Ah, the fantastic marketing campaigns of the 1970’s. It reminds us of a phrase that the great bartender Moe Sizlack once uttered while showing Homer Simpson the tools of success he had used when he was a boxer, “Oh, those things are called brass knuckles. They, uh, yeah, they don’t let you use those no more.” The same could be said of Dodge’s late 1970’s “Adult Toys from Dodge” campaign that was centered on their truck and van lineup. It was sexist to say the least, making the not-so-subtle possession relationship between “adult toys” and women, and there’s no question that it would never pass the muster of today’s marketing groups.

It hearkens back to a time when men could smoke cigarettes and have an alcoholic drink on TV, and when a secretary, back before the word secretary had been replaced by the phrase “executive assistant,” might receive a pat on the rump for a job well done (and we’re glad that our executive assistant wives and girlfriends no longer have to put up with that).

That’s not to say that today’s marketing doesn’t use sex appeal to sell products, in fact we’d make the case that it’s hard to find marketing that doesn’t use sex to sell something, but women are no longer inferred to as “adult toys.” Now their near naked bodies are simply blatantly put on display, which is an odd part of political correctness that we have yet to understand.

If we take a look at the vehicles in the Dodge campaign itself, it was split into two areas: vans and trucks. We’ll begin by looking at the vans since the van craze of the 1970’s was as much a part of Americana then as the space race was in the 1960’s. Dodge put together multiple option and themes for the Tradesman, which they had given the name of the Street Van.

Each version featured wild 1970’s paint schemes, giant polyglass tires, open slot mag wheels, bucket captains seats for the driver and passenger, a few hundred different flavors of bubble tint windows, chin spoilers, and all sorts of wonderful and tacky interior options. Just looking at these rides seems to bring forth the smell of medicinal marijuana and conjures up memories of our mothers warning us to keep away from those “child molester” vans.

In regards to the truck lineup, while it wasn’t as visually wild and crazy as the Tradesman, it certainly had better names for vehicles. The aptly named Four by Four Ramcharger was Dodge’s competition against the Ford Bronco.

It came with a standard roll-bar and had an optional removable hardtop that could be replaced with a vinyl softop , complete with “rollable” windows to let in fresh air during camping trips. The Macho Power Wagon was a sister vehicle of the Ramcharger and came with a two-tone paint job as well as a rollbar and full-time four wheel drive.

The pickups featured the Warlock, a stepside shortbed truck with solid oak stake sides that Dodge felt was the “ultimate status pickup,” but perhaps the vehicle that gained the most traction, both then and today, was the Lil’ Red Express Truck.

It was released in 1978, and in an utterly horrible sign of the times, was the fastest American made vehicle from 0 to 100 MPH as tested by Car and Driver Magazine.

This could be due to a loophole in emissions regulations at the time as trucks were not required to run the power-robbing catalytic converters that were installed on cars. As such, the Lil’ Red Express had a special high performance 360 cubic inch 4-barrel small block, which was a modified version of the 360 police engine.

It produced a whopping 225 net horsepower at 3800 RPM, and while that can be achieved my a 4-cylinder Toyota Camry today, and the emissions choked engines of the 1970 anything that produced over 200 horsepower was an engineering miracle.

The 360 was backed up by a special 727 Torqueflite automatic and a 3.55 geared rear end, and the exhaust exited through HEMI mufflers and the signature chrome semi-style exhaust stacks. Stylistically the Lil’ Red Express rode on GR60x15 raised white letter tires on 7-inch Chrome wheels up front and LR60x15 on 8-inch chrome wheels on the rear. A bench seat was standard equipment, though optional bucket seats were available.

This leads us to wonder if perhaps there isn’t room today for another marketing package from Dodge and Ram that takes on a similar theme. We definitely think that a modern version of the Li’l Red Express would be both welcomed and heralded by the public and the media, but we’ll leave it to the powers that be to determine how the sex appeal portion of the marketing package should be handled!