HOORAY FOR HOLLYWOOD

THIS 1941 GRAHAM HOLLYWOOD TAKES DARE TO BE DIFFERENT IN A DIFFERENT DIRECTION.

- DREW HARDIN

HOT ROD has long championed the idea of building cars that are out of the mainstream. Long before then-Editor Jeff Smith dubbed the movement “Dare to be Different” in the 1980s, HRM featured cars that were wild, wacky, and downright strange. In a good way, though.

Dick Raczuk’s 1941 Graham Hollywood is wild, certainly, and it is also unlike most prewar cars that typically get the hot rod treatment. For one thing, it’s extremely rare. Sources vary when tallying Hollywood production, but estimates range from a few hundred to just over 1,000. It’s also a four-door sedan, arguably the body style furthest down the list of desirable hot rod material.

But what a sedan it is. The Graham Hollywood’s bloodlines reach back to icons of classic American automotive styling. From the cowl back, the body was made from the same dies that formed the Cord Beverly sedan of the mid-1930s, a ground-breaking design penned by Gordon Buehrig, who also famously created the boattail Auburn Speedster and the stately Duesenberg Model J. The front fenders, hood, and grille were rendered by John Tjaarda, who influenced the look of the elegant Lincoln Zephyr.

“It’s artwork,” Dick said when asked what drew him to the Hollywood, a car he spotted in a Hemmings ad in the late 1990s. “The Cord was way ahead of its time. It was art, considering what the competition was offering at the time. I hardly changed anything. It didn’t need a chop job, or any of that stuff. I just subtly changed things. I didn’t change anything more than an inch and a half here and there.”