Happy 50th Anniversary to the Ford Mustang

Just a quick note to say Happy 50th Anniversary to the Ford Mustang. If there is another automotive icon here in the States with a history like the Corvette, it’s the Ford Mustang.

A lot of Corvette people put down the Mustang, but you’ll never hear us utter a derogatory word about the car.

Ford’s Mustang made a great impact on my life on three different occasions and I can tell you for a fact that if there had been no Mustang, there would be no CorvetteBlogger.com.

I’ve told the story countless times, but here it is again once more for any new readers that may have joined us recently.

In 1966 my father was working for a Johnson & Johnson company called Ethicon and in 1966, J&J offered the top sales guys at each of their divisions the bonus of a new 1966 Ford Mustang. My father won the car. He picked it up from the Ford dealer and drove it straight to a Chevrolet dealer in Camden, NJ where it was traded in for a 1966 Corvette Sting Ray Convertible. I grew up in that car and own it today. I can tell you with certainty that had my Dad not received that Mustang, there would be no Corvette and therefore, no CorvetteBlogger.com.

The second time that a Mustang entered my life was in 1986 when I was senior in high school. My first car was a 1972 Pontiac Catalina. It was gold with black vinyl top and with the bench seating, I could seat eight high school friends comfortably. It had a loud stereo and the car was very fast with its Pontiac 400 V8, but it was boat for sure.

For my 18th birthday, my mom surprised me with a 1979 fox-body Ford Mustang. It was a black with red interior and had a hatchback and was a great looking car. Opposite of the Catalina, it was slower but much better looking and it served me well into college before the four-cylinder engine gave way.

During the time I owned that Mustang, I subscribed to various Mustang magazines and I could name a dozen facts for you at the drop of a hat like the differences of the bodies based on the production years and which ones had the 351 Cleveland vs the Windsor engine and so on. You could say I was into it.

In 2000 or 2001, I actually started a Mustang classified ads website to compliment our Corvette classified ads site VetteFinders.com. But the cars and people were very much different than the Corvette community I was used to and so I eventually sold it and decided right then and there to concentrate exclusively on what I love – Corvettes.

So again, I say to all my Corvette friends to drop the cross-town rivalry for a day and help Ford celebrate this great milestone by wishing the Mustang a happy 50th Birthday!

Check out the press release that Chevrolet offered in support of the Mustang’s 50th Birthday.

Mustang Photo credit: carfanaticsforum.com

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