Much like a same-colored tuxedo hailing from the same era, there’s just something about the color of this 1978 Ford Granada that accurately dates it to the 1970s better than even its exterior styling or a ruffled tuxedo shirt could. Nonetheless, this 1978 Ford Granada is gleefully charming in its powder blue, a color Ford somewhat disappointingly called just “Light Blue” in 1978.
Photo by Chris Green – Photographed in greater Los Angeles, California
This may be the most “Granada” Granada I’ve ever seen! I see sheet metal and think “polyester”. Great catch by Chris, and thanks for sharing it, Brendan.
I confess to having the ruffled tuxedo shirt for my HS graduation picture. Fortunately the tux was black…and I had a lot more hair on my head back then compared to today.
I sure miss the ’70s.👦👦👦👦👦
I’ll chime in admitting having worn the powdered blue to my prom… and yes, the model year of this car (1978) was my graduation year.
This car looks like it’s sporting LTD II wheel covers though, and I particularly like those fancy shoes. ;o) Since it’s a basic stamped wheel cover from Ford, perhaps the Granada came with them too.
Those wheelcovers are right for the Granada. And if there was ever a more nondescript design I am having trouble thinking of it. To go to the trouble to design, manufacture and insert a plastic center piece that was nothing more than plain red plastic was just amazing to me at the time. No wonder so many people popped for the wires. My father’s Monarch had alloy wheels (which come to think of it also had a plain red plastic center cap.)
Those plain red caps were probably used so that a hubcap or alloy wheel center allowed that hubcap or wheel to be used on a Ford AND Mercury.
Ahh 1978! Actually a wonderful time in my life. I liked the 2 door version better, and optioned with a 302, and a 4 speed manual. Had a friend who had one. Was pretty cool mashup between faux “Luxury ” and modest tire smoker.
I graduated a few years earlier; my suit was a silvery-purple.
That’s a lovely picture of a nice looking car in a good color. I don’t know what the sales figures were in 1978 but memory says that Ford really hit the target with the Granada; these cars were everywhere for a while. I think their appeal was that you could have a smaller car with all the comforts of your brougham-battle-cruiser. A bad economy and high gas prices were forcing people to grudgingly acknowledge that the days of the dinosaur-sized car were ending. So smaller cars it was to be for them. However, Detroit had still tended to view small cars as a choice driven by necessity; the guy buying a smaller car sure wasn’t in a position to spring for a bordello-velvet interior. He was going to be a rubber-mat guy.
The Granada changed that. I still think they were handsome cars and very right for their time, but the luxury of hindsight allows me to comment that quality wasn’t even a hobby at Ford in those days….
My best friend in high school traded his high-school-hand-me-down Mercury Comet in on this car’s corporate sibling, the Mercury Monarch. His was also light blue, but a metallic paint. He had a dark blue vinyl top and all of the brougham trimmings. This was a VERY nice car done up that way. His was a ’79, and he opted for the leather (or really nice vinyl) upgraded interior and all the power options. It was a brougham, but smartly sized, and was quite a nice highway cruiser. He did not opt for the V8, instead going with the 250 straight six as he had in his ’74 Comet. It was slow off the line, but once up to cruising speed (with cruise control of course), it was quite comfortable.
We both started work at a rather famous tool manufacturer in Towson Maryland three weeks out of high school (1978), and this was his get-a-new-job-present-to-himself, after commuting in the Comet for a year or so. I went for the 1979 Futura in Midnight Blue to keep some of the broughaminess I had with my hand-me-down-high-school car, a ’73 LTD. While my car was not on an aged platform like his, carpooling to work in his car was much more pleasant, unless we were tooling up through Loch Raven. (I did that this very morning, actually, in my Civic… Great Fun!) On the curvy roads, the Fairmont was a much better handling car.
He came from a family of Mercury fans. I last saw him a decade or so ago, and he was driving a Mercury Marauder! – (my pick BTW if we ever get to the QOTD – Which ’00s big car would you pick?). His cousin drove one of the BEST looking Mercurys ever… an emerald green ’67 to ’69 Cougar.
I agree 100%. Ford broke ground by selling a small car that was attractive and nicely trimmed (if not better). I knew several who moved to these from larger cars and who did not feel like they had downgraded in class or prestige. My own father went from a Continental Mark IV to a really loaded Monarch.
The Volare/Aspen came out a year after these and never came close to hitting that same chord. The styling was less appealing to sensibilities at the time and the decent proportion of strippo versions repelled many of those otherwise brave enough to deal with Chrysler’s increasing issues.
If only the delivery had been as good as the promise. These did not age as well as they should have and did not perform as well as they should have. Dad’s Monarch with the 351 was great to drive but after 1976 or so the 351 went away and the much weaker 302 was the best available.
Popular Mechanics surveyed early Aspen/Volare owners and found an overwhelming number of respondents (broken down by division for some reason; 33.6% of Dodges and 48.8% of Plymouths) owned wagons, something neither the outgoing Dart/Valiant nor the Granada or GM X-bodies offered. Page 92;
https://books.google.com/books?id=ReIDAAAAMBAJ&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false
Here’s the Granada one from May ’75 (page 80)
https://books.google.com/books?id=auIDAAAAMBAJ&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false
I’ve always said that it was Iacocca’s cross-generational hit. Most of his other projects were either aimed squarely at his own generation (LTD, Mark III, both the 1980 and ’90 Imperials) or at those Boomers (Mustang, T115 minivan). But besides being something a middle-aged or older owner could trade out of one of the biggest-ever fullsizes into without feeling they were coming down, it was a car someone pushing 30 and coming out of a beat-up aircooled VW or ’68ish musclecar bought well-used could feel like a real grownup in.
I’m really surprised Ford hadn’t tried this earlier. Or was the American mindset still to ‘move up’ to a bigger car? Offering a lot of options so people could build a car to their taste sure worked for the Mustang; it took them ten years to try luxing up a compact sedan?
I can’t put my finger on why but I just knew that was SoCal before even scrolling down to see the location. Something about the buildings, the foliage, and the lighting…
I can’t say I was ever a (US) Granada fan but I can appreciate seeing one these days. Nice catch.
To me the shot looks like a still from either Charlie’s Angels or any Quinn Martin production, so your pegging it as southern California is profoundly reasonable.
Very likely LA area…I would guess between Ventura Blvd and Mulholland, Studio City or Sherman Oaks.
Reminds me of getting my driver’s license. Dad had a gold 77 Monarch. We went everywhere in that car. His was a base model with the six cylinder engine. I can still smel the interipr just looking at the picture of this car. I wouldn’t mind one with a 302.
Ford has a distinct interior scent that seems to transcend the decades. On certain hot summer days, the interior of my current 2012 Focus smells exactly like the 65 Galaxie that my mom drove back in the 70s.
Was there any good reason to choose a base model Granada over a new Fairmont in 1978? Any measure of performance, roominess, ergonomics etc., where the Granada comes out on top? I know Ford reserved the high-end trims and features to the Granada to make it seem upscale, but that isn’t applicable here. And the Granada from what I understand usually cost more.
When my uncle heard that I was looking at buying a new car his one piece of advice was: DON’T buy a car in it’s first year of production. That was in the early 70s.
Ironically, I bought a 72 Vega and it was NOT nearly as well built as a cousin’s 71.
All correct, but the perception of the Granada was upscale, that of the Fairmont was not. For many buyers, that gave the Granada a cachet that the Fairmont lacked. Granada had the Maverick as its cheapie sibling at introduction, allowing it to be THE Brougham compact.
Also, if you didn’t like Ford’s Better Idea of pushing the Fsirmont’d turn signal stalk to blow the horn…
You hit the nail on the head with this shade of blue being a popular tuxedo color in 1978. Never liked this shade of baby blue that was everywhere in the late ’70’s – early ’80’s.
When I moved to Chicago in 1985 I remember seeing a lot of beater Granadas & Monarchs far more than I saw in the hippie dippie college city of Madison WI, which made me wonder if this Ford Brougham sold better in urban areas.
My father had a 62 Comet in a slightly lighter shade of this blue. So two thumbs up from me. I was a groomsman at my buddies wedding in 1976 and my tux was very much the colour of the Granada. Those were the days. Yes, Lokki Ford sold a lot of Granada’s and they were everywhere and highly rated models along with Mercury’s Monarch. People loved them and drove the wheels off if the cars didn’t crumble from rust in certain parts of North America.
Love this car, but my choice would be the Ghia in 2 tone silver and black.
Bet the interior is dark blue.
In 76 I was looking for a Mustang II but the dealership didn’t have one equipped like I wanted so the owner suggested that we go up to his house to look at the cars he had stored there. I found a Pinto that would be an acceptable “replacement” for the Mustang but to get to it I had to move a Granada. That Granada was a near twin to this car, just being a 76 instead of a 78. It had the 250 six, with column shifted automatic transmission and a bench front seat, which probably made it a bit of a stripper even though it had whitewalls and full wheel covers. It was a nice car, certainly nicer than my father’s baby blue 75 Comet equipped nearly the same way as that Granada. I almost dropped my idea of buying the Pinto and doing a V8 engine swap. Had that Granada been a 2 door I think I would have bought it.
Lightning might not strike twice, but Iacocca does. Exactly ten years after Iacocca began the ‘broughamification’ of the large car market with the LTD, here comes the Granada doing the same thing in the compact field during those fuel-conscious seventies. It was the first smaller car truly for the luxury, brougham market. This was no tarted up Mopar A-body; the Granada/Monarch was a small (but lower-priced) compact aimed squarely at those who wanted something with an upmarket ‘feel’ and appearance, if not outright luxury.
And, as usual with Iacocca’s instincts, it worked. It was exactly the right car at the right time, and Ford made out handsomely, despite the mediocrity of the entire package. Just another great example of Iacocca selling the sizzle, not the steak. For anyone around in the mid-to-late seventies, the Granada and Monarch were everywhere.
But, in another trait of some of Iacocca’s successes, they all disappeared, seemingly having fallen off the face of the earth. A car that at one time you couldn’t miss swinging a dead cat, was nowhere to be found.
The Granada’s success isn’t really due to Iacocca’s instincts. It was 100% a reaction to the market reacting to the energy crisis and the shift to luxury.
The Granada was supposed to be the replacement for the Maverick. Ford was shocked by the take rate of the LDO option on the Maverick and the fact that the energy crisis caused sales of the Maverick to spike. So at the last minute Ford decided to keep the Maverick alive and drop the base models of the Granada to maximize its ability to amortize the costs with the expected lower sales of having 2 “compact” cars.
Yeah, but, c’mon, Iacocca and ‘brougham’ were virtually synonymous and damn near anything that came from Ford in the seventies had that Iacocca brougham touch, including stuff like the Pinto and Mustang II. While the Granada might have originally been intended as a run-of-the-mill replacement for the Maverick, when the styling of the two are compared, the former definitely comes off as more elegant, way more than the Maverick LDO.
Iacocca would have jumped at the chance to move the Granada upmarket and make it seem like it was an ersatz, cheapo, domestic Mercedes. With the fuel crisis, it all just fell into his lap. Circumstances might have led to the Maverick and Granada, but you just know Iacocca was behind it 100%.
Just look at the Chrysler and GM competition. There were upmarket, quasi-luxo versions of the A-body and Nova, but they just didn’t have the ‘look’ of the Granada.
I’ve been seeing a green early model Granada coupe around here lately. I’ve been meaning to get a picture of it if I ever see it when I have my camera handy.
Ah the Granada
What a miserable @#$#ing car that was. My folks had a 1976 Monarch and from the time I was born (1977) till 1986, this was the car I spent most of my ride time in. It was horrible. The car had factory air conditioning but that was only for the folks in the front as the backseat dwellers got none of that cold air. The car was slow(school buses routinely honked at it for going so slow(and my mother was and is not a slow driver). The car was not really that comfortable to sit in (and this is with cloth seats, God knows how even more miserable the cars with vinyl seats were)
In 1986 the car was traded in for a Dodge Aries K wagon which ironically was better in every way. it was comfortable to ride in, the A/C was cold and all could feel it. It also kept up with traffic.
There’s a webpage devoted to the Granada/Monarch/Versailles:
http://www.gmv-registry.com/62.html
Looks like a total of 2,390,335 Granadas, Monarchs, & Versailles were built between 1975 thru 1980.
Cars like this are great cash cows for a company and suppliers.
That’s alotta Granada.
When I was fourteen years old, my older brother got married. He was never a scion of taste and for the groomsmen, we all had the baby blue tuxedos with the ruffled shirt. It was made of the cheapest polyester imaginable.
I tried it on and at the age of fourteen, I thought I was just the coolest dude in town. I recently looked back at the picture. With my long hair (which never worked for me) and that tux, I was not the same person!
Frilly tops and powder blue tuxedos didn’t deter Kansas in 1977. 🙂
The first car I legally drove was a 78 Granada in the beige/brown color combination. It was the drivers education car my high school got from the local Ford dealer. I have had a soft spot for them ever since. Great memories, of an otherwise malaise mobile.
I spent the summer of 1977 in a 75 ( or 76 ) driving around with 3 other teenagers. As a light blue Granada like this was my H. S. driver – ed car as well. It was a 6 cylinder and would stall every time the steering wheel was @ full lock. Which made it “fun” learning how to park, and do K turns.
Almost identical to my Grandma’s 351 powered ‘76 Granada that she owned until 2010. Her powder blue paint was still gleaming even after 34 years of living in Northern BC, though she was always very meticulous with cleaning and maintenance and the car lived most of it’s life in a carport and later an underground parkade.
This sure brought back some memories!
That is really oil burning blue, designed to camouflage the copious oil smoke from the wheezy 6 cylinder. Same for the Fairmonts.
There’s a mint one just like that in my area, same color, see it very seldom, but must be a ’76 with the round headlamps.
I had a 76 with the slow 250 inline 6. It was a rather uncomfortable slow and thirsty car. It was a poor choice of a car when you could drive a big ltd thing was comfortable and faster and actually same gas. The volare was a way better car than a Granada. Way more powerful with a 6 even and easier to work on and more comfortable.
The Granada had a woodgrain dash with almost no gauges. I think it had a speedometer and gas gauge and nothing else. It lasted almost 400000 miles and survived being a cab, two junk yards, hitting 12 mail boxes, having 14 adults in it, going airborne over a railroad crossing, being shot att and being stolen by a drunk who got it stuck in a mud hole. At the end of my ownership it had a cracked head and burned or put 14 quarts of oil in he cooling system. Luckily I had a gas station owner give me pre owned oil for free. Every day 3 or 4 milk jugs of oil. Drove it like that for 6 months as a cab until it had so little compression it would not go up a big hill with out dropping to 15 mph. So I let a Granada owning friend take the tires and Ford hub caps with red dot and put his rusty rims on it and he took a tail light and off to the junk yard barely making it as the tormented six started and locked up 1/2 a mile from the junk yard. It barely coated in. Weirdly the battered Granada with its sagging springs and scrapped body and Oldsmobile trim screwed to the rear fenders hiding massive rust holes and old man bumpers with overrides did not stay. It left its second junkyard and was resurrected by someone.i regard as crazy for doing it. It was once again cab with another engine and new springs and fixed body with new paint. Still had the olds trim.
It looks similar to the one “Seinfeld’s” George Costanza borrowed from his father and drove to mall, where he ignorantly parked in a handicap spot (egged on by Kramer), where said car was then smashed to pieces by an angry mob. The reaction of George when he saw the damaged car was priceless–it was almost an homage to Keith Gordon’s Arnie Cunningham in “Christine” where he returns with Leigh to Darnell’s, only to find that Christine has been pummeled to a mass of crinkled metal.
Found a hilarious pic to illustrate…granted, the Seinfeld car was a Mercury Monarch, but come on–they are basically the same car.
Kramer had a brown 1983 Ford LTD and couldn’t get it running in the parking garage after they lost it. Air conditioner episode, it’s pee-pee time! His car was the one he owned for the whole series.
My dad had this as a company car in 1978, same colour, same everything. The engine was the 351W H.O. and I’m gonna say, at 16 years old and getting to use it every so often, it was a rocket! I kind of thought it was “old man-ish” at the time considering it had this acrylic kind of fabric material for the seats but it was easy to keep clean and actually worked quite well for the rest of the interior. Fake woodgrain-look dash plastics but it was laid out pretty good for controls and knobs etc. I too had the same colour of suit for my curling banquet, kind of reminded me of the suits Texans would wear in movies with gambling and casinos. I always thought it was a Cleveland but was recently advised that Ford didn’t use the 351C in such vehicles. I later had the same 351W H.O. in my 1984 Ford Clubwagon XLT and even though my van was a pig on gas (2 tanks totalled 140L), I don’t believe my dad ever commented about the gas consumption for the Granada. Guess maybe that was because it was a company car and they covered all expenses, even weekends to the lake etc. I even got smacked by a large truck when driving it one time and this clown reversed his vehicle in a one-way restauarant drive-thru so since my father would have gotten introuble if he had to report it ( I was 16, the company car had preferred 25 & over insurance but dad let me drive it anyway). so I ended up learning bodywork for the first time-fiberglass front body items of course. A crash course in such a thing and today, I have a wealth of experience for body work. Neighbour of mine recently advised that he had the 1978 Lincoln Versailles which of course was a dressed up Granada. His was the metallic aqua-marine green as were many of the same year in my city. I wish I had somehow been able to keep my dad’s company car but they sold off the fleet vehicles about 2 years later from what I remember. Nice motor jammed into the engine compartment with barely any space leftover. The 82 N. Yorker 5th Ave. I later bought my son, same style and size of car as the Ford and I guess since I never knew much about pre-70’s cars, to me the Granada and the N.Y etc. were all luxury cars to me.