Remembering
Burt Bouwkamp, Chrysler Engineer 1949–1987
Burt
Bouwkamp, passed away October 26, 2022 at age 95. Two weeks after
graduating high school he entered the US Navy’s
V-12 Program to be trained as a naval officer. He attended the U of
Notre Dame, Indiana State Teachers College and the U of Illinois,
where he graduated in Naval Science and was commissioned as an Ensign
in the US Naval Reserve in June 1947. In February 1948 he graduated
from the U of Illinois with a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering. He was
awarded membership in several honor societies: Bronze Tablet, Tau
Beta Pi, Pi Tau Sigma. He then joined Standard Oil of Indiana as an
Inspection Engineer at the Whiting, IN refinery. A year later, Burt
applied and was selected by Chrysler Corp. for its advanced degree
automotive engineering program. He joined Chrysler in February 1949
and graduated from the Chrysler Institute of Engineering in 1951 with
a Master’s Degree in
Automotive Engineering. Burt retired after 38 years at Chrysler Corp.
– 30 years in the Detroit
area, 4 years (1975-1979) in England and 4 years (1983-1987) in
Japan. His interests during retirement were golfing (18 handicap),
fishing and travel. Burt and his wife Emme had 4 sons, 10
grandchildren and 18 great grandchildren.
Some
other interesting tidbits, shared
at the Memorial Service celebrating Burt –
Burt
was a Boy Scout Leader for 4 years, and one of his sons attained
Eagle Scout under his tutelage
Though
he didn’t plan on it,
Burt was recruited by a friend of his to sit for the entrance exam
to be accepted into the Chrysler Institute of Engineering. Not only
did he successfully complete the exam, he scored higher than all the
other applicants who sat for the exam with him.
Burt
prepared a book entitled “Memorable
Moments at Chrysler (1949-1987). See the attached photographed copy,
that we saw the Memorial Service.
Burt
also prepared a book entitled “The
Chrysler 300 on the Sands at Daytona Beach 1955 through 1961”
that some 300 Club members have in their libraries. No additional
copies are available, but the contents of this book are
substantially that presented in this link: Chrysler
300 Letter Cars: Racing at Daytona Beach, 1955-1961 | Allpar Forums
Of
course, we remember Burt with his onsite success with the 6
Pont-a-Mousson 4-speed Short Ram 300-F coupes, each running the
Flying Mile at over 140 mph, with record-setter Gregg Ziegler
running its 2-way average of 144.9 mph. This February 1960 Speed
Weeks success began in early 1959 when Bob Rodger assigned Burt to
lead this effort.
We
heard the story of Burt and a fellow Chrysler engineer testing a ram
413 on a dyno down at Daytona during 1960 Speed Weeks. They didn’t
bother hooking up hoses to the exhausts when they fired up the
motor. Within 45 seconds the room filled with carbon monoxide, Burt
felt like he was going to pass out, grabbed his fellow engineer and
they ran out of the room. That was the last time they didn’t
hook up those exhaust hoses.
Along
those same lines, Burt had lost most all his hearing in his later
years. With all the engine testing he had experienced, in the dyno
rooms with no mufflers hooked up, his Family members chuckled that
he could barely hear them.
As
Chief Engineer-Dodge Cars, 1964-1968, Burt was against the
production of the 1966-1967 Charger and unhappy with its appearance,
but was overruled by Chrysler executives who insisted Dodge had to
have a fastback to compete against the Mustang 2+2, introduced in
1965.
Also
at the Dodge Division, Burt signed off on all engineering and design
elements of the 1968 Charger. He successfully pushed to move the
fuel filler cap to the top of the left rear fender. Burt owned his
B8 Green ’68 383
TorqueFlite Charger for years, before selling it to his son John.
Burt
designed the small ‘whale’s
eye’ side marker lights
found on the forward and rear sides of all 1968 Chrysler Corp. cars
– round ones on
Plymouths and Dodges, square ones on Chryslers and Imperials. Turns
out Chrysler higher-ups disliked these and had rectangular
reflectors added to the 1969 models. Since this change came so late
in the production ramp-up cycle, it was too late to provide lighting
for them.
Burt’s
sons mentioned that he was most proud of his oversight of Chrysler’s
C2 Project – the
Horizon/Omni ‘World Car’
produced 1977-1989, selling 4 million cars. Burt relocated to
England, was Director of European Product Development 1975-1979, had
to retrain his brain to think in Metric terms and worked to develop
this car line – both US
and European versions appearing identical but having different front
and rear suspensions, drivetrains, dashboards and more.
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