(first posted 5/3/2013) At last, a Mercury that I would have been proud to ride high and mighty in. This is almost unbelievable: the rear section of the Palomar wagon’s roof slid forward, like the Studebaker Wagonaire, but simultaneously, the forward-facing third row seat elevated like a pope-mobile, and a windshield even popped up, from somewhere. A genuine flying-bridge Mercruiser. Now this would have been the car to take the Niedermeyers to Colorado!
Here’s a side view. Curiously, it’s a two-door hardtop wagon, which only adds to its exotic appeal. It looks rather Chrysler-ish. And I’m wondering if the Mercury designers stole this idea from the Bulgemobile Company.
![Mercury Palomar 1961 [1]](https://i0.wp.com/www.curbsideclassic.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/Mercury-Palomar-1961-1.jpg)
The front is almost a dead ringer for the 1962 Dodge Custom 880, except those headlights which the Ford stylists filched from a German Taunus, undoubtedly.
According to carstyling.ru, the Palomar was considered for 1966 production, but some dull executives gave it the thumbs down. Booh! Where’s the sense of adventure? Of course, maybe Studebaker’s less than stellar success with the Wagonaire might have had some influence. Sadly, the Palomar was destroyed in a fire that engulfed the Ford Rotunda building.
That’s quite a cool wagon but I can see why it didnt see production all those clever touches would have cost huge bux and passing that on to the punter doesn’t always work well
For the Chrysler-ish look, could be possible then it could had been designed by Elmwood Engel before he moved to Chrysler or Don Kopka who arrived at Ford after he worked at Chrysler? 😉
+1 for Elmwood!
Elmwood’s influence can be seen in that spear of Di-Noc on the side. I fear that Auto Correct has struck again.
I’m pretty sure Elmwood Engel designed the Turing sedan.
I met Elmwood’s brother when I raced little cars as a Cub Scout.
They even named the racing series after him.
A perfect example of something too good to be true.
From the front three quarter view it almost looks like it has a plexi roof.
And nearly like it has plexi pillars too, they are so thin
A bit of Mercuryphobia!I like them today but as a kid only 67/68 Cougars and Cyclones did it for me.
My guess is the wind foil slid rearward on tracks and then extended out the rear like a clear rear facing sunshade.
This is a cool car. Mew had a ’66 Vista Cruiser and I was in love with looking out the tinted roof panels and playing with the 2nd row sun visors.
Love the Bulgemobile references and looking at all that glass in the rear, it’s almost McCall-like in it’s execution. I can see little children receiving 2nd and 3rd degree burns during a high sky summer afternoon drive with Mom and Dad. Bring plenty of Coppertone!
I think Chevy did something like this with their Trail Blazer a few years back and I recall it was not on the market but for a short period of time.
Whoops.
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Actually one of my uncles had a 59 Mercury wagon that had very similar lines and I believe it was a 4 door hardtop. Front and rear detail was different but the overall lines were much the same as the above illustration. There was no sliding rear roof of course but it was a beautiful wagon in my eyes. It made my dad’s 56 Ford 2 door ranch wagon look like a truck.
The side trim is kinda ’61 Chevyish. However, the horizontal ribs/lines in the last photo (added later?) remind me of the Ford Flex, or less optimistically the Lincoln Blackwood.
Named for an observatory– that’s quite fitting.
Truly a car suited only for one very limited use: take the kids swimming at the country club in the summer months. Too bad it was not produced; it could have been the predecessor to the ’82/’85 Riviera convertible as cars having utility only as country club cruisers.
Mercury knew two door hardtop wagons. Only Mercury, during ’57 through ’59, had production versions of the unique body style.
Like this.
I knew of the hardtop 4-door wagons available, but had forgotten the 2-door (if I had ever seen it before at all). That’s fantastic! (Shame it wasn’t produced on any vehicles other than the somewhat visually challenging ’59 Merc…)
Late, but here. I see this car and think 2 things.
First, I hear Cab Calloway singing the intro to The Jumpin Jive “Palomar, Shalimar, Swanee Shore, let me dig that jive once more.” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_8yGGtVKrD8.
Second, I see an early 60s Chrysler hardtop wagon. The roofline is almost identical. As much as I love them, it would have been woefully out of date by 1966.
The rear quarter window and tailgate track on the Palomar do look alot like those on the 1971-76 GM clamshell wagons though
That’s was my first thought 71 impala clamshell
Habemus Palomar!
I’m more curious about the name…Palomar? Like the observatory? Oh I see. And as an additional option you can have a hydraulically raised & lowered telescope under the retractible roof…
Wow never seen that before.
A much smaller version was marketed as the Easy-Bake Oven. If the sun hit that Palomar, it may have caused the rotunda fire.
The Pontiac Stinger (1989 concept car) also had the rising rear seat thing, it could be raised 15″ when needed (for whatever reason it might be needed, 3:45 in video below). Lots of other goofy features and general ’80s LOLiness in this promo, along with general GM cluelessness about how to attract young people to their cars.
Did they really say “attitude gyro”?
I kind of like a lot of the features, especially the seat cushions that turn into beach chairs. The exterior styling, though . . ..
I dunno, do you really want all that sand getting in your car when you reinsert the beach chairs into the main seats? Also, that T-roof would be nice if only you could make the panels disappear when not needed as in the video. The corded “long distance cellular phones” look dated, but Pontiac was 20+ years ahead of Honda with the built-in vacuum cleaner.
I really like the Stinger – hopefully it was 4WD.
Not sure if I would have ordered all of those accessories (garden hose?) but the concept and ideas were way ahead of their time.
By 1966 it was sadly passe .
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I love it, too bad none made it .
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-Nate
Yep, but by 67 they had their wagon shizzle together. hehehe
Yes, rather! Especially the quarter glass/wagon glass/wayback glass, which bears much more than a passing resemblance to ’60-’64 DPCD big wagons (as on this ’63 Dodge 880).
Mmmm…I donno about that. The new-for-’61 oval Taunus headlamps you can see here; notice the curved upper and lower perimeter of each lamp. Another view of the Palomar on that carstyling.ru site shows its lamps had straight-line upper and lower perimeters—looks to me much more like the usual US quad round ø5-3/4″ sealed-beam headlamps with oval cover lenses over the two lamps on each side.
Actually, I would’ve pegged it as a General 62 bubbletop with extra roof
On closer inspection, you’re right about the headlights, as usual!
Here is a picture that clearly shows the dual headlights:
Yeah, what would happen if actual Ford Taunus headlamps were fitted instead of those US quad round headlamps, hmm? Would the Americans say, ‘Hey, I wanna my car to have those far-out space age headlamps!’
There are varying dates on this car, with some claiming it to be from 1961, but it was shown in Chicago in 1962.
“The 1961 Mercury Palomar (named after Mt. Palomar where the largest telescope in the world at the time was located) was Ford Motor Company’s first station wagon concept car. The silver-blue fiberglass prototype had a some very atypical features; it was a four-door hardtop on the driver’s side only with “suicide” type doors, had a so-called flying bridge third passenger seat inspired by boats, and a sliding roof section. This design was proposed as a possible 1966 Mercury, but unfortunately the design got no further than this singular concept car. In fact, it was never seriously considered for production. The Palomar was on display inside Ford’s Rotunda building for some months and is believed to have been destroyed when a fire engulfed the building on November 9, 1962.”
I would love to have seen the driver’s side door treatment if true.
Just ’cause someone has to say it for the record, his name was ELWOOD.
True, but it sure made for a good laugh. If I were a better carver, I’d make up a Pinewood Derby car that looked like the Palomar in honor of the side comments!
And now we know where Brooks Stevens stole the wagonaire roof idea from. Studebaker then just used kids to stand up back there in the advertisements, instead of the seated, flying-bridge concept!
Local news stations loved Stude Wagonaires. Our local CBS affiliate had one they used when they made history in 64 by broadcasting a tornado live. It’s in the video on youtube. April 3rd 1964. My mom was working at the base when it came thru.
Despite the fact that the front fenders are very similar to the ’61 Buick, the character line is very similar to the ’62 Chevy, the roofline looks like a bubbletop GM wagon, and all that glass would be murder to keep cool…I really like it!