1950s Pontiac Tail Lights

One potential source of brand identification is the shape of an automobile's tail light assembly.  This use of tail light design is common today.  But not always so.  For example, I wrote here about rear styling of various brands for the 1936 model year, and all the tail lights shown were round -- almost no brand distinction at all.

It was only by the late 1950s that distinctive tail light assembly designs began to be common for American cars.  A counter-example of this is General Motors' Pontiac brand.  From 1949 through the 1956 model year, Pontiac's featured round tail lights.  I was slightly surprised by this, because I was aware that Fords used round tail lights for the 1952-1957 models years, but hadn't given Pontiac's longer run of that theme much thought.

Unless noted, images below are of cars listed for sale.

Gallery

1936 Pontiac with tail lights typical for that model year.

1941 Pontiac.  From the late 1930s through 1948 Pontiacs had rectangular tail lights.

1950 Pontiac, Mecum auction photo.  Pontiacs got their post- World War 2 redesign for 1949, and round tail lights returned, as can be seen on this lightly facelifted 1950 Catalina hardtop with Snohomish County, Washington license places.

Barrett-Jackson auction photo of a 1951 Pontiac.  My father bought one that was almost identical to this, though his lacked the sun visor.

1952 Pontiac, the final year for the body launched for 1949.

Pontiacs got new bodies for 1953, but round tail lights were retained.

1954 Pontiac, Mecum auction photo.

Pontiacs were drastically redesigned for 1955, but tail lights remained round.

Mecum auction photo of a 1956 Pontiac.

1957 Pontiac, where this Mecum auction photo shows that the facelift resulted in oval, not round, tail lights.  This geometric change was not large, but it broke an eight-year product identification tradition.

Then for 1958, redesigned Pontiacs featured paired round tail lights in a oval setting.

Pontiacs were redesigned again for 1959.  Here the tail light assembly is a stretched oval, far removed from the days of the round theme.