Ford Mustang (1964–6)

For Timothy, Zak and the other Americans who remember these great cars … So very easy to write about—it just flows for these popular models. From Autocade at http://autocade.net/index.php/Ford_Mustang_%281964%E2%80%936%29.

Ford Mustang (1964–6)

Ford Mustang/Ford T-5. 1964–6 (prod. 1,288,527). 2-door coupé, 2-door fastback, 2-door convertible. F/R, 170, 200 in³ (6 cyl OHV), 260, 289 in³ (V8 OHV). Incredibly successful sports car from Ford, based around Falcon bits, but with its own long-hood, short-deck proportions borrowed from European sports models. Ford identified the baby boomer segment and division head Lee Iacocca pushed the concept from engineer and product planner Donald N. Frey. Created the “pony car” segment. Teaser campaign, massive marketing blitz, including three-network TV ad buy on April 16, 1964. Launched at World’s Fair on April 17, 1964 with base price of $2,368—a thousand dollars less than what original survey respondents thought. Original model retrospectively called the 1964½ model year, though should be ‘early 1965’ model. Sporting appointments, such as bucket seats; car could be extensively personalized. Brakes, steering not class-leading but performance acceptable, V8s the cars to go for. Shelby high-performance model from 1965. Sold 418,812 in first year, and a million by March 1966. Called T-5 (its development name) in Germany due to trade mark conflict. Set template for Mustangs to follow, including current model.