58 (?) Merc Questin...

[JAFFA]

Ok, ive been checkin around some pages for 58 mercury pics, i love this cars appearance, but what i have noticed is there seems to be a variety of taillights..

They all said 1958 Montclair, but for what ive seen, there are three different taillights designs, have i been seeing concept/prototype pics??

This onealso have different side-trim..

[MrObsessive]

Ok, ive been checkin around some pages for 58 mercury pics, i love this cars appearance, but what i have noticed is there seems to be a variety of taillights..

They all said 1958 Montclair, but for what ive seen, there are three different taillights designs, have i been seeing concept/prototype pics??

This onealso have different side-trim..

The top photo is what looks to be a Turnpike Cruiser (a '57), and that one would have glitzier tailights than the rest of the Mercury line------given that it was the top of the line back then. If it were a '58 it would have the "rocket spear" inset in the rear fender.

The other two below are definitely '58's.....not much changed between the two years 'cept for front ends and tailight/bumpers.

I'm a little fuzzy on 1957-58 Mercs as they were a weeeeee bit before my time!

Someone else who would remember when they were new could probably give more info.

[mr moto]

Here's a pretty cool reference. The 1958 Mercury brochure on the the Old Car Manual Project website. This stuff is great entertainment in addition to reference!

http://www.tocmp.com/brochures/Mercury/1958/index.htm

I agree with Mr Obsessive that the top photo is a '57 and it's definitely a Turnpike Cruiser (the rear window is a dead giveaway). I believe there were a few '58 Cruisers made but I don't know much about them. It was just about a '57 only model and was also available as a convertible that had a continental kit as standard!

I couldn't resist adding this pic of the '57 Cruiser from the Owner's Manual. Check out the antennas!

Edited December 5, 2007 by mr moto

[bigphoto]

The top pic is a 57 however the car next to it is a 58

and the differences were the Monterey and the Montclair

version you may want to google image by year and model

vs year and make.

[MrObsessive]

Funny thing is, I don't remember seeing many '57-58 Mercurys of any sort back in the '60's when they would have been mostly on the road. I noticed a LOT of '50's cars as a little kid in the '60's but Mercs seemed rather scarce. Their shapes were certainly distinctive enough to be anything but forgettable!

From what I was told by my Dad, 1958 was a bad year for the country in general due to a nasty but curt recession. So there wouldn't have been much of '58 anything to go round I guess compared to other years.

[MrObsessive]

Pure Rocketship '50's!!

Sigh........... Wouldn't it be nice if the car designers today could have free reign with designs as they did back then?..............Good or bad! Instead we get super boring designs (although that IS starting to change) that seem to hang on for years.

Pity.

[Raul_Perez]

The best website I've seen for stock and custom car pictures is www.carnut.com They have an index that breaks the pictures down by make and year. Once you make that selection, then they're listed by model and special features.

If you can't find a picture of a particular year or model there, then it probably isn't available...

Good luck,

Raul

[ramonesblues]

i had a cousin that had a '59 turnpike cruiser, with 26 inch glass packs. What a rap it had!! This was in '62 when I was a freshman in high school.

[JAFFA]

Thx for the replies!

[bobss396]

1958-1960 were big "flop" years for the big 3 car makers as compared to the great success of the 1955-1957 years. Look at the sales numbers for the end of the decade, they dropped off quite a bit. I'm not sure what the economy was like, but 1960-1961 were the first years of the compact "ecomony" cars.

Bob

[Guest rick r]

One of the problems with the '58 new-car season, that had nothing to do with the recession, was the institution of the Federally mandated window price sticker. To that point the buyer could pound out as good a deal as he could, and the dealers were sometimes really flexible.

The start of the Monroney sticker also helped kill the buzz for the Edsel, which was already released a year late because of a scarcity of qualified dealers. Here was this new car, kinda flashy, with a new dealer network, and now it had a price sign, too! Too many people resisted the urge...

Edited December 8, 2007 by rick r