Tim Finn posted a number of shots from Corvette Day, presumably in the Portland area. I see lots of Corvettes in the background, but what caught my eyes was this ’69 Ford Fairlane sedan. Now if only it had had a six cylinder, we’d really be gushing!
Yes, yes; we love you too, Corvettes (some more than others), but this very fine condition stripper Fairlane is just a lot more…exotic, and CC worthy. When’s the last time you saw one? And a Corvette? 15 minutes ago?
No six cylinder under its hood; it’s actually got a 351, which seems more than a bit unusual for a stripper Fairlane sedan, unless of course it was bought by the FBI or some other governmental agency that could justify that.
A prime example of what is desperately needed at vintage car shows: More examples of what people actually drove back in the day. I got tired of Boomer high school wet dreams a long time ago.
Memories of driving these during my summer job with the Pennsylvania Electric Company back in 69 and 70.
“what is desperately needed at vintage car shows: More examples of what people actually drove back in the day”: you nailed it. At least in name of variety. My plans for when I can afford an antique car is towards something along this lines.
I’ll admit a bit of bias here. I started in the antique vehicle hobby back in 1969 showing a 1937 Buick Special 2-door sedan. At least on a local level, antique car shows were Model T’s, Model A’s, and lots of ordinary sedans (many of which were still in semi-daily driver mode), plus a rare classic or something that today would be the automatic go-to when the term “antique car” is mentioned.
Our local group (Flood City Region AACA) had exactly one noteworthy car, a 1930 Packard Phaeton, custom bodied by Packard, and a nearby brother and sister who’d show up with a 1937 Buick Limited 7 passenger sedan.
“I got tired of Boomer high school wet dreams a long time ago” Well said!
+1K!
Well said!
Back in 1976, a friend bought a retired Canadian National Railways (CN) pool car – a ’68 Ford Custom with a 240-inch 6, 3-on-the-tree, and manual steering, in corporate orange. No radio, if I recall correctly.
That one was as basic as it got.
Sounds awesome.
I think she paid $400, a deal even at the time.
Amen, amen and again I say amen! Variety is always more interesting than seeing (yawn!) someone else’s version of the same car. The visual palate becomes jaded, the mind seeks something different – like a Fairlane in a field of Corvettes.
It is inevitable that the Corvettes will dominate at the car show. If just basic old cars like this were preserved and even restored in the same percentage as Corvettes, they would be a much bigger percentage of the cars on the road. That provides plenty of eye candy, but the safety and ecological impact would be high enough to attract government attention.
I like the way it seems slightly higher-sprung, like a movie stunt car. I had those Hancook Optimos on my old Avalon, and you’d need very high inflation psi to get them to look like that. Almost like it’s going for a bias-ply look with the stiff sidewalls. Maybe helps if it’s got no power steering, or helps handling. I fond this an interesting car and would love to check it out in depth if I saw it at a car show.
Nice old Fairlane, with some good patina on the roof and trunk lid. I saw a lot of them in all their different body styles when I was a kid in the late ‘60’s and early ‘70’s, and I always liked them. While it does stand out among all those Corvettes, it stands out in a good way. It’s not unusual to see an old ‘Vette in great shape, but a Fairlane is a much rarer sight, and it’s great to see an everyday car from the late ‘60’s still on the road.
I bet laying behind someone’s barn is a perfectly good Inline 6 that used to call this car home.
I mean, I guess it could have been ordered by the government, or someone wanting something of a sleeper.
Beautiful car, either way, thanks for the pics!
I like this Fairlane with its patina; a true survivor. I also like the truck in the background of the third picture that is wearing a headache rack … a late 40’s Dodge maybe?
Wow! First off, it seems to me that the 66-69 Fairlane/Torino have gone almost extinct, while GM A bodies and Mopar B bodies (even the sedans) are still seen here and there. I have actually wanted to do a CC on a Fairlane of this general era and never found one. And these sold in really big numbers.
And when we did find one here, wouldn’t we all know it, the same color as my two Fords of this period – that same Ford Lime Gold metallic that graced an ungodly number of Fords from 1967-69 but which has almost never been chosen by restorers.
Finally, I always kind of liked the 66-67 Fairlane, but the 68-69 looked like they tried to squeeze every last ounce of personality out of the thing. These come across to me about as generic as a car could get back then.
Don’t you just love the A pillars on these years? The car is bare-bones, but it has those shining A pillars. So sweet. I remember polishing my dad’s 67 Galaxie 500 and loving those shiny A pillars. I don’t know anyone else making their A pillars look like that, do you?
I like the full sized Fords and Fairlanes of 1968 and 1969. Nice looking cars. Not overly styled and still squarish in style. The hadn’t yet reached the broughamifcation of the 1972 Torinos and 1973 LTD/Galaxie with the fake luxury look and added weight. My Dad had when I was a teenager a 1971 Torino wagon. It was was a 250ci Six with a 3 on the tree. No power steering. It had 29K on it when he bought it in 1977. Last year of the old Fairlane/Torino chassis before the 1972 body style. The 71 Torino was a good car. He had it till the early 1980s. Had the typical Ford paint problems of the era. Ours looked like the picture below except it was light blue with a dark blue interior.
Yes, it’s nice to see something different and rare. Most of these were dissolved by rust and sent to the crusher, so seeing an original survivor like this is an extra special treat. I’ll take it a step further though, and send a shout out for the humble station wagon. The family hauler of choice before the invention of the minivan and the SUV, if your family didn’t own one, at least one of your friend’s family did. Full size wagons were the most popular, but there were a fair number of mid-size offerings as well. In the early 1970’s, you could even get subcompact two-door wagons from Ford (Pinto) and Chevy (Vega).
Totally agree with Syke’s initial comment and most of the sentiment here. It always seems like there’s a trend at vintage car shows. Nowadays it’s boomer dreams of muscle cars and Corvettes. Not too long ago it was Tri-Five Chevys with fuzzy dice hanging from the mirrors and never-ending audio loops of “At the Hop”. But there’s seldom any representation by the real cars driven by real people. It’s the coverage of those that keeps me coming back here to CC 🙂
The local weekly car show has a fine collection of these ‘unpopular’ cars, plus a levening of hot rods, corvettes and others. I’ll have to get over there one of these days and take some pics.
I walk past rows of recently imported Corvettes Camaros Mustangs etc at car shows but will stop at a tidy 60s Toyota Corona or similar or an old Ford Zephyr Morris or similar that were so common back in the day, LHD means bought not built over here and they have become belly button cars.
Same here, Bryce. It’s nice to know some guys can still afford to import stuff, given what our exchange rates have done. But a car that is part of our country’s automotive heritage resonates more with me than a car that was never seen here back then.
My father purchased a brand new, specially ordered, 1970 Fairlane 500 wagon in December 1969 with 302, 3 speed manual transmission, power tailgate, but no other options. Manual steering and brakes. I was 5 1/2 and remember going with him to Don Comer Ford in Portsmouth, VA to pick it up. I remember it took him a few seconds to find the ignition because this was the first year of the interlock. He had the car until March, 1981, with well over 200,000 miles. It was rusted badly and needed a new gearshift, but the engine was still strong. He lacked the patience to teach me to drive it (and I wasn’t the brightest kid anyway), so a family friend let me use his 1979 Buick Century wagon to take my driver’s test with. A year later I got a 1966 Mercury Comet coupe, but only kept it six months. I am very nostalgic towards the Falcons, Fairlanes, Montegos, and Comets of 1966 to 1971.
The color of that Fairlane looks very close to the color of Jack Arnold’s full-size Custom 500 in the Wonder Years.
https://www.imcdb.org/vehicle_65205-Ford-Custom-500-1969.html
This is very nice…couldn’t agree more that these kinds of vehicles deserve attention, though I don’t warn to a 6 with a three on a tree as much as others. Possibly because my memory is framed by my Dad’s new dark blue 69 Ford Custom 2 door (a company car) with a V8 (I assume a 302), auto, radio, armstrong steering (my Mom refused to drive it) and the unusual pairing of black walls and full wheel covers. This Fairlane is so nicely connected to the new full-size styling that year…the horzontal lines in the grille and those memorable jet tailights that had been around in various shapes for so many years, yet somehow still looked like a good fit to the 1969 styling.
Am I the only person here who would like to see a 428 Cobra Jet in that thing with dual exhaust slightly protruding out the back? Stance is good as is, maybe a little bigger rubber however. Didn’t Dirty Harry Callahan drive one of these?
Looks like someone should have oiled their hood hinges.
Well on the other side of the world in late 60s Israel, if you were a FoMoCo kind of person, those (even with the six) were luxury cars; the merely well-off bought Falcons and Mavericks, a Fairlane like this was for the truly wealthy (plebs had to settle for Israeli-assembled Ford Escorts. The middle classes had Cortinas). Above that, there were really only one or two Mercury models (forget Lincoln. I don’t think we had more than one or two Lincolns sold per YEAR back then). Of course, because they were extremely reliable, such cars were driven to the ground so that hardly any survive in Israel. But there are tons of imported Corvettes.
I thus second the emotions voiced by Syke and kiwibryce above.
I love reading these comments about the love for the bare-bones stripper models that were everywhere back in the day and now, rarer than a ‘69 Camaro.
I feel like I’m part of a secret club that Vette and tri-five owners can’t join. Long live the Radio Delete!
How many times did you have someone excitely tell you that you needed to see their collector car, and they show you a Corvette? I have seemed to somehow manage to hide the disappointment in my eyes as I feign interest. It happened just this weekend, as a matter of fact. (At least it was a 1970.)
Another freaking Corvette.
Another freaking Mustang.
Another freaking Beetle.
Another freaking Jeep.
ooooh a Camaro/Firebird/Thunderbird.
When I see a car show with newbies, I glance down streets of similar muscle cars and as they wander among them, I’m out scouting for anything other than those same freaking cars.
So I would have been estatic over this Fairlane. Everything about it is so choice. Yes – my companions would be wondering why I am interested in a pea green sedan, I would be pulling up a chair and silently admiring it.
Thats CC completely. We’re not snobs – we are total nerds.
I’m a Baby Boomer and I have _never_ had nor wanted a ’57 Chevy, etc…..
I used to get chased away from car shows in my 1940’s beaters and ‘A’ Model Fords….
Thankfully, the bullshit “!!!PATINA!!!” craze has made inroads on unpopular vehicles and more and more I see these along with many other daily drivers and grocery getters .
A street sweeper driver at work used to have a really nice all original 1969 Fairlane two door sedan with optional vinyl top, a 6 banger and three speed of course, he bought it and last thing I knew in the late 1990’s he was thinking of junking it because no one wanted it……
-Nate
This is my ’69 Fairlane 500 Sedan. It was my Papaw’s car. All original with a 302 and 3 on the tree.
Seeing that car makes the theme from “The FBI” play inside my head, LOL! Ford was a sponsor and while the agents drove Plain Jane midsize or full size sedans, the end credits always had Inspector Lewis Erskine, played by Efram Zimbalist, Jr., driving a Mustang convertible through the streets of Washington, D.C.! Each new season brought a new Mustang to the end credits.