The Studebaker Golden Hawk is a two-door pillarless hardtop coupe type car produced by the Studebaker Corporation of South Bend, Indiana between 1956 and 1958.
The last Studebaker until the Avanti to have styling influenced by industrial designer Raymond Loewy's studio, the Golden Hawk took the basic shape of the 1953–55 Champion/Commander Starliner hardtop coupe but added a large, almost vertical eggcrate grille and raised hoodline in place of the earlier car's swooping, pointed nose. At the rear, a raised, squared-off trunklid replaced the earlier sloped lid, and vertical fiberglass tailfins were added to the rear quarters. The Golden Hawk was two inches shorter than the standard Hawk at 53.6 inches.
The Golden Hawk was continued for the 1957 and 1958 model years, but with some changes. Packard's Utica, Michigan engine plant was leased to Curtiss-Wright during 1956 (and eventually sold to them), marking the end of genuine Packard production. Packard-badged cars were produced for two more years, but they were essentially rebadged Studebakers. The Packard V8, introduced only two years earlier, was therefore no longer available. It was replaced with the Studebaker 289 cubic inch V8 with the addition of a McCulloch supercharger, giving the same 275 HP output as the Packard engine. This improved the car's top speed, making these the best-performing Hawks until the Gran Turismo Hawk became available with the Avanti's R2 supercharged engine for the 1963 model year.
Like many more expensive cars, Golden Hawk sales were heavily hit by the late-1950s recession, and the model was discontinued after only selling 878 examples in 1958. The Silver Hawk remained as the only Hawk model; it was renamed simply the Studebaker Hawk for the 1960 model year.
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