Muscle cars were ancient history; there were no more snarling tri power GTOs, SS396 Chevelles, or any other such cars rolling off assembly lines. Perhaps the last holdout of the dying breed was the Pontiac Trans Am. The 1979 model had the base 403 CID Oldsmobile engine, with the 400 CID Pontiac engine (220 hp) optional. There were very few 400s available, however, since the tooling had been scrapped after the 1978 production run. You could also downgrade the Trans Am to a 301 CID Pontiac motor. Ford offered the 5.0 Mustang, and the Camaro Z28 had the 350. That was about it for engine size. Even so, the cars performed nowhere near as well as their predecessors.

When Chrysler announced that the 300 was coming back in 1979, I imagine a lot of people pumped their fists in the air and shouted "YES!" The euphoria, however, powered by visions of either a reborn 400 or (dare we dream?) 440 engine, was short lived. The vision of even  a regular gas motor home 440 lurking under the hood of something like the Cordoba body (the logical choice) was more than most people could hope for. After all, you could DO something to a 440. You could buy parts for it and make it run; it had only been out of production  for 2 years, and the speed equipment available for the monster wedge could fill ten catalogs.  Enter the 300 Special Edition, and exit the dream.

By 1979, Chrysler's midsize personal luxury car, the $6337.00 Cordoba, was  entering its fourth model year without a major styling change and was beginning to fade in the marketplace. This was due in part to its less than stellar performance, since the car had a standard 318 V8 producing 135 horsepower. Chrysler's other models such as the Newport, New Yorker, Fifth Avenue, and LeBaron, were feeling the pinch as well due to a second gas crisis. Contrived or not, the renewed specter of gas lines was enough to put sales of bigger, less efficient cars in the tank. By the end of the year, Chrysler's new CEO, Lee Iacocca,  petitioned the government for a loan. Congress passed the "Chrysler Corporation Loan Guarantee Act of 1979" (Public Law 96-185) on December 20, 1979, signed into law by President Jimmy Carter on January 7, 1980.

Midway through the 1979 model year, Chrysler decided to market an option package for  the Cordoba and revive the 300 name at the same time. Good idea, bad package.   In remembrance (I suppose) of days gone by, Chrysler offered the new model, called the 300 Special Edition, in Spinnaker White only. The interior was red leather and had a leather wrapped steering wheel and a rally gauge cluster with a tachometer.  Non functional front fender vents, special emblems,  and red, white and blue pin striping completed the body motif, while a rather nice set of aluminum wheels with raised white letter Goodyear GR60 x 15 tires made it look rather inviting. The  9.25" rear end hooked up to heavy duty suspension was an oddity, completely unnecessary for the 360's power range. 

 The package would have met with more success had Chrysler stuck something good under the hood. The only engine offered was a 195 hp 360 cubic inch V8 with a four barrel carburetor which, when combined with the three speed automatic transmission, produced less than thrilling performance. To illustrate just how bad things were in 1979, Chrysler's standard engine for the Cordoba was called the Federal engine. That kind of says it all, doesn't it? With Federally mandated fuel economy, emissions standards, and all sorts of other lovely requirements, car makers threw in the towel where performance was concerned and built stuff like this. 

I always liked the Cordoba.  I owned a 1977 with a 400 four barrel Lean Burn engine. It ran very well and had plenty of power. It was a fairly big, comfortable luxury car, and had nice styling. I ran the daylights out of it until 2002, when the rust demon finally made it unsafe. The 300 Special Edition had the look, and it had the luxury and suspension it needed to make it in the performance market. Chrysler did a nice job of quickly designing something that could have been a big seller, but once again they dropped the ball by putting a mouse motor under the hood. 3811 of these 300s were sold, but there would be no 1980 version. The 300 name would not be borrowed again until 1999, one year after Chrysler ceased to exist as an American company. 

Perhaps Lee Iacocca didn't want to antagonize the Feds by producing another street terror like the original 300 because he knew he would soon be going hat in hand to borrow lots of taxpayer dollars to save the company. It would have been nice to knock out a limited number of these 300s with a 440 under the hood, but you'll have to do that yourself. Hey! Not a bad idea.