Attached is a photo of me and my siblings, in at the side of our 1970 Ford LTD Country Squire. I’m the boy in the middle of the front row.
We are all wearing Mayflower moving hats, as my grandfather worked for Mayflower at the time. I believe this is the autumn of 1970, and my youngest sibling, who was born in October of 1970, isn’t in the picture. I remember taking trips to Indianapolis to see my grandparents in this car. We would leave after my dad got home from work, he would put all the seats down and we would sleep while he drove all night, not safe at all, but we all survived.
My lil’ sister, precipitously poised on my bicycle, next to Mom’s brand new ’66 Ford Country Sedan.
My parents, Uncle and his kids at their lake house where we used to have family gatherings. The ’68 Country Squire LTD was ours.
CC Effect: My Dad and I went to Carlisle’s Ford Nationals yesterday and got into the discussion about his ‘60 Dodge Dart Seneca. I thought he bought a 2 door past sedan, citing the preference of parents for 2 door cars. He said he only began to worry about this when I approached 6 and my sister Marcia just turned 3. He said his Dodge was a 4 door sedan, like his ‘56 Chevy 210. Right around the time my sister turned 3, and I was not quite 6, he bought the ‘66 Impala fastback 2 door hardtop.
His memory was better than mine it turns out… here’s a picture of my sister and I (I’m probably like 3 to 4 and my sister looks like she’s around 1. The Dodge is behind the picket fence. It’s hard to tell, but it’s a sedan…. follow up picture coming.
Apologies for the orientation of the photo, he took a picture of a picture when we were texting back and forth.
As he was going through the old pictures, he found this one, and it shows that his car was obviously a 4 door.
I love those wheel covers! I though sure he only had dog dishes on that car.
Again apologies, as this is how it came through in his text to me, and I was unable to rotate it…
I sure do enjoy the CC kids posts!
In the late ‘60s and early ‘70s, my friends parents from up the street had a ‘67 Ford wagon in dark blue with three on the tree. If I remember correctly, the fender badges said 390. This was their only vehicle at the time. Mrs. D was a fairly small woman, but could row through those gears just fine.
Later on, Mr. D. bought a red & white late ‘60s Ford pickup with a camper shell. Sure enough, several of us kids got to go on an overnight trip to the local lake with Mr. D and his son. I can almost taste the bluegill and bass that was cooked up that evening.
To this day, even though I was never a big Ford fan, the sight of any of them from that era puts a smile on my face.
(Handsome looking Dodge Seneca, too, by the way!)
You have raised an interesting point, PRNDL.
The above (partially) pictured ’66 Ford CS was the first car my parents owned with an automatic transmission, power steering & brakes and in dash factory air conditioning.
Quite the step up in automotive status for them!
And yet my petite, small boned “June Cleaver” Mother, even today, claims that she had no problem dealing with manual (non power assisted) steering and “Three On The Tree” manual transmission cars on the various cars that preceded the wagon. I do recall, even as a grade school kid, that Mom liked to “rev it up” in first and second gear before shifting into third gear.
It was just a given, in the late 1950’s and early 1960’s, that many/most family cars weren’t always “loaded”.
Dad taught me, early on, how to use a tire gauge and manual “T-Handle” tire pump as Mom could detect when the front tires were down a few pounds of air (making the car harder to steer).
Dad reluctantly gave in to the power option loaded wagon because both of them (Mom and Dad) were slowly developing arthritis in their hands and knees. Doubtlessly moving from dry, low humidity Oklahoma to the hot & damp climate of New Orleans hastened on their arthritis.
Thanks for the compliment on the Seneca, PRNDL, but I felt like an idiot right after posting it since we were talking about a Country Squire Wagon. I think I got exited when this CC appeared, like 3 seconds after Dad texted me these pictures.
When he and I were on our way to Carlisle, we spotted a ‘57 Nomad, although it was tagged as a Belair on the fin, and I asked him about that. He said, “I’m not sure, as I was never much of a ‘Station Wagon Guy’”. We never had one when I was growing up, and his first car with air conditioning was a ‘73 LTD. Weird, because he was never a Ford guy (or Dodge for that matter). We had mostly GM products; Chevys for the most part in those early years.
One of the neighborhood moms, “Miss Betty” had a white ‘64 Country Sedan, and drove us around a lot in that. Riding around in the way-back was so much fun. It was all fun and games until one day when we were broadsided by a ‘62 Ford Custom Taxi, spinning the wagon around and ending up with the way-back hanging partially over a bridge. Kids being kids, we asked, “Can we do it again?!?!” Miss Betty, still white knuckled to the steering wheel, did not find that funny at all.
The Country Squire Alumni Club is where all the best people are found. 😁
Mom and Dad were SO very proud of their “Suburban Status Symbol” Ford station wagon!
One may have to be “of a certain age” to understand this.
This looks alot like most of my own old family-car pics, photos that just incidentally included the car in the background but today the car draws my attention as much as the intended subject(s). My folks did take some photos of their new ’66 Dodge Polara wagon (it looks odd to me seeing this car all new with shiny paint; I remember it only when it was faded and dented), but their other cars appear only as background fodder.
Just about every outdoor family picture my Father ever took had one of our cars in the background.
When Dad started to focus his camera the entire family herded towards the car; just out of habit and instinct.
Another Dad picture: Your grumpy scribbler (me), his cat, Mom’s new Country Sedan.
My brother, in the picture, and I always sat in the way back, those side facing seats were horrible, but, sure made fighting with each other easier!