Wagons in vintage Street scenes

See that '63 Thunderbird at bottom of the photo, on the right?


That's the famous Thunderbird Italien, a Ford concept vehicle in 1963.....


After a complete restoration, it sold at Barrett-Jackson in 2008 for $660,000.....At least that's what the B-J site says. Another web page had the price at $1.76 million.

 

Just goes to prove why Ford never made it to number one. If they would have put that into production, they would have robbed a sizable amount of their competitor's sales. Buick division alone would have suffered sleepless nights at the thought of monumental Riviera sales losses

 

You have the "Whiz Kids" to thank for that. They're the bean counters hired by Ford right after the war, who starved Ford of just about every good thing (such as electrostatic painting) and promoting safety en masse when the buying public wasn't ready for such things, or willing to pay for them.

 

Ford couldn't put the Italien into production. It was already 1963, and an all-new Thunderbird was already in the pipeline. I do think Ford should have applied that roof to the new Thunderbird, in some manner. I agree that it would have robbed Buick of some Riviera sales, if done right.

 

It almost looks like an AMC roofline

 

Who knows? The Marlin was also on its way down the pipeline around that time.

 

I'll take the Waggoneer.

 

I'd hitch the Subie to the Wagoneer, use them both.