call a few of 'em out here. Feel free to share some of your own in the comments below. Dodge Neon SRT4 and Caliber SRT4: The Neon was a passably good and plucky little city car when it debuted for the 1995 model year. The Caliber, which replaced the aging Neon and sought to replace its friendly marketing campaign with something more sinister, was panned from the very outset for its cheap interior furnishings, but at least offered some decent utility with its hatchback shape. What the two little front-wheel-drive Dodge models have in common are their rip-roarin' SRT variants, each powered by turbocharged 2.4-liter four-cylinder engines. Known for their propensity to light up their front tires under hard acceleration, the duo were legitimately quick and fun to drive with a fantastic turbo whoosh that called to mind the early days of turbo technology. — Consumer Editor Jeremy Korzeniewski  Chevrolet HHR SS: Chevy's HHR SS came out early in my automotive journalism career, and I have fond memories of the press launch (and having dinner with Bob Lutz) that included plenty of tire-smoking hard launches and demonstrations of the manual transmission's no-lift shift feature. The 260-horsepower turbocharged four-cylinder was and still is a spunky little engine that makes the retro-inspired HHR a fun little hot rod that works quite well as a fun little daily driver.

Volkswagen C Coupe GTE bows in Shanghai

Following the debut of the slick, semi-aggressive Sport Coupe GTE concept in Geneva, Volkswagen is bringing something a bit more grandiose to the Shanghai Motor Show. It's called the C Coupe GTE, and it points the way forward for Volkswagen's large sedans – in China, at least. The C Coupe GTE is low and long, and rides on the same Volkswagen MLB platform that underpins vehicles like the Audi A6. Volkswagen's head of design, Klaus Bischoff, says "the C Coupe GTE very clearly shows the new 'face' of top Volkswagen sedans for the first time," so get used to this design. We think it's pretty attractive, and a car like this could easily work as an upper-tier CC replacement. But don't get your hopes up too much – VW USA says this concept was "designed chiefly for the Chinese market." That's evident inside, where the C Coupe boasts a four-passenger seating configuration with luxurious accommodations for folks in back. In fact, backseat riders can share data with the driver via the car's infotainment system. "Information about the manager's appointments can be transferred via a smartphone to the infotainment system," says Volkswagen. "Parallel to this, the appointment list also serves to plan the navigation route for the day. However, the chauffeur only has specifically filtered information for the infotainment system to facilitate punctual arrival at the destination." Like other GTE-badged models, the C Coupe uses a plug-in hybrid powertrain. That means it's got a four-cylinder turbocharged gasoline engine, an electric motor, and a 14.1-kWh lithium-ion battery, all mated to an eight-speed automatic transmission. Total system output is 242 horsepower and 369 pound-feet of torque, and Volkswagen says the C Coupe can travel up to 31 miles in electric mode (at speeds up to 81 miles per hour). Hitting 62 mph takes 8.6 seconds, but when driven economically, Volkswagen says the sedan can achieve up to 102 miles per gallon (on the Euro cycle) and cruising range is a whopping 684 miles. See the C Coupe GTE for yourself in the slideshow above, and scroll down for a huge helping of information in VW's press blast. VOLKSWAGEN DEBUTS C COUPE GTE IN SHANGHAI New plug-in hybrid concept car points the way to the future of large Volkswagen sedans Wolfsburg/Shanghai, April 2015 - Volkswagen is expanding its model range at high speed and the latest show of this intent is on display at Auto Shanghai-the C Coupe GTE.