brake bleeding firm now spongie.

You DID bench bleed the master (on the car is usually best) with the bleeder tubes fully immersed in the reservoir fluid until ALL the air bubbles were gone. Some will bleed in just a few strokes, but don't be surprised if it takes awhile and your leg wears out before you're done (helps if you've got a buddy handy to take over when that happens).
A couple of weeks ago the neighbors were trying to bleed the brakes on a 74 Dart after installing reman calipers. No go. I had them try bench bleeding the master and after about 15 minutes had them install a reman that was laying around uninstalled from a Duster. Even that one took longer than I expected to bench bleed, but after about 45 minutes the brakes were bled, and the Dart had solid brakes and good pedal feel.
On a different note, later that week the neighbor took the car to the nearest shop up the street with a rack and had it aligned. It has to be the lousiest alignment (car has new bushings, ball joints, and tie rod ends) I've ever seen, by a "tech" that let the car out the door, pulling to the right, and with camber settings so bad you could see the uneven tire lean with the naked eye. Driving the car it is pretty obvious the toe wasn't even set. "Tech" told the neighbor the car had been wrecked and "that was as good as he could get it" and wouldn't give him the specs it had been set at. I told him to take it back to them and get them to make it right. I haven't heard the outcome, but I would have gotten my money back or shoved something up the shop owner's rearend. Moral of the story is to be patient, find (and use) someone that knows these old cars and has a good rep for anything you've got to farm out (like alignments).