There’s a love-hate relationship with the dog-dish (or poverty) hubcap that’s been going on for many decades.
Hordes of car guys dumped dog dish caps for Day Two wheels like Torque Thrust mags because cool factor spiked with new wheels—while other guys kept the dog dish caps for a sleeper look.
Some guys just didn’t care because dog dish caps came with the car and that was fine—here are five examples.
Jerry Sutherland
The most obvious examples are the classic plain Mopar dog-dish caps. They used these caps on 1969-74 B and E-body Mopars and if you cheaped-out on your option list, you were likely to see this style on your brand-new ’70 Road Runner. These caps were called plain for a reason—they were all function and very little form.
Dog-dish caps were better than full wheel covers under heavy-duty driving—that’s why police cars had them. I’ve seen a trend toward using dog dish caps on pristine muscle car restorations, so my guess is that’s how the car was ordered. Bone-stock restorations will look at the build sheet and stick to the ‘as-ordered’ game plan—no matter what the original owner did on Day Two.
The second example is the 1969 Chevy dog dish/poverty cap. This is something you’re likely to see on a COPO Camaro because they built these cars to look like sleepers. In other words, they wanted these street monsters to look like something your elderly teacher would drive.
It worked; many racing opponents fell into the COPO stealth trap back in ’69. You’ll see dog-dish hubcaps on every correct COPO Camaro—real or tribute version. These caps were cool and simple at the same time, because the inset Chevy logo was surrounded by a simple black line.
The third example is the 1967 Ford Fairlane dog dish hubcap. Ford thought it was funny to slap those hubcaps on Fairlanes with beastly 427 big blocks under the hood.
This was bait-and-switch at its finest because these intermediate, dog-dish equipped Fords looked like something Aunt Gertrude would drive to church every Sunday. That’s why these 427 Fords ambushed street warriors every weekend back in the late 60s. Ford poverty caps had their own style—F-O-R-D in big letters set in a ribbed outer circle.
The 1962 Olds F-85 had one of the coolest dog-dish hubcaps ever offered on a compact car. Despite their dog-dish status, these early 60s Olds caps had details and color you wouldn’t see on a competitor’s car.
These units generally stayed with the car because they were functional and not burdened by the extra price of non-stock wheel cover options. To put it bluntly, F-85 buyers were cheap, so any extra costs had to be examined in detail—stock hubcaps were fine.
The last example is the 1963 AMC Rambler Classic. You rarely saw one of these cars with anything but poverty caps because AMC buyers were relentlessly practical about their cars.
There is no way you’d see a Rambler Classic buyer pry off his dog-dish factory steel wheels and replace them with chrome reverse wheels back in ‘63. That’s not a universe that makes sense. The AMC wheels weren’t as fancy as the Olds F-85 caps–but they had a very cool, red-highlighted R in the center. That was enough flash for ’63 Rambler Classic guys.
So, it comes down to this. Do you dump your poverty caps, or do you keep it stock?
Fortunately, this isn’t like a Grade 7 math test—there are no wrong answers.
Jerry Sutherland
By: Jerry Sutherland
Jerry Sutherland is a veteran automotive writer with a primary focus on the collector car hobby. His work has been published in many outlets and publications, including the National Post, Calgary Herald, Edmonton Journal, Ottawa Citizen, Montreal Gazette, Saskatoon StarPhoenix, Regina Leader-Post, Vancouver Sun and The Truth About Cars. He is also a regular contributor to Auto Roundup Publications.
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