1956 Holden FJ Utility

Description

A true Australian icon, the FJ is perhaps the most fondly remembered of all the early Holdens. Today, the sight of its big, bold, familiar front grille has the power to transport nostalgic baby boomers back to that fabulous era when the fifties stood for rock 'n roll and not your age group.
The first car that many ordinary Australians had ever owned, it sold in unprecedented numbers and offered an equally unprecedented degree of mobility, freedom and privacy.Essentially a face-lifted version of its predecessor, the FX or 48-215 model, the FJ's main external distinguishing features were a torpedo-style tail light and the horizontal, American-influenced chrome grille with twin port 'nostrils'.A utility was also offered, and the first Holden panel van made its debut two months after the FJ's October 1953 launch.By 1954, FJ Holdens were being produced at assembly plants nationwide at the rate of 250 per day - not nearly enough to satisfy demand. The same year, however, GM-H took the decision to ship FJs to New Zealand beginning an export drive that by 1956 saw Holdens on the road in Thailand, Malaya and North Bomeo. GM-H celebrated the production of the 250,000th Holden, an FJ, in January 1956.