I thought this setting was a wee bit odd, but then there there were plenty of affluent farmers back then that could well afford a new Lincoln. That was especially so in late 1972 and 1973, when the US agreed to allow the USSR to buy large quantities of subsidized American grain, leading to a global shortage, higher grain prices and increasing global food prices by at least 30%.
I remembered “The Soviet Wheat Deal” in general terms, as I was living in Iowa at the time. I didn’t realize until just now, reading about it, that the Americans made a massive blunder, by not knowing the the Soviets had experienced severe crop failures and would quickly buy up many times the amount the Americans initially assumed. The US subsides amounted to some $300 million, which was a lot more than it would be today. Although the deal was seen as an embarrassing mistake by the US negotiators, it was a windfall for Midwest grain farmers. I read at the time that winter vacations in Florida, Mexico and other warm destinations were way up after that.
PERFECT pose by the model “farmer.” He has “Why not?” all over him.
It is an odd photo.
The car would get bogged down in the mud – get really filthy. You going to put those boots into that heavy deep pile carpeting? That barn coat covered in horse hair and smelling like your favorite ride onto that plush sofa? You going to pull a thresher with it?
This isn’t farmer thinking. This is out of touch with farming think. I know farmers and while they liked a Lincoln – they drove Fords. In my old farm town in Kansas, I have known of no one who worked the land in a luxury car.
That is what the Lincoln truck was for.
Exactly. I wonder how they got this shot, possibly some early Photoshop something. Otherwise they would have had to wash it before taking the picture. And, they likely needed a tractor to pull it out of the mud.
“Early Photoshop” was known as an airbrush. How’d they get the photo? Well, they have ways; that’s what makes them professional photographers—they’re not tourists taking snapshots. Every still-photo ad ever made for breakfast cereal has used thinned white glue for completely convincing milk, so the cereal doesn’t go soggy.
Indeed. Thanks for explaining the “art. From what I’ve read farmers were more likely to be seen in LTDs and Caprices.
You don’t see what’s in front of the car. I’m betting they’re all of four feet from either a paved or gravel driveway. Truck it there, roll it onto the grass, a quick wipe-down and it’s photo time.
This is what Kansas farmers drove, and usually not a Cheyenne version. My uncle drove a Chevy pickup and my aunt drove an Impala or Bonneville, depending on what their rural Buick/Pontiac/Oldsmobile/Chevy dealer had in stock after the wheat was harvested. This ‘71 Cheyenne has a wooden load floor for hauling livestock.
Almost all cars were still big back then and in Texas farmers would buy 1 big car, it was the only way to get everybody to Church in 1 car and other family events funerals and family reunions were still a thing back then, at least in my family in Central Texas, we always had at least 1 massive car, a Lincoln, Olds 98, Chrysler 300, at 1 point we always had at least 1 in the driveway and 1 on the street.
Well believe it or not Farmers do bathe and cleanup very nicely. My uncle was a successful prosperous farmer back in Iowa. By the mid 70s in his 50s he splurged on a new Lincoln himself but a Mark V model. So …
I took one look at that gent and thought: Developer. The affluent farmer on the tractor just sold his land to the affluent man with the Lincoln; he’s tilling his last field to ensure a solid landing for Sears and Radio Shack.
Floyd bought all of his farm trucks, pickups and heavier-duty, from Bob down at Ed Koehn Ford-Lincoln-Mercury in Greenville. So when it came time for Floyd to buy a new car for his wife Betty (and to take the family to church on Sundays), Bob gave him a screaming deal on a Conti, for not much more than the Mercury he initially came in for.
Are you sure Floyd bought the car from Bob at the Ed Koehn dealership and not Frosty?
I suppose that there are farmers, and then there are Farmers. People that own large holdings and manage them, but don’t get up early to feed the chickens or milk the cows. They are involved in the agri-industry. Not to say that they don’t understand or even love the land, but their farms are just too big to be directly run by a family.
Kind of like rental property landlords, on the basic level are the guys that do their own yard work, maintenance, and repairs. Then you have the high end owners who have their property professionally managed and only occasionally, if ever, actually visit their properties.
This seems like an extension of the old “tycoon” Lincoln ad we saw a couple of weeks ago, where the Captains of Industry were standing in front of their Continentals. I guess the message is that real rich guys buy these cars, not just the neighborhood guy that owns a couple of dry cleaners.
My favorite Buick Riviera ad is the one that features an airline pilot posed next to his car on his country estate, with his private plane visible in the hanger. I guess that he has made some good investments!
I still see extremely low mileage cars like these for sale in farm country. Lots of “go to church” rigs still out there, albeit not at giveaway prices anymore.
That would be another great advertising trope – the early 70s seemed all about posing cars in fields and meadows of all kinds. All the better to get one with farm machinery in the background.
If we are making up stories, I would argue that this isn’t the farmer, but the developer who is trying to buy the farmer’s land so he can turn it into a new subdivision.
I’ve always loved these types of ads instead of the ones today where everything is flying around and throwing dirt/gravel like a scene from Thema and Louis.
Anyhow, this also made me think of growing up on our farm in the mid-west (IL) and my parents got a 1975 Cadillac in 1976. Things were better back then and maybe this is why (per the article). But the memory that sticks with me is there was a very rich older guy from Chicago who purchased a farm near ours. He had a very attractive younger wife. One day I saw Bernie drive past in a brand new 1980 Cadillac Seville with the 5.7 diesel. Gray and black and was stunning. About a week later, I was in the front yard next to the road that came to the highway next to our farm. I heard and saw his new Cadillac diesel coming to a stop. His window was down and when he stopped, I said hello and noticed corn stocks hanging from the bottom of his new Cadillac. I asked him why they were there and he said that he had cattle get out yesterday and he had to chase them down through the field! haha. I’ll never forget that.
My rancher relatives told me that when the cows were calving and they were having late, but mild snowfalls, they would drive their Cadillac out into the fields and load up the newborn calves into the backseat of their car and then drive it to the warm barn.
For some reason, your story made me think of another one. I totally forgot this, but when I was in sales at the Cadillac store in the mid-west. We had an old guy who always drove Cadillac’s, but nobody at the dealership wanted to work with him. Being young and new, I took that challenge and boy did I learn why nobody wanted that “deal”. He was a logger and chewed, having his spittoon mounted on the hump near the center of the dash. Let’s just say his aim wasn’t always that good and his cars were dirty all the time. One time he came in looking for a new Cadillac and the managers insisted on taking his trade to service first and have them put it up on the rack to check it out. When I asked why, the service manager said because the old logger guy would often use his Cadillac to pull logs with a chain. They were looking for damages and signs that he had used that one and they found it! Need I say, we didn’t make a deal with him on that one.
Thanx Dan ;
I think back in the day most Service Station and Indie mechanics had similar stories, at the Atlantic Richfield station we has the tiny little old lady who drove a HUGE 1959 Chrysler station wagon, it was filled with trash and garbage from the back window to the front seat, a mountain of garbage reaching the ceiling and cascading into the driver’s seat ~ you could smell the car a block away, we always parked out back and one boss would drive it into the service areas, mostly we’d do repairs in the sun un the apron so as to not stink out the entire garage .
There’s a;ways that -one- customer, like the mean drunk at your local bar, no one likes them but someone has to give them service .
-Nate
I wasn’t alive in 1972 or thereabouts but my understanding is that there was some level of (waning) prestige for the generation buying these in flaunting that they didn’t have to work with their hands. So the story here is that he’s driving out to check on his crops in this because he’s made it and isn’t the guy on the tractor anymore
Ollyvah Douglas drove a Lincoln Continental on “Green Acres”—a convertible, even; it had a pernandle and everything!
lolol “Green Acres” was first thing I though of too!! By the end off the show’s run. “Oliver” and “Lisa” had swapped to the “Marquis convertible”.
In one “Petticoat Jnctn episode, :”Lisa” drove the car to “Steve/ Betty Jo’s” house.
Yes. Lincoln discontinued their convertibles after the 1967 model year, so Oliver and Lisa downgraded to the Marquis, which was the most prestigious convertible that Ford, a sponsor of the show, offered.
“Green Acres” was a spin-off of “Petticoat Junction” which was a spinoff of “The Beverly Hillbillies.” There were several cross-over episodes of the shows where characters from one show visited the other ones. This presented problems as “The Beverly Hillbillies” had Chrysler as a sponsor of the show. There’s a cross-over episode of “The Beverly Hillbillies” where the hillbillies are visiting Hooterville and Lisa Douglas shows up driving a ’67 (or so) Plymouth Sport Fury convertible.
“P. Jct” was not a spin-off of “Hillbillies”, was same production company, but no character spun from “BH”. Actor playing another character doesn’t count.
Later had crossover episodes, but not a true spin-off like “The Jeffersons” from “All in the Family, etc.
HEY!
Sam Drucker appeared at the Shady Rest, the Clampetts, and at the General Store in Green Acres. Frank Cady was the only actor to play a recurring character on three television sitcoms at the same time, which he did from 1968 to 1969, appearing on The Beverly Hillbillies, Green Acres, and Petticoat Junction simultaneously.
As Sam Drucker, he appeared in 142 of 170 Green Acres episodes during its six-year run from 1965 to 1971. Also as Drucker, he was one of only three co-stars of Petticoat Junction who stayed with the series for its entire seven-year run (1963–1970), along with Edgar Buchanan and Linda Henning, appearing in 152 of the show’s 222 episodes.
He played Drucker in 10 episodes of The Beverly Hillbillies ifrom 1968 to 1970, and he continued his Drucker role in the final season of Green Acres after Petticoat Junction ended in 1970.
The Clampetts appeared in Hooterville more than once. These were spin-offs.
Has the same anti-climatic feel as Joe Mannix switching to a Camaro after the Dodge Challenger went out of production.
The only Midwestern farmers who drove Lincoln Continentals back then were on Green Acres.
They were the only ones using Hoyt-Clagwell tractors too.
Yes! Pernandle 🙂
This of course brings up the whole Green Acres, Beverly Hillbillies, Petticoat Junction, (Mr. Ed, Hogan’s Heroes) universe. It seems that while Ford products were favored on Green Acres, The Beverly Hillibillies and Petticoat Junction were aligned with Chrysler. Mr. Ed (Studebaker, of course) and Hogan’s Heroes (who the heck knows??) were something else altogether.
Oh, and yes, apparently Hooterville was in Missouri. Although I’m not sure how that squares with Jed striking oil while one day shooting at some food.
Fresh Air…Times Square.
For those shows, the Rural Purge was a mercy killing. You can only be a fish out of water for so long and they were running out of ideas fast. There’s a reason why Beverly Hillbillies’ later color seasons are rarely seen compared to the earlier B&W ones.
I never thought about the ’70s but could imagine a sequel series to Hogan’s Heroes where Schultz goes back to his toy factory in Bavaria, Hogan – realizing it’d be Babies Ever After back home – secures the US distribution rights to Schultz toys and Col. Klink gets a job in the factory rather than returning home to Dresden and life in Russian-controlled rubble. By 1955 they’d be driving a BMW 507, a Cadillac and an Isetta respectively.
Wow – you are incorrectly assuming so much!
Green Acres was on the radio for years, starring Gale Gordon. The Real McCoys kicked off the rural revolution by the late 1950s. Lil Abner was a hit comic for decades before it became a hit Broadway musical and movie. Green Acres ended up with Paul Henning during the Sixties. It was reformulated during the 1980s-1990s for Newhart. There are dozen of shows that have used and are still using similar comedy formats. It is an old schtick that never seems to get old. The Beverly Hillbillies were one of the most popular television show in history. The Andy Griffith Show is still a big ratings winner and its spin-off Mayberry RFD was still Top Ten, and winning Emmy awards.
The Rural Purge was personal. Incoming CBS television executives hated these shows, but the shows were still big – huge ratings winners. But new corporate leadership wanted Baby Boomer appeal and knocked off all the soft comedy set in rural settings popular during this time.
They may not have liked them, but it was Nielsen’s rolling out more precise geographic and demographic TV ratings in the late 60’s that killed CBS’s rural comedies. While the raw ratings were high, the were low with the audiences advertisers coveted.
There are 323 oil wells in Missouri right now.
THANK YOU Daniel ! .
I always thought it was pronounced ‘prindle’ .
I wonder if Green Acres was where I heard it first .
-Nate
It is pronounced ‘prindle’. Lisa’s mangled pronunciations were a running gag on the show.
I feel like I’ve seen/heard of many instances with guys like these and luxury cars, however I usually hear them referred to as “ranchers” instead of “farmers”. Are they generally interchangeable terms, the way some wealthy psychopaths are called “eccentric”? I’ve been conditioned to think of the former as a wealthy, landholder-supervisor type who would certainly appreciate the ride in a luxury car and the latter as a no-frills guy who keeps his old pickup around for decades.
Here I go again with another LS400 reference today – the earliest instance I remember was of a article; possibly in a Lexus owner’s magazine, about a Texas rancher who racked up half a million miles on his LS which was maybe 10 years old at the time. I remember thinking as someone mentioned above, of dirty boots clashing with the sumptous interior but I guess these guys really do use these cars to make long trips instead of tilling soil.
Ah, found it! Seems I remembered a few details wrong in the intervening 18 years since I’d read it – he actually identifies as a farmer, how about that! And he started in LA and eventually to Utah which explains the mileage but this image has been long in my mind when I hear of such stories.
Thousand Oaks is a northern LA-area suburb, think lots of tract homes, generally upper-ish income level. Tehachapi is inland and north, kind of a highway and perhaps partial freeway slog on 118 and maybe I-5 depending on your mood. Either way the LS400 is a perfect car for that trip and the Thousand Oaks home, you’re unlikely to touch an unpaved road until the apple orchard’s driveway (maybe). I’m guessing the guy had a 1960s Ford or Chevy pickup that he would drive to the farmstand though from the farm. 🙂
Generally speaking, “ranchers” refers to people who raise cattle and who consider themselves to be “cowboys” and “cowgirls.” Cattle ranchers don’t consider people who raise other kinds of animals to be ranchers, but people who raise other kinds of animals might consider themselves to be ranchers.
“Farmers,” on the other hand, primarily refers to people who raise various kinds of crops, although it can be used to describe people who raise animals, too, although not usually cattle. (If you want to piss off a cattle rancher, call him a “farmer.”) Farmers might have horses and cows, in addition to what else they raise, but they are less likely to consider themselves to be cowboys and cowgirls.
Regardless of how much money they have, ranchers are generally considered to be a step above farmers in social pecking orders.
Finally, let me add, that in the various rural pecking orders, for reasons that I don’t comprehend, the lowest of the low and the lowest of the farmers is the poor “beet farmer.” To be called a “beet farmer” is considered to be a terrible insult.
My first real job at 14 was on a mink ranch. Gotta be real careful feeding mink, especially when the mom has babies in the pen with her.
Ranchers specifically raise cattle *for meat*. If milk is the main output, you’re a dairy farmer.
There’s an old joke about a Vermont dairy farmer listening to a Texas rancher brag about the size of his spread; “I could get in my truck at sunup, drive until sundown and still not reach my far property line!”
The Vermonter gives him a sympathetic look and says, “yup, had a truck like that myself once.”
You’re right, that raising other animals are considered farming not on a ranch, example “pig farm” or “dairy farm”.
Didn’t “LBJ” drive a “Lincoln cnvrt” round his spread too? Think it was a “Barbara Walters” special, waay on back..
Sure did. White 64. https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a41954161/1964-lincoln-continental-convertible-bring-a-trailer-auction/
You’d have to be out standing in your field to afford one of those!
Geddit?
Q: Why is a farmer an expert?
A:He’s outstanding in his field.
I get the impression the Lincoln was photographed in another setting and ‘inserted’ into the field. The back window is white (red arrow). It should show green field. The perspective on the car seems a bit exaggerated as well.
Indeed. I noticed that too and thought that this was likely a photo composition. But then I saw the reflection in the front right bumper, and thought “Well, that’s some kind of attention to detail for the age.”.
I don’t know…it probably comes down to which was less expensive. Photo composition or driving a car out into a field and then towing it out later.
Airbrushing probably reached its apex in the ’70s. Only, much of it was not well-rendered or convincing. Topps baseball, hockey and football cards, had some of the poorest professional airbrushing, I recall from that era.
So many unusual elements here. The pleats in the seating look almost like they were hand-painted. Especially noticeable on the rear seating. And odd how the man’s head reflected on the hood appears so tiny and abbreviated, in spite of the hood centre crease. I think, more of his head should appear reflected on the hood.
It certainly would have looked more consistent, if shot on-site.
Well spotted as all left hand windows show white. You would have fault Ford would have taken more care but then again its fooled a few posters here.
My well-to-do farmer and rancher relatives were still driving Cadillacs in the ’60s and ’70s. Most (but not all) of them switched to Lincolns in the ’80s after Cadillac downsized their products one time too many. However, my more snobby farmer and rancher relatives had moved on by then and were buying Jaguar XJs and Mercedes S-Classes.
Farmers around more are more grape growers, if you will, than anything else. More likely to have had a Mercedes back then when Napa/Sonoma began to take off. Might have seen a Caddy or Lincoln now and then though as the rush to foreign wasn’t quite yet in full swing.
It could be the banker foreclosing the family farm
Or it could be Capitalist checking on his serfs.
Great propaganda material for the Soviets.
Personally, I think this is a ridiculous ad.
But then it was one among many of its time.
Nice car.
One Soviet loved and collected expensive cars, especially foreign models. President Nixon gifted Premier Leonid Brezhnev with a 1973 Lincoln Continental at Camp David. The previous year Nixon gifted Brezhnev with a Cadillac while in Moscow.
Vintage Ad: 1972 Lincoln Continental Sedan – What The Corporate Welfare Farmer Drives.
There .
I fixed it for you .
This is a great thread, I remember a few Farmers in the 1960’s who were doing well enough to buy a new Ford station wagon every five years or so .
As mentioned : “Rancher” usually means raising beef for meat .
“Dairy Farms” , “Chicken / Pig farms” were also common names back then .
-Nate
500,000 plus miles? Maybe, but I don’t think that is on the original drivetrain. I had a co worker who ran his LS up to 250K but thought that after so many years he needed something newer. Maybe that owner had the engine and transmission replaced somewhere along the line. Up to 300K on the original motor might be possible, but much past that seems unlikely. Nothing wrong with keeping a car on the road by fixing what it needs or engine replacement.
I guess you missed the million mile Lexus LS 400? Original engine, but three transmissions.
https://carbuzz.com/news/matt-farah-s-lexus-ls400-finally-hits-a-million-miles
(I think you wrote this in reply to my Lexus post above?)
That article was from 2003, and since then the 1UZ-FE drivetrain has been proven to be incredibly durable as well as refined – I myself owned a 1999 LS400 that had 317,000 miles on it’s original drivetrain.
As an example; a feat widely shown in the media back then was of standing a penny on it’s edge (or a glass of water) on top of the intake manifold and revving the engine to redline without any disturbance. What is even more remarkable is people attempting this feat with the same results on high-mileage cars many years later.
There is also the famous “million mile Lexus” belonging to YouTuber Matt Farah – he bought his 1996 LS with 897,000 miles in 2014 and documented for 5 years when the odometer finally rolled over.
Drive through Iowa, central Illinois, or Indiana today and half the private vehicles you see are $80K pickups owned by ethanol farmers.
Submitted for your approval…
Haha, lovely!
That’s great!
Awesome! On the cab of that machine is an RTK GPS antenna that allows that machine to autosteer to sub-inch accuracy. I work for that company.
Guess these types of ads were paying homage to the old phrase “Gentleman Farmer”!
FoMoCo had / has no problem making long life vehicles when they want to .
Some made very good profit, others less so .
The much hated Escorts from the 1980’s were perfect examples ~ they lived long past any reasonable expiration date after rough service as Barrio Beaters and Ghetto Hoopties .
I never saw a rusty one in California even after twenty years .
Then there were those funny looking (to me anyway) Taurus / Tempo ~ they kept right on rolling for decades .
The low co$t Ranger light duty trucks with four cylinder engines routinely roll up 400,000 + miles before needing any engine work .
Sadly they deliberately made them *very* easy rusters, even in Los Angles .
I still see these Lincolns around, most are well kept hobby cars but more than a few are battered Ghetto Hoopties that simply refuse to die .
-Nate
Those “out on the grass” photos were a theme of 1972 L-M advertising. I’ll go with shot-on-location, but then the rear window touched up to get a clean visual line on the top of the rear seat (but no other trickery):
Seems like Chrysler Corp. did a series of these for their Imperial models in the early 1970s too. One I remember was burgandy in color, four door, with a large estate in the background.
The rich ALWAYS make money from the ” Big Government ” they decry & big time farmers during Nixons Detente .
They don’t fundraise for politicians. without wanting nothing but !
These ads are topical of the time .
I have seen a beautiful 70s Lincoln Ads near oil wells & cattle .
They sure had a presence & build quality.
Cadillac outsold Lincoln three to one in that era & the Wreath & Crest , was still legend & aspiration for most .
Lincoln was always running up against the brilliant branding by Cadillac of there , at the time excellent cars …..remember they where selling plenty commercial chassis for ambulances & hearses – flower cars , which added to their practical prestige.
Lincoln was trying to emulate this :
They where going after the gentleman farmer market .
I knew plenty has a boy .
Big cars : Cadillac being dominant, with Olds 98 , Buick Electra, Imperial, & assorted other Chryslers the choice.
These people loved cars ; would discuss every detail about them.
I knew an old Silo Contractor – Farmer with !7 Cadillacs in his life & a Buick or two .
He used them in his phrase: ” To mix business with pleasure.”
These cars where rugged & those torque heavy engines could pull trailers & haul .
Yes they did it .
.
I remember back then the government bought all the mid west corn and then ended up having to burn it all on the farms.