(first posted 5/1/2012) Ah, the Country Squire. What says 1960s to 1970s upper-middle class suburbia better than one of these? Before minivans, before SUVs, and before crossovers, these were the ne plus ultra family hauler for upwardly mobile moms.
The Country Squire had been a Ford staple for many years by the time the 1975 model came along. Introduced in 1949 as a two door steel-roofed wagon with real wood inserts in the doors, quarter panels and tailgate, they were soon a family staple. The 1975 model was a restyled version of the 1973 Ford. ’75s had new front and rear styling, and several new interior options across the board. The Country Squire gained a new grille and hidden headlights, shared with the plush LTD Landau series.
All LTD wagons were powered by a 400 CID V8, backed by a Select Shift Cruise-O-Matic transmission. A 460 V8 was optional. Other standard features included power brakes, power steering and a power tailgate window.
Country Squires added the usual woodgrained vinyl sides and tailgate, framed by light fiberglass woodtone moldings. An extended range fuel tank was optional, adding an extra eight gallons to the already good-sized tank.
These were the biggest Ford wagons would get, with a length of 225.6″, 121″ wheelbase, and 79.9″ width. You did get a lot of space though, with 94.6 cubic feet of cargo volume – more than 100 if you counted the below-deck storage.
An interesting feature was the dual facing rear seats, which turned your Country Squire into an 8-passenger wagon. It was very different from the rear facing seats found on most Detroit wagons of the time, with the exception of the 1971-76 GM B-body wagons, where the third row actually faced forward. Ford’s famous Magic Doorgate made it a lot easier to get in and out of the jump seats, too.
If the standard interior wasn’t to your liking, there were several optional interior choices. The Landau Luxury Group was the best interior you could get, with embroidered split bench seating, shag carpeting and – ooh, an electric clock! It was essentially the same interior found in top-drawer LTD Landau sedans and coupes.
Only slightly less plush was the Squire Brougham option, which featured a split bench seat with fold-down armrests and passenger recliner. It was, as you might have guessed, lifted from the LTD Brougham series. Most Country Squires were loaded, and popular options included the SelectAire air conditioner, Automatic Temperature Control, vinyl roof and a luggage rack with built-in woodgrained wind deflector.
Now, if you didn’t want to flaunt your good fortune, you could get a plain-sided LTD, load it up with options, and the neighbors wouldn’t be the wiser. But then you’d miss out on those cool hidden headlights!
Whether basic or fancy, these wagons were just the thing for hauling the kids to the Grand Canyon or towing your boat up to the lake for the day. If National Lampoon’s Vacation had been done in the ’70s, this would have been Clark Griswold’s ride.
Thanks are in order for PN, who shot this well-traveled Squire a while back.
What a great vehicle. I love it when a great name on a car stays at the top of the pecking order for a long, long time. Like the Chrysler New Yorker, the Country Squire was the top end Ford wagon when it came out and went out. From the 1940s into the 1990s – that’s some staying power. Just think – these things came with flatheads, Y blocks, FEs, Limas, and finally the injected 5.0. Quite a spread.
For those of us who grew up in the 1960s, these things were iconic. My dad had a white 66. It seems like everyone’s dad, mom, uncle, neighbor had one of these at one time or another. And how few of them are around now.
As a kid, I loved the dual facing rear seats. They seemed so roomy at the time. I can recall an adult sitting back there once, but could not imagine doing it for any long period of time.
Well said, jp.
Anyone under the age of 60 just cannot comprehend the allure, the cache, the desirability, the envy expressed by the WWII/Korean Conflict generations over having a Ford station wagon in the driveway.
It was the Escalade or the Lexus SUV of this era.
Below is a picture of my parent’s “Suburban Status Symbol”. Because of the torrential heat, humidity and sun here in tropical New Orleans, Mom & Dad passed on the di-noc stuck on sides on both of their station wagons.
Wish we’d had one of these back in the ’70’s. My dad wouldn’t have gone for the fake wood, though…it would have been the plain-sided LTD for us. A buddy’s dad had a few of these (a ’66 and later a ’70) and they were great cars.
Living on the east coast of Canada, it’s hard to imagine cars this old still in daily use.
Take a trip to Vancouver Island and you’ll see old cars all over the place. The mild climate and salt-free roads are very easy on cars.
Vancouver is a different place; our pollution tests and class consciousness mean old cars are very rare indeed.
I’m not so sure about how much daily use this one gets. It’s part of a rather interesting collection of four cars at this house; three out front, and one in the driveway (second to last picture). Every time I’ve walked by, they’re all there. Maybe they don’t drive much anymore; it’s a walking-friendly neighborhood (Whitaker).
With that in mind, the most amazing thing about the Country Squire is the fact that the headlamp doors are in the down position. Absolutely amazing. The Ford headlamp doors of that era were vacuum operated. (When I graduated high school I picked up a 1975 LTD Landau coupe bank repo for $700. I fought a vacuum leak for over a year before I figured it out!) The default for the headlamp doors with a loss of vacuum would be a return to the up position (for obvious safety reasons). Even the slightest vacuum leak would eventually have the headlamp doors headed up after an extended period of time without having the engine started and the vacuum restored. Vacuum leaks were not the norm, but they were not uncommon, particularly as the car aged, and this car has definitely aged!!
The Squire was as much a part of middle-class suburbia then as minivans & SUVs are now. Our ’70 Squire’s cargo area floor was of sheet steel; seats were very durable vinyl able to stand up to abuse from kids & dogs. Much less carpet & cloth than today.
I remember playing with the headlamp door valve, instead of washing it as I was supposed to. There was enough reserve to open & close them several times. I think the ventilation controls were also vacuum-assisted.
Detroit evidently loved vacuum accessories, whereas Japan was more into electric motors, perhaps due to Mabuchi or smaller-displacement engines. Different strokes.
Neighbors had one of these in the early 80s. My memory may be off but I think I remember it catching on fire while parked. Is that even possible? Maybe a smoldering short?
Anyway, good timing – found some real wood on this ’51 over the weekend:
Dad had a ’76 LTD 4-dr model in the early ’80s, after a couple years of ownership it developed a smoking short in the wiring harness. A new wiring harness installed by a talented friend fixed this problem. Maybe it was particular to these cars?
I was at the mall with my brothers when I saw one of these spontaneously catch on fire in the parking lot, in the mid-80’s. It was, literally, “POOF…crackle, crackle…” Struck me as a waste because it was a particularly nice Country Squire.
Our beloved neighbors, the Kemps, had a beautiful C/S in the 70’s that they traded for a new, ’79 (?) LeMans Safari also with Di-Noc vinyl body sides. While still a nice car, I liked the C/S way better.
Country Squire, Colony Park, Estate, Kingswood, Brookwood, Vista Cruiser, Town & Country…
(Sorry I zoned out for a moment, forgive me)
Funny how all the great station-wagon names could also be suburb names.
Michael Meyers drove one of these in the original ‘Halloween.’
Interesting they gave ole Mike a Country Squire to cruise the suburban ‘hood while stalking Jamie Lee Curtiss.
Sure it was a Country Squire? Seems like Mike got his ride from the mental institution from which he escaped and, as such, it was a much more lower tier version. But, yeah, it was definitely a full-size Ford station wagon of mid-seventies vintage.
Looks wide enough to carry drywall and plywood. Looks long enough to do a good job with a ladder rack. Probably as good for work as my 77 impala was. I think I like it.
Don’t know if I could afford it though. Might have to buy out exxon or shell. I was doing just fine till reality struck.
The engine size makes it seem like these cars should’ve been hot rods but they were so heavy and inefficient that it just wasn’t happening.
In my opinion, if you were looking for a neat project you’re either better off going back to the 60’s before pollution controls or going 1979 & later when a strict diet made them far better on fuel without any sacrifice in power or room.
I had a 430 cubic inch ’62 Continental until a few years ago. The prodigious consumption of fossil fuel (single digits in town, not that I ever dared actually check) and pollution and CO2 outputs were a bit of a problem to me. If I had a ton of money I would get a ’61 and put a modern drivetrain like from the last Crown Vic in it. And god knows front disc brakes. Only have crap crash protection to worry about then. Maybe $40K for a perfect one, $20K more for the work. (Not gonna happen.)
Anyway, if you have a ton of money to spend you could get an older Country Squire of your choice and do the same.
Good grief! What a bomb. There is no way I would ever lower myself to drive something as hideously ratty as this. Reminds me of a guy I worked with once, who admittedly didn’t quite have them all, who hauled coal(!) in his 1962 Tempest wagon. He did the best he could with what he had. Perhaps that’s the case here.
Junk it quickly…please?
By 1975, I was in Jeep/pickup truck/minimalist-back-to-nature-lifestyle-weekends-camping mode along with my buddies…until I met the wonderful gal that would become my wife in two years that June…
I abhored all full-sized cars at the time, mainly because they were all unapologetic gas hogs and the quality was abysmal.
1975 was also the last time I owned a Chevy until 2004 when I ordered and bought my 1976 Custom Deluxe C-20!
> Junk it quickly…please?
Zackman, if you look at the pics closely, you’ll see that the body on this car is actually in fairly good condition, with very little visible rust. It mostly looks ugly because all that fake wood hasn’t aged well. How many cars from Eugene have been featured on CC that have been cobbled together or have real live moss growing on them? This certainly isn’t the worst car that we’ve seen. Heck, the windows in the rear doors even roll all the way down. I fail to see why this car deserves such harsh criticism, at least on this website.
I agree if it weren’t for the piece of trim missing on the front fender a little contact paper would have this thing looking pretty darn good again. OK it really needs the proper Di-Noc but still it is in very good shape.
Also the 1970s era silver paint that never seemed to be able to hold a shine after about 5 years.
At least it is better than the clear coated silvers that followed that lost their clear coat rather quickly.
That’s good ol’ lacquer for ya…
One issue that comes up in me are the emotions I felt and remembered at the time when I see something here that raises my hackles one way or the other.
Yes, the car in question is a survivor, for sure.
Now that you raised the point about the windows rolling all the way down – now I gotta take back what I said!
And remember Z-man, the windows haven’t been cleaned on the outside OR the inside for what, a decade?
Nothing makes an old car look better than cleaning the glass.
Except maybe a new set of whitewalls.
Nice, straight bumpers on this one.
Sure hope we see more of the Mercury behind it.
I just hope someone restores this, this could easily be a beautiful car, appears to only need cosmetic restoration mostly. If this was over here, someone would have long ago snapped it up and brought it back to its former glory.
I’d love to have one of these
“Junk it quickly…please”
Are you kidding me?
I would love to have this as a daily driver (I work near 75 & 94 in Detroit).
The only issue would be getting out of the way of the locals in their hellcats and redeyes.
And on weekends I would have it valeted at the club.
Seriously.
My best friend’s mom drove one exactly the same as the one in the first ad at the top. It was traded in for a more fuel efficient silver 83 Camaro which lost all of it’s paint within two years. I remember that she was very sad that the wagon was gone.
Nice! My dad had a 73 Colony Park with a 460, and I still miss that car, what a cruiser. Only downfall was the gallons per mile fuel mileage!
Perhaps it’s because it’s what we had when I was growing up, but I’m much more partial to the late ’60s Country Squires. Our ’68 had the 390/four barrel – it would *move!* Dad had a massive box-tube trailer hitch frame bolted underneath and we pulled an 18′ “Swinger” camper all over the SE on family vacations.
IIRC, there were seat belts for ten (six adults on the bench seats and four ‘young’uns’ in the ‘way back’).
Cost reduction efforts really seemed to kick in in the ’70s, and I find these later generation LTDs to be but a mere shadow of the ’60s models, which were almost jewel-like in their interior appointments.
This snapshot reminds me of the famous Bigfoot sighting picture.
🙂
That looks just like my family’s 1st Squire, which inexplicably oscillated & rolled while drawing our 2-axle Ideal trailer on a family trip while in Wisconsin. I tumbled in back like a lottery ball. Trailer disintegrated, front roof crushed a bit, but we all walked away from it. Don’t recall if it was totaled or ultimately repaired.
My uncle had a ’67 Squire.
Agree, Res.
My parent’s above pictured ’66 Country Sedan was special ordered (a 7 week wait!) with the same 390 4-BBL “Thunderbird Special” engine. Dad was a pre-interstate highway system 2 lane passing champion in it. The full sized van that replaced the wagon was an ice wagon dog by comparison.
Yours looks just like the one Betty Draper Francis drove in the careful-to-be “period correct” AMC tv series “Madmen”.
The 60’s details in this show, up front or in the background, were awesome.
That street sure has a high density of CCs. You’ve got the Merc behind the Country Squire with a Squareback behind it and a Tempo and the previously featured homemade truck thingy lurking in the background.
The Country Squires definitely earned Ford the moniker the Wagon Master they used in some advertising. As the proper station wagon neared its end Ford had over 50% of the market, with Subaru taking about 25% and everyone else accounting for the remaining 25%.
A Ford salesman friend of my Dad’s was nicknamed “Country” because he sold so many Country Squire and Country Sedan station wagons during the 1950’s, 1960’s and 1970’s. He said the wagons sold themselves as everyone in suburbia wanted one.
Ford’s long running advertising slogan of “We’re The Wagon Masters” was apt and correct.
The problem with the pullman rear seats on these is that they are useless for anyone but small children, I had a Colony Park for a while before my Estate Wagon and there is just no way an adult could sit back there, much less 2.
then again, no self respecting adult would sit in those rear facing seats Carmine!
But if you had too…..
The third row on my Estate Wagon is roomier than the back seat of a 2nd gen F-body, you could fit 2 real adults back there.
I sorta like it but I always thought the LTD was dowdy looking. I always dug the lines of the GM rivals better.
I think Country Squires are very attractive up to about the 1968 model. After that, meh. And the ’75? Double meh.
For me I thought the Country Squire’s stayed attractive until the 1972 model year, after that they’ve gotten too bulky and boxy for my liking
Totally agree with Minstrel_Gallery.
“Only slightly less plush was the Squire Brougham option, which featured a split bench seat with fold-down armrests and passenger recliner. It was, as you might have guessed, lifted from the LTD Brougham series.”
So could you still get the nylon tricot (panty cloth) like earlier LTDs?
Oh wait, a fondness for nylon tricot might be why you need a wagon in the first place… 😛
It’s regular (albeit “SuperSoft”)vinyl in the top trim level and what Ford called DuraWeave (woven vinyl, approx. 20 grit) in the midline choice.
Still a fair bit nicer than the Chevys of the era where the top-line Kingswood Estate/Caprice Estate trim bought you an Impala-level interior and the true Caprice interior wasn’t available in wagons in any form.
1975 was the begining of the big Ford wagons’ sales decline, with high gas prices and GM’s smaller ’77 B bodies gaining. Also, some shift to mid size wagons. Minivans were 8 years away.
The high water mark for Squires in my mind is 1973. Seems like all of Chicago suburbs had one in every 3rd driveway.
The LTD, with the exception of the Landau, is probably the only car I like from Ford during the 74-78 period. The overhangs weren’t ridiculous and it didn’t appear as bulbous as the pre 77 GMs.
I’ve mentioned the parents’ powder-blue ’66 Squire previously, but later on they also had a ’72 Colony Park in bright red. Of the two I much preferred the Squire for drivability; the CP was just ridiculously floaty and tended to wander all over the place going down the road. Made at least one lengthy trip in the thing, hauling some friends to northern Jersey, and even made a foray into Manhattan, where it looked supremely out of place.
On a more esoteric level, if one must have acres of fake wood down the side, the Squire gets the nod as well; the Merc’s sheathing just looked like a sheet of contact paper with a cheesy bit of chrome to cover the edges.
I believe this car wins the title of being the broughamiest wagon ever built!
You would have to pick one with the vinyl roof option checked , as many of them came back in the day. I Use to think that it kept the car a cooler place on a hot summer day. Is that complete poppycock?
My parents had a succession of those through the seventies/early eighties, owing to the number of siblings who learned to drive in them.
Very comfortable, very quiet and reasonably well assembled. I don’t recall any of them having major mechanical issues. The perfect car for a family…
…except they handled – empty or loaded – like a shopping cart full of canned soup.
Drove exact same model and color in senior year of high school. Actually handled very well, just steer and the wagon would cleanly follow, like guiding a hot knife thru butter. Very good ride. Brakes were kind of touchy. Huge bench seats front and rear. They did have standard power tail gate windows even if you didnt have power windows in front. Never worried or at least bothered about being tail gated in this giant, everything is soooo far back there.
I almost salute these when I see the survivors roaming LA. Battle weary but still serving someone. 1969’s were a real step down from 68s IMO… and by 1975 the bean counters had made a shell out of the Country Squire to where it seemed tacky.
Now I understand why my sister traded the Colony Park she had For a Cutlass Cruiser. I remember that all over the road feeling in many a full sized Lincloln or Mercury… It’s not fun.
Well, I don’t know about anyone else but I’ve got a ’69 Country Squire that I hot-rodded and I love it. It turns heads everywhere it goes. OK, some people call it the “brady-mobile” or the “brady bunch car” but I don’t care, It’s cool. I can put a 4’x8′ sheet of plywood in the back and close the tailgate. Try doing that with your cross-over or SUV. I even have a matching pull-behind custom trailer for cruise nights that I made from a wrecked beyond repair 1970 Country squire. The FE 390 motor isn’t really that bad on gas either and gets about 14 mpg around town, not bad for a 5000 pound fullsize american car with a big-block V-8 and a 4 bbl. carb.
Kenny.
I for one love the 69 big Fords, particularly as a Country Squire. They just did not mix well with northern climates. You have a great cruiser there.
Sweet, lets see a picture of the trailer too.
Do you have a photo of the trailer?
I’ve got the trailer in the shop but I’ll see if I can get some recent pics posted, Kenny.
When I got my license in 1983 Dad gave me his 73 Duster and bought a 74 CSquire with only 32K miles from a widow of a friend of his. It even had the original Firestone721s still on it.
I found out the hard way how bad those were when I took it camping with 5 friends and we blew 2 tires on the way. Amazingly we were bale to find a second used tire along the way to get to our destination.
About a year later my dad became ill and couldnt drive anymore and my mom sold it [too big for her to park; even after she learned to drive on a 1950 Nash!] to buy an 82 Skylark. YEESH!
LOL! My grandfather had the yellow one like in the top picture. I remember riding with him all over town sitting on the front seat arm rests (these are the days before car seat rules) as a 3 year old..eating cookies while he smoked cigars…ahh the 70’s!
At my first police department, we had the 1976 version of this car, in the woodless, no-hidden-headlights version. As a PATROL CAR! It had a strong 460-or whatever V8 but you didn’t want to try anything FAST in it, with its loose suspension and ponderous rear end. The wagon was like a caricature of the sedans that the department bought in the same year; whatever the sedans did badly, the wagon did worse. It was the “penalty box” and the rookies always got stuck with it.
Although no one in my family ever owned one of these, or any station wagons when I was a boy, I remember seeing these and wishing my family did. I not only liked how station wagons looked compared to sedans and two doors, but I liked how big they were by comparison.
My Dad always drove wagons, especially GM. In 1982 he saw a panther wagon advertised for sale in the local paper with only 7,000 miles on it. We went to see it and it was like brand new so he bought it. He loved that car. It was a Country Squire with the fake woodgrain – of course, and wire wheel hubcaps, loaded to the max. The color was Medium Fawn Glow, and it had the rare Interior Luxury Group, so it was truly like having a Lincoln station wagon. It was the quietest car I can remember, even moreso than my Mom’s ’79 Riviera at the time. And it rode extremely well, too. – Dad always said it was the smoothest riding car he ever owned. It was even the car I learned to drive on! If there was a negative, it was the 302 non-fuel injected V-8 (1983 would be the first year for fuel injection) Other than that, it was a great vehicle right up until the 100k mark, when engine/tranny problems started and he decided to get rid of it. He always said it was the best wagon he ever owned.
Those cars are all still there, btw. I walk/bike/drive by them often and always think of CC.
Unfortunately those cars are all gone now as the owner seems to have moved on. House was renovated. A few non-descript new cars out front these days.
Pre-SUV, pre-Minivan people, under the age of 45 or so, have NO idea what a “Suburban Status Symbol” a new (or near new) Ford station wagon was for the post WWII/Korean War veterans and their wives.
A Ford-station-wagon-in-the-driveway was roughly the equivalent of a Lexus SUV or Escalade of today.
Here’s a picture of my Mom & Dad’s status symbol, parked in the driveway of the 2 story house she was SO very proud of, in the late 1960’s.
You should have mentioned the short-lived (’65-’67) unique Country Squire logo.
The 1960s Squires had a certain appeal, but personally, I think the 1960 Country Sedan is the best looking big American wagon of the era. And notice how sleek it looks sans luggage rack.
I always prefer the Squires.
This looks way better than the sedan.
The most amazing thing about the 1960 Country Squire is that the competition was stuff like the ‘batwing’ Chevrolet and ‘Suddenly it’s 1958’ Plymouth. How anyone would choose one of the latter two over the Ford is beyond me.
my understanding from a guy that built them in the Dallas plant, was the ’60 Ford was utter junk. He had nothing good to say about them, and that the ’61 and 59 were vastly better built and engineered.
Cleanly styled it is, but quality control was job 409 that year.
I like the ”50s/60s Squires with the leading spear; starting in the early ’70s the woodgrain trim got slabbier and slabbier.
My favourite Ford wagon. Looks so good it doesn’t even need wood.
1965-1967 Country Squire Logo:
Cutest Ford Squire ever.
Also the slowest Ford Squire ever.
So slow, when equipped with the 2 speed Ford-o-Matic automatic transmission, that it was a traffic hazard.
Ford Australia briefly (62-64) tried an “aristocratic” woodie for the horsey set with the local Falcon Squire. Didn’t translate well into ‘Strine tho.
or into British English…
Nothing like a big old American station wagon with Di Noc,and Ford was the wagon king.I`ll take one over a minivan, CUV or Suv anyday-but not with the two speed Ford-O-Matic thank you.
That would be the perfect zombie apocalypse vehicle. Do any of you remember the Curb Your Enthusiasm episode where Larry gets pulled over by a Norseman driving a red squire? One of my favorites and I still remember the car. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a4e-4rlks4g
This was my high school ride. Exact shade of faded silver. Looking back I can’t believe I drove something this large through downtown Seattle. It actually handled pretty well, just steer and the thing would automatically follow the curve like a bus. Best thing about it was even if someone tailgated you, who cares, they were sooo far back you didn’t even notice.
Here a Country Squire who meet a sad fate in the movie “Billy Madison”.
http://www.imcdb.org/vehicle_40109-Ford-LTD-Country-Squire-1975.html
Nice! Forgot about that one.
Or how about Out On A Limb?
I remember some of these still floating around in the early 90s, but can’t recall the last one I saw. I imagine they all saw regular family use, then became the old car the kids drove–not always gently–to school, and thus didn’t survive like the Mark Vs and Continentals of the era have. I’m more familiar with the box Panther generation that followed, as a number of parents in the 1985-93 era were still using them, and Colony Parks, to commute to work and ferry the brood.
I like the looks of them.
With that extended-range fuel tank and the 460 it only had to stop at every other gas station.
We bought a new 76 LTD wagon that we put 173,000 mile on before trading it in 88 for a new Crown Victoria. By then we only had our youngest girl left home and didn’t need a wagon anymore. But that wagon was just about the best car we ever owned.
This car was as great as it was ridiculous. I was a kid and my dad had a 73 LTD Country Squire Wagon. What a beast! Big Block engine, terrible brakes, I don’t remember there being seat belts in the rear rumble seats, but could hold a shitload of kids. I swear my dad changed calipers yearly. The engine never gave him trouble…ever. The paint was fading as well as the faux wood paneling, but it just kept going. My dad didn’t want to let it go, but he had to move on. It was the ugliest car I thought ever existed, now, hindsight tells me otherwise.
Yes. There was a time when vehicles were even more tacky than the SUVs of today. The amount of poor taste applied over 19 feet is astronomical.
I am 40 and we had a 74 and a 78 both in red with the wood grain when I was a kid, and I had always wanted one so I gave up and found a perfect 77 on Craigslist and I bought it and I absolutely love it.
Thanks for the Pictures and comments! This car has a special place in my heart. Country Squires were and are extremely rare here in Norway due to silly taxes. I bought my first in 1983 while studying at University of North Dakota, a fantastic 1976 blue 460. My friend skidded throught the guardails out in Montana. I hitched out with the Law School Dean’s toolbox and got in on the road after sleeping two nights in the back. We then drove it out to the west coast, down to Mexico and across to DC, picking up parts on the way. When I reluctantly sold it in DC it was again complete. In 1985 I was back in North America, working in Toronto. did many great trips in a 1977 golden 400. My girlfriend loved it too, especially the bed in the back!
Now, five Ranger Rovers later, the Family is again driving an “AmCar”. Tesla Model S is probably the best american car ever. Now I can listen to my favourite local country radio stations while outperforming all other cars on the narrow Norwegian roads (except the other 15.000 Teslas of course).
Harald, Oslo Norway
Before the SUV’s of today, before the minivan (referred to as the “mommymobile”), there was the “DADDYMOBILE”, the full-sized station wagons that men bought as they grew families (Goodbye Ford Mustang, HELLO FORD LTD WAGON). Most family men went for the woodgrain sided wagons, while bachelors mostly preferred the plain sided ones without the hideaway headlights. As a kid in my 20’s, I had a 1976 Ford LTD wagon that was very reliable, and in the wintertime, I could actually get around, instead of being cooped up in the house, a lot better than my ’69 Buick Skylark that I had before, which wasn’t going anywhere in the winter. Same with my 1990 Buick Lesabre Estate wagon I got a dozen years later, it too held the road in nasty weather. Now you have to shell out big $$$ for a truck or SUV that has that kind of reliability
“If National Lampoon’s Vacation had been done in the ’70s, this would have been Clark Griswold’s ride.”
Wasn’t the Wagon Queen Family Truckster specifically based on 70s Ford wagons?
It was based on a then-current box Panther Country Squire.
Oops, didn’t realize until it was too late to delete the newest entry that I posted twice on this thread.
So Sorry!
It has the rare “distressed” Di-Noc® synthetically genuine patina’d option.
The sales tagline was 🎵 “If it’s a-PEELIN’, lets start dealin’.🎵
I think it’s the hidden headlights that put me off this one. The photo of the LTD with the regular headlights looks so much more natural. Hidden lights on a wagon just seem – like — no. Keep them for the T-bird or the Lincoln or Merc. A wagon has to work harder than those, it doesn’t have time to mess with headlight doors.
Ah the unshakable 400 2-BBL of the era (of which I owned several). City traffic or highway cruising, 20 MPH or 80 MPH: The one constant; 10 MPG.
Di-Noc may have had its drawbacks, but you never saw a Squire/Colony Park with rusty normal to heavy dings when protected by Di-Noc. That is unless the car was so old that the Di-Noc itself was cracked or peeled.
A comment my cars sometimes received was “so new, it’s still in the shipping crate”.
If the memory of station wagons live for a thousand years, Di-Noc will be the first thing remembered.
I see Di-Noc is often a built-in punch line here, but perhaps it’s time for a Di-Noc CC essay. Founded in Cleveland in the 1920s, it produced all kinds of photographic film/plate items for photographers, printers, engravers, industry, military, and so on. Forty-plus years before today’s Squire was assembled, Di-Noc was already doing the wood-like veneers for Detroit’s dashboards:
There was a heavy duty camper towing package- 460 V8, C6 automatic with extra cooling, Posi rear, HD suspension components, power steering cooler, and four wheel disc brakes. It would out pull an F-150 and was a real terror stoplight to stoplight.
In some sort of strange variation on classic CC effect, a couple of months ago my friend Geoff sent me memories of the family cars of his childhood. And then what should be featured on CC only weeks later, but a ’75 Ford wagon! Strictly speaking, Geoff’s parents’ car was a ’75 Ford Custom 500 “Country Sedan” rather than a “Country Squire”, but hey, it’s still a full-sized Ford wagon of the same vintage, right? Anyway, here are Geoff’s memories of this particular car:
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1975 Ford Custom 500 Country Sedan
Pale yellow exterior
Dark green vinyl interior
V6 engine (I think)*
Thin whitewall tires
Since the purchase of the Country Squire in ’64, two more additions to the family had arrived by the mid-’70s and there had been no departures. As we got older, my two older siblings had each acquired vehicles so situations where we were all in the same vehicle at the same time were infrequent. Still, when it came time to get a new car, a station wagon was still the only option and Father remained resolutely a Ford man. The Squire had been around for over half my life and I confess a degree of melancholy to see its elegant taillights for the last time.
Father was proud of his new acquisition in the late spring or early summer of 1975. He was anxious for an opportunity to share his enthusiasm with his now-much-less- enthusiastic adolescent, teenage, and young adult progeny. Using a trip to Frosty’s on Corydon at Niagara for ice cream cones as bait, he wrangled mom and about six or seven of us for a drive in the new wheels. What could go wrong?
Dad found a parking spot, ignored all requests for the more exotic menu items on offer, and went into the shop for 7 or 8 vanilla soft ice cream cones. I recall there being wasps swarming around a nearby garbage bin, so car windows had been rolled up while we waited. Father emerged carefully transporting two sort of flimsy circular cone trays containing the order. He approached the front passenger-door window, which my mother had partially opened, to pass through the first tray of cones. As he did so, the bottom of the leading cone made contact with the top of the partially lowered window.
As my mother attempted to deal with the combined cone and ice cream debris that was landing in her lap, Father stood transfixed as he watched molten ice cream run down the inside of the window, traverse the “fuzzy caterpillar” gasket and proceed down the inner door cavity. Undoubtedly, memories of a previous ruinous, dairy-related incident harassed his cranial tranquility. The situation released a performance-enhancing-drug-like response. With disappearing lips and a clenched jaw, my mild-mannered father assumed the persona of a ‘roid-altered Soviet discus medalist and hurled the trays with the remaining ice cream cones skyward “frisbee style”. They were last seen heading in a north-easterly direction, spraying their centrifugally-disintegrating contents to the amazement of anyone they might have encountered on re-entry.
The trip home was discussion-free as we admired the quiet purr of the engine; the smooth-riding, vibration-free suspension; and richly-appointed vinyl upholstery of the new family car. Us kids also silently pondered our new respect for Father’s previously-hidden athletic prowess.
The following summer I took my last road trip as part of the family in this vehicle on a tour of North and South Dakota and Minnesota. I confess that an ulterior motive was to go LP shopping in as many record stores and delete bins as I could find. I remember very vividly our family’s discovery of the Sturgis South Dakota Harley Davidson Rally. As we traveled from Rapid City to Sioux Falls we had an endless escort of leather-clad, tattooed bikers and their -ahem – female companions on their deafening, intimidating, chrome-crusted rides. In general, they bore no resemblance to attendees of the Gospel Chapel Easter Conference, and Mother and Father spent most of the time averting their gaze in the restaurants, motels, and stores where we inevitably encountered our unexpected fellow travelers. But I do have fond memories of this “rite of passage” vacation.
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*I questioned the V6, and replied:
To me, the ’75 was a big step backwards, aesthetically, from the ’64. I don’t believe Ford had developed a V6 engine yet at that point – rather, I think it’s likely that the big V8 in the ’75 Ford wagon was a neutered beast that delivered the power of a 6 and the economy of V12. Starting around 1971, manufacturers were required to rate an engine’s HP in Net, rather than Gross, terms. Net involved deducting the parasitic drag and losses caused by the accessories (water pump, alternator, smog pump, power-steering pump) and the drivetrain (transmission and differential), and represented actual power available at the drive wheels. Besides the psychological hit of the lower HP numbers, cars of this era were saddled with increasingly complex carburetors and mysterious emissions controls that affected drivability negatively. ’75 was right on the cusp of catalytic converters too, which meant additional restriction in the exhaust system. All in all, there’s a good reason the automotive era of c. 1973 through the mid-1980s is known as the Malaise Era.
… and Geoff replied:
According to (brother) Paul it was a 400 cu.in. V8 under the hood of this gas-guzzler. No wonder my father had conniptions about the fuel bills. Having seen your in-depth analysis of power plants, I am definitely out of mine.
My Dad moved up to full-sized wagons with a ’69 Country Squire he bought new at Luzurne Motors…in a way he was “copying” an earlier purchase my Uncle made of a new ’69 4 door LTD hardtop right before he graduated college (something he unfortunately repeated in 1984 when my sister bought a new ’84 Pontiac Sunbird, which for my Dad turned out to be the worst car he ever bought. Prior to the ’69 he had a series of smaller wagons: a ’61 and ’63 Rambler, and a ’65 Olds F85 (with the 330V8, his first V8 car).
He followed up with a ’73 Country Sedan, which although a lower model in the pecking order, was much better equipped than the ’69….other than his ’78 Chevy Caprice wagon, it was probably the closest thing to a luxury car he ever owned. Besides being the first car with air conditioning, power locks (but no power windows), and AM/FM stereo radio, it had the trailer towing package and probably some other options I’m forgetting. The ’73 had the 400 2bbl, whereas the ’69 had a 351. Oh, and both had front disc brakes, since Dad also had a ’68 Renault R10 with discs, he only had cars with front discs from that point forward. Also, both wagons were 6 passenger; he preferred the “empty” space in the back we used for storing stuff during our camping trips such that my two youngest sisters could still sleep in the back cargo area….he called it “the well”, and we didn’t need the 8 seat capability.
The Ford was comfortable cruiser for long trips, but my Mother found it cumbersome around town, she referred to it as a “boat”…but as she’s tiny, 4′ 8” and 83 lbs, driving the large car wasn’t much fun for errands in the city. The ’73 was purchased about 6 months before the first gas crisis, and as it got crummy mileage, my Dad tried things to get better mileage, like the electronic ignition kit we installed (then removed when it burned up the coil). He even sold his ’68 Renault R10 so my Mother could drive his “2nd” car, since the R10 was standard and my Mother never was comfortable driving standard. I’m sure our family mirrored lots of others, we liked our gas guzzler but were concerned about availability of fuel for it. He eventually traded the ’73 on a ’78 Chevy Caprice wagon with a 305, which got better mileage, in time for the 2nd gas crisis..
One thing that stands out on the ’73 was the loud turn signals. Maybe because it had the trailer towing package (don’t know if they substituted heavy-duty relays for standard ones in the package?) but you could really hear the loud clicking of the relays when turn signals were on. Don’t remember hearing similar clicking when braking; maybe it was just turn signals. You always had a constant reminder when they were activated, so you wouldn’t drive far with them activated inadvertently.