@jack-dodds, that roof harkens back to the Cougar Tony mentioned.
Yes I recall that roof back in the day. I thought it looked great on that size Cougar and complemented its styling well. The 302 was a fast car for that era.
@chris I agree wholeheartedly about the body cladding era....it looked just horrible and cheapened the car's appearance. Pontiac was the worst offender for this IMO.
Yes, I didn't mention Pontiac, but Grand Ams & Bonnevilles got way out of hand! I recall seeing many with front "chins" torn, cracked & split because careless drivers would destroy them on parking lot cement stops.
@perrone1 Yes, that "square C-pillar" was a Mercury design cue for years. I picked up on that when looking at these modern proposals.
That teal Cougar reminds me of just how hideous all that "body cladding" became. Factory & aftermarket ground effects, rocker fins, deck-spoilers, wale tails, lower front air dams, etc... all became common place on many American cars from about 1982-1996.
My 1984 T/A H.O. looked good (IMO ) but to see all this "boy-racer-crap" on Oldsmobiles, Mercurys, and even some Cadillacs was a bit much!
We bought a new 1997 Ford Thunderbird V8 without any "cladding." By then, I was sick of it!
PS
- We found out, the hard way, that Ford had placed the air intakes so low on these V8s that driving through a rainstorm might cause "water ingestion" and consequently ruin the engine. This happened to my wife. With less than 30K miles, the engine was now toast. Insurance repaired everything and filed class action lawsuits against Ford.... but that's a different story.
Yes sir! Great account of yesteryear and the crazy stuff auto-philes had to endure.
