What Is A Pontiac Silver Streak? The History Behind The Design Feature

The silver streak design perhaps reached its pinnacle on Pontiacs built from the 1930s to the 1950s. The wide band of chrome that ran down the center of the hood gave the classic Pontiac a smooth, distinctive look that evoked speed and modernity, coming to define the brand for decades afterward. It didn't actually make the car go faster, but it certainly looked like it did.

Still, it almost never came to pass. While the original 1926 Pontiac saw great success, the Pontiac brand faced struggles with the advent of the Great Depression, unaided by the fact that the Chevrolet has recently been upgraded from four-cylinder engine to a six, undermining one of the chief reasons the Pontiac previously stood out. Sales collapsed across the board, and for a year and a half GM combined the struggling Chevrolet and Pontiac brands to save costs, almost deciding to end Pontiac outright. But the 1935 redesign under design chief Frank Hershey, including the silver steak, helped change that.

Many new features accompanied the 1935 Pontiac, including a more streamlined almost Art Deco body, larger rounded fenders, rear-hinge so-called suicide doors, split windshields, an all-steel turret top instead of fabric roof panels, and an L-head six-cylinder engine. Chief among the changes was the silver streak, as perhaps more than any other feature, it became a signature brand trademark for 20 years, beginning as a band of ribs running from the bottom of the windshield over the top of the hood, and settling into the waterfall grille.

It's believed to have been inspired by a photo in a French magazine of a Napier race car on which the oil cooler extended out of the hood. The thorough redesign lifted sales for Pontiac, and over the next couple of decades there were a few tweaks to the silver streak. Sometimes the silver band was narrowed, sometimes it was widened, and for a few models the space between the ribs was extended.

But in 1957, the silver streak was eliminated altogether. Sales were slipping and the Pontiac division once again found itself on life support, with general manager Semon E. "Bunky" Knudsen wanting to update its image. He is said to have brutally dismissed the design as looking like "an old man's suspenders." That may not be how we see it today, but that quip certainly helped end the streak's 20-year run.