I will never forget the night we abandoned George’s ’66 Mustang up in the Maine woods on the road to Belfast. The 289 cubic inch engine gave up the ghost on us in the dark in 1975. We were at loose ends, as recent graduate of college and had not quite figured out what to do with the rest of our lives, and were not smart enough to be apprehensive about it yet.
There is nothing wrong with that, but the ignominious end of that great little green convertible made us all sad. We had no time- or money- to repair it and gave a quit-claim transfer on the title to some local folks on the road to just take the thing, and get us a ride to mass transportation- or thumb. We thought nothing about hitch-hiking then, go figure.
Let me be frank: we beat the crap out of those cars. We did not take care of them, since the salt of a Michigan winter ate them alive, rust splotches starting when they were only a few years old. We knew viscerally the lesson that nothing lasts- body or engine, it was all going to go the way of entropy. The cars were disposable things, their might and sleek styling notwithstanding.
The Mustang had started so beautifully- the dawn of an age of motoring that coined its own name- the Pony Car era. The montage above has the usual suspects. They didn’t start out as behemoths of speed; the Mustang was actually a fairly modest performer Cougars, Mustangs, Camaros, Firebird, Before we get any further, let’s get something straight about what we are talking about here. There were the Ponies- the ones that responded to Ford’s dramatic introduction as the “1965 ½” Mustang. It was a pert little ride so wildly popular that Ford was forced to attach the iconic logo gas cap to the car with a sturdy cable to avoid people like me from unscrewing them and taking them home.
Detroit was all about meeting market needs- the next step up from the Ponies was a class of mid-size footstompers- like Dick’s Charger, the Torino GT, Mercury Cyclone, the Pontiac Goats, Chevelle SS, Plymouth Road Runner, Buick Grand Sport and the sleek Olds 442.
Standing alone was the Corvette- the most assertively aberrant car until the Dodge Viper. And the two full-out hallucinations from Chrysler; the Plymouth Superbird and Dodge Charger Daytona.Real race cars, sold right at the neighborhood Chrysler dealer.
Two of my idiot buddies lunched the hemi-powered Superbird that belonged to a teacher who had what now would be considered an equally aberrant interest in testosterone-crazed teenaged boys. Something about not having oil in the engine- but to me, nothing ever said Detroit Crazy like having a Daytona blow by you at more than a hundred miles an hour on I-75 headed north.
There were other exotics- the 427 Shelby Cobra being my personal favorite, which followed the same general idea that the lunatics at AMC did, which was to find the lightest body and frame that could accommodate the biggest possible engine.
I had a ride in a Cobra one time, and discovered that the torque actually serve to turn the car to the right when the accelerator was depressed with alacrity. They were rockets, those things, and the sense of being crushed back into your bucket seat- or like the Charger 440 R/T, being able to burn rubber at a standstill by applying full pressure to the brake and gas pedals.
Jeeze, what a rush. And it was not nostalgia. It was real and it was happening right then.
There were others- there were muscle sedan-trucks like the El Camino, and luxury sedans like the Toronado- the amazing front-wheel drive rocket that the father of a good friend piloted across Wyoming like a heat-seeking missile.
God, they were cool, each one of them in its own right. The most popular car in America in the late 1960s was the vanilla Impala from Generous Motors. There was so much more. My goodness, there was. Technical marvels and brute raw power.
I am going to get around to the Adventure of the Charger 400 R/T this morning, I swear, but there are too many damn cars, you know? I promise I will get to the Adventure in Bloomfield Hills of these mornings, but I will have to tell you about our Pony car first- the 1968 AMC Javelin 343. For a Rambler, that little car could scream.
Copyright 2014 Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com
Twitter: @jayare303