There was a legend that in '66 when Mercury had their funny car team on the road they equipped Dyno Don and Fast Eddie with custom Mercury station wagons with non-standard options like bucket front seats, etc. Any truth to this? And were there other "factory" tow cars out there as well?
....................................... The sexy Mercury "mounting' that Shivel-lay from the back!!!! That way he don't hafta look at her ugly face!! Cool picture!! 6sally6
Back then you didn't always have to have a factory race team sponsorship to get a one-off. I had the factory (factories) build me some pretty radical cars in the 60s and 70s. In 1970, my brother-in-law took the options list and ordered a Chevy, 454cid, 4-speed. bucket seat, Kingswood station wagon....... red with the 'woodie' trim. It had the SuperSport badging but I'm told there weren't supposed to be any....... so I'm not sure if he slapped 'em on there himself. Also in the 70s, I "optioned" a top-of-the-line Chevy Nova (I think it was called a 'Concourse"?) with all the good bits. I wanted an American "Mercedi-aguar" with bucket seats, 4-doors, 4-speed, 350cid, 4-barrel, dual pipes, and the rest of the mechanical upgrade items. The dealer sales manager insisted on a big deposit because of the 'freak' I ordered. But 5 weeks later, when it showed up, more than one dude tried to buy it out from under me. One of my best friends was my salesman so that wasn't likely to happen. Nowadays everybody sells super 4-doors, but back then it was unheard of. I'm sure that in the 60s you could "have it your way" even easier than the 2 examples I've given.
Both of your examples were regular production options, listed in the sales literature. May not have been commonly ordered, but they were available. Ford did offer the bucket seats in a Country Squire around 63-64. I don’t think that one made the literature, though.
Back then you could order just about anything with the right connections! I would like to hear about other unusual cars that were ordered. My favorite one is the 1970 Torino wagon with the 429 Cobra Jet.
Nothing too earth shaking, but a friend now owns a factory correct 396 Camaro that was ordered yellow with a green interior by it's first owner, a John Deere exec.
That 1966 Pontiac Ventura four door that @racer-x has been hinting at would make a pretty cool tow car, claims it is a 3×2/421/4 speed car.
When I saw the two wagons, if I can recall 1966 well enough, they were both black with the fake wood trim outside. Both cars were on flat trailers. I recall trying to get over there during the SuperNationals (!) but I never did. It made a pretty outstanding impression in amongst the angle trucks, pickups and half-semis. But sorry, I didn't even own a camera back then. Dad had a Brownie, though. 620 negatives forever!
Dick Landy had a classy '65(?) Dodge wagon. Cragars & whitewalls somehow work. I don't think it was special ordered, though.
Tv Tommy through the years, in no particular order. https://www.nhra.com/news/2010/tommy-s-towing-toys
Back in the mid 1980's some enterprising Corvette engineers hotrodded a Caprice wagon with a Corvette drivetrain to keep up with their Corvette test cars, complete with the Corvette wheels and tires.
Hey D, Nice array of the Ivo team & crew push/tow car scene. But, you forgot the first one that was the most famous, due to the fact that no one else was doing cross country road trips for drag racing sponsorships. Sure, others towed across the country for a big Westcoast event starting in 1959, but these two guys started the whole pro touring events and attractions. Road Kings? Ha! True to the club's title meanings... "Ever since Don Prudhomme was part of Tommy Ivo’s crew and friend, My brother and I have always liked the progress of his career. It was one long, successful, competitive career. He was seen as an integral part of each of Tommy Ivo’s Buick FED race cars. He was even part of the first professional USA road tour of the major dragstrips with the Ivo Twin Buick FED." https://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/threads/new-prudhomme-book-excerpt.1209740/#post-13796420 “Then, as history has told us, he and Don Prudhomme went on a cross country road trip to start the whole touring thing for the big time, big name drag racers, first from So Cal, then from all over. They were getting paid to tour and show up at various drag strips in the USA.” Jnaki Here is a film that I had recorded of one of the earliest power runs at Lion's Dragstrip in the 1959-60 era. The Ivo twin sound was provided by another old 1320 hot rod/racer. Thanks, Lee 1959 Twin with Buick push/tow car As a Buick fanatic from the early days, he always had a Buick tow car/push vehicle. But, for this long distance road trip across the USA, he snagged a Cadillac sponsorship. Cruising in style... 1960 awards... Ivo Buick push/tow car 1959-60 Cadillac in the Ivo pits area.
I'd like to think that a car built for and owned by Bill Mitchell himself would be a pretty special piece, especially since it was looked over by "visiting" or Vacationing" Chevy engineers where it was raced. Somebody hiding a fuelie 327 backed by a 4-speed, maybe.
When my Dad bought his tricked-out 389 Tri-Power Bonneville, at the end of the options list was a box marked "Special Paint". We were told it meant you could have your car painted any GM color. For a whopping $22. He paid it and got the car painted a non-Pontiac silver....
Sounds like my car...it's a tripower Bonneville, and in the color blank on the trim tag it says "special."
I'd say that the wagon that was in the photo that Marty posted in post 16 is the car or one of that Spiritof67 asked about in post 1. It wasn't uncommon to special order a car in the 60's when I was in Vietnam late in 68 one of my best buds was Rick Danzi from Silver Springs Md who's dad managed an Olds Dealership in DC. His dad sent him the info and order forms from Olds to mark off the boxes for a new car for when he got back to the world. I had liked the looks of the 68 Cutlass and loved the look of the 69 and with his paperwork wrote down the list of things I wanted on the car, First go with a W31 was flat too spendy so I went with a 310 hp 350, M 21 4 speed, 3.42 Posi and an AM-FM Multiplex radio with a platinum silver and black bench color combo. Black wall tires, poverty caps and only those options. Probably the shortest option list on any 69 Cutlass that Williams and Swanson sold that year. When I was running it at Little River in spring of 69 = Ft Hood boy, I ran in G stock and a couple of times had to face a 62 Chevy wagon with a 409.,4 speed and quick gears in the finals and that car had a back quarter window full of national record holder stickers. I never knew if it was an assembled to run in stock class rig or factory ordered that way but he blew my doors off every time. Still if you knew a sales person who would work with you and you had access to the lists that the dealer ordered off you could come up with some real interesting combos as some of the others said. There were a few sleeper street racers in this area that had what you might call out of context engine drive train body combos in the 60's because someone figured out how to put together a light weight car with a big engine that didn't brag about it's self.
why the heck would anybody want a bucket seat set up especially with a consul over the bench seat? i love the bench seat in my 41 cad and my OT 68 impala… (maybe i should keep my 56 pontiac project car that my dad bought in 1965.)