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My First Mustang
By “Dave Parts”

I was just a kid in the third grade, I rode my bike to school and as I approached one day, I noticed a crowd of adults gathered around in the parking lot. Being suspicious of adults that caught my attention right off but they were looking at a car, an orange car. I had never seen an orange car before so I moved a little closer to get a better look. The first thing that caught my attention were the lines, it was low and sleek. The roofline went all the way back sloping down to the triple taillights.

I was born in the generation of tailfins, mudflaps and curb feelers, of rounded bulbous taillights, and gaudy chrome monster hood ornaments. I was just a kid in the third grade but I learned something that day, something the whole world came to learn, that cars could be… what’s the word I’m looking for? Cool! Yeah, that’s cars could be cool. Of course there had always been cool cars just that regular people didn’t get to drive them. Movie stars got killed in fancy exotics and then there were the Rolls Royce’s from the movies.

Then there was Mustang, the first really cool car. A car that a schoolteacher could afford and movie stars wanted to be seen in. Soon James Bond and Steve McQueen would drive themselves into history in a car that started out in life as a glorified Ford Falcon. The 50’s roundness was hammered flat, the overstuffed upholstery was replaced by the bucket seat, it was modeled to look like a sports car. It’s success made it become a sports car. Lee Ioccoa saw the first prototype Mustang Fastback and approved it for production on the spot.

My dad, God bless him was a man of his times, he drove a 1959 Chrysler Imperial and thought it was cool car. A car that set the standard for ugly even by 1960’s standards but dad loved ugly cars the same way some people love ugly dogs. Dad loved them both and in 1965 he traded in the 2 ton Imperial sled on a brand-new 1965 Buick duce and a quarter. While crowds were deluging Ford dealerships and fistfights were breaking out over the purchase of new Mustangs Dad quietly bought his Buick in quiet GM dealership, no lines, no crowds, no fist fights.

But if you didn’t live through it you couldn’t imagine the earthquake created by the Mustang. People were surrounded in parking lots being peppered with questions. An International House of pancakes had a sign that read, were selling them like Mustangs. Songs were sung about them and my Trix cereal box advertised, “Hey Kids! Free toy Mustang car inside!” No one sang to the lonely Chrysler Imperial and no cereal boxes ever offered. “Hey Kids! Free toy Buick Electra 225 inside!!”

In Junior High School Mr. Strong was my shop teacher, I was proud of that because he was the coolest teacher in the whole school. He had a mustache and played the banjo at Shakey’s Pizza on the weekends but he drove a 1966 Shelby Mustang and to us middle schoolers that was the epitome of cool. A mustache and a Mustang, we would wait for him to come out just to listen to him crank the car and then drive off and if we were lucky, he would bark the tires at the top of the street and we could hear him going through the gears long after he had disappeared from our sight.

Nobody paid any attention to dad in the duce and a quarter and in 1967 dad bought mom a new car. A 1965 Chevrolet Impala station wagon, Ooh, now we’re styling!
For those of you unfamiliar, try to imagine a shoebox on 4 rubber tires with a 6-cylinder engine 2-bench seats and one AM radio. Dad assumed Mother preferred bland over ugly but even bland embellished its plainness, it was the Amishmobile.

In 1968 Steve McQueen drove a fastback with a 4-speed and a big block 390 into movie history with the most famous car chase ever filmed. Counting up the You Tube videos almost a quarter million views on a 50 year old mediocre movie where no one is sure, if its the car make that makes the movie star cool? Or does the movie star make the car look cool? McQueen’s passion for racecar driving made him insist that he drive all the scenes himself and that they all be filmed at full speed. The remake of Gone in Sixty Seconds made with Nicholas Cage the scenes were filmed at half speed and then the film was sped up with zero views on YouTube.

But McQueen’s Bullit sparked its own industry, Ford refused to pony up advertising money (excuse the pun) so McQueen’s Bullit lacked the running horse and corral on the grill. But come on, Bullit was supposed to be a rebel street cop who played by his own rules what other car could he drive? A 65 Buick duce and a quarter? Or a Chevy Impala station wagon? In the years since, Ford has produced another Bullit Mustang and Bullit wheels are the rage and the most popular color for a 1968 fastback, formally known as emerald green is now affectionately known as Bullit green.

Ten minutes of celluloid changed the automotive world forever, in a car that had already changed the automotive world. Watch the bullit chase scene but watch the other cars on the road, look at the cars parked on the streets and in the parking lots.
That Charger was pretty cool but next to that Mustang it looked like something my Dad would buy.

In 1971 James Bond took the Las Vegas police department on a chase through the Vegas strip and with the help of Joey Chitwood showed a Mustang could be cool even on two wheels. Like Bullit the coolness race was run between star and car. I sat in the theater that day soon to get my learners permit and thought, I wish I could have a car like that! But at 15? With paper route wages?

My older sister had sworn me to secrecy; she was 17 and had just attended the secret coven of teenage girls. Apparently, they don’t just accidentally tear up their father’s cars at all. It all part of a well orchestrated plot, by doing damage to dad’s ride the financial prospects of getting their own car are made brighter. But now I have spilled the beans on the fiendishly cleaver conspiracy. Even at the time, I understood and sympathized it’s awfully hard to be 17 and try to look cool driving a two ton duce and a quarter or the Amishmobile.

So then it was agreed, my dad would go to the used car auction and see what he could find in the way of a practical car. Oh God, how my heart fell on that word practical! I loved my dad but he thought cars with tail fins were cool and the absence of any style what so ever meant practical. I would have my driver’s license in 5 months and would probably take my test in what ever he brought home. That one word to me did what that one spark did to the Hindinburg. Likewise my sister knew what that code word “Practical” meant as well.

We begged to be allowed to accompany them to the auction, Dad would hear of it, he would allow no electioneering or campaigning and ordered us to stay home. So we sat there and we waited, “maybe it will be alright” I said, trying to break the tension and trying to be positive. In my own mind it was just a false hope, probably the best thing he could bring home was nothing.

“You’re kidding right?” she answered, “You’ve seen what he buys for himself and for mom what would that lead you to expect that he’d buy for us?”

My mind whirled with visions of rusted Studebakers or Dodge Darts or even an old-rusted 1959 Chrysler Imperial. Dad pulling in to the drive way and getting out smiling to tell us “Now kids, that’s a cool car and practical let me tell you!”

When they got home it was already dark, we saw two sets of headlights pull up the driveway towards the garage in the back yard. With our hearts in our throats we dashed to the back door filled with fear and excitement. With just the one 100 watt back porch yellow light bulb to see by we stared in shocked disbelief. Dad was getting out of a 1968 Maroon Ford Mustang coupe. A 289 V8 with a shift o matic transmission, black interior and an AM radio. No air conditioning with a little front end damage but to me it was the coolest car in the whole world even before we found three 38-caliber bullets in the glove box. Could it get any cooler? Maybe Steve McQueen left them there.

What made dad do it? How could this man, the world’s worst judge of automotive iron, with no perception of cool what so ever buy a car that they wrote songs about. Maybe it was just dumb luck or maybe dad was cooler than he let on, maybe it was a fathers love. Dumb luck? Maybe, father’s love probably, because dad spent the next 40 years of his life in some of the worst GM badges ever made. His last car, his retirement car as he called it, a big square Oldsmobile 98. “Son,” he said, “That’s a nice car.”

Within hours, my sister and I were already fighting over the Mustang, “Mom! That little moron is running all the gas out of it!” I would crank the car and drive from the top of the drive way to the garage in the back yard then do a 3 point turn and repeat the process in reverse. She was right of course because I didn’t have a license that was all I could do and I was a stupid little moron, but I was a cool stupid little moron. I was 15 and had a Mustang to drive even if it was only just in the back yard. I was a backyard Steve McQueen.

“Now Dad, that’s a nice car!”

By DAVE PARTS