Roll Like Rat Pack Royalty in This 1958 Dual-Ghia on Bring a Trailer

• Never heard of a Dual-Ghia? In the 1950s, it was the A-list car to have.
• This one has an onboard record player, fitting for a brand of car owned by nearly every member of the Rat Pack.
• The style is hand-built Italian, but the power is V-8 American.

Frank Sinatra. Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz. Sammy Davis Jr. If you were on the celebrity A-list in the 1950s, then you drove something even more special than a Cadillac or a Mercedes. Something handmade, exclusive, and jaw-droppingly gorgeous. Something that said, "I did it my way." Something like this 1958 Dual-Ghia swinging into the scene over at Bring a Trailer (which, like Car and Driver, is part of Hearst Autos).

This convertible, in super classy burgundy over tan leather, is very rare; it's said to be #60 of 115 cars made. It's a big-finned, big-chrome blend of Italian coachwork and American V-8 power.

If you've never heard of a Dual-Ghia before, that's understandable. A relatively short-lived partnership between the Detroit-based Dual-Motors Corporation and the better-known Carrozzeria Ghia coachbuilding house in Italy, the Dual-Ghia lasted just three years, from 1956 to 1958. At the time, the company could boast the longest production line in the world, with Dodge-based frames and drivetrains being shipped to Italy for bodywork and interiors, then shipped back to Detroit for final assembly.

The roots of the idea can be traced back to Ghia's concept work with Chrysler in the early 1950s, which produced the Firearrows I through IV and the Firebomb. While never put into production, these cars gave Chrysler something to point to at auto shows when GM stuck a Corvette in its display.

Dual-Motors was so-named because it mostly built fire trucks and the like, vehicles that would have one engine for driving and another for pumping water. Workmanlike fare, but fire trucks sure have a lot of chrome on them and require skilled assembly, so the company workforce had the ability to build something special. The owner of Dual-Motors, an Italian-American named Eugene Casaroll, had the desire.

Fitted with a 315-cubic-inch "Red Ram" Dodge V-8 good for 230 horsepower, a Dual-Ghia could run up to 120 mph, very fast for its day. When at rest, its incredibly labor-intensive build quality was equally stunning. The paintwork at Ghia involved some 15 coats of hand-polished lacquer.

The car cost $7650 when new, nearly $90K in today's money, making it one of the most expensive cars on sale in the U.S. at the time. As production was so slow, only the well-connected could get their hands on one, and the cars cropped up in all sorts of great stories of the era. Once, then-governor Ronald Reagan lost his Dual-Ghia in a poker game with President Lyndon Johnson.

This example is peak Rat Pack era, with an onboard Highway Hi-Fi record player. You can just see ol' Blue Eyes at the wheel, cruising around Palm Springs.

Somehow, every Dual-Ghia lost money for the company that built them, and the cars soon faded from the scene. For a time, though, not even a Rolls-Royce could touch them as the way to make the scene.

The auction ends on October 23.

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Brendan McAleer

Contributing Editor

Brendan McAleer is a freelance writer and photographer based in North Vancouver, B.C., Canada. He grew up splitting his knuckles on British automobiles, came of age in the golden era of Japanese sport-compact performance, and began writing about cars and people in 2008. His particular interest is the intersection between humanity and machinery, whether it is the racing career of Walter Cronkite or Japanese animator Hayao Miyazaki's half-century obsession with the Citroën 2CV. He has taught both of his young daughters how to shift a manual transmission and is grateful for the excuse they provide to be perpetually buying Hot Wheels.