AUTOS: Step to the Rear

Another flock of 1956 models rolled into dealers' showrooms last week -full speed astern. In ads, sales talks and posters, the automakers were putting most of the emphasis on the rear ends of their new cars. The design changes that in other years were known as face lifting, cracked a design expert, should be known this year as "tail lifting," since the major body changes were in back.

The new going-away look is dominated by higher, longer rear fenders (now known as "fins," and "air foils") ending in aquiline beaks that sniff disdainfully off into space like ships' figureheads in reverse. The fender line in many new cars, e.g., Cadillac, Plymouth, Chevrolet and Studebaker-Packard's Clipper, was borrowed from the shape of swept-wing aircraft to give autos a jet-propelled look. Cadillac, which has long built taillights into the fenders, now houses them in circular openings that project like twin exhaust pipes above the real exhaust vents. The most complicated rear end appears on the Dodge Custom Royal Lancer, whose chrome-scrolled tail fenders sprout sharklike fins and snorkel-like radio antennae. Ford's Thunderbird had a functional reason for a big change in the rear. It hung the tire mount outside to make more room in the luggage compartment.