The same word can conjure up different images for different people. Take ‘Bermuda’, for example. A sun worshiper immediately thinks of pink-sand beaches and tropical paradise. To clothiers and white-belt wearing geezers, Bermuda means a pair of shorts. Farmers have visions of big Bermuda onions. And for Car Guys like us, the name recalls the one-year-only, top-of-the-line station wagon from that most unfortunate of of nameplates, Edsel.
Aaron Severson has covered the Edsel story far better than I could here, so I shall offer only a brief precis for the uninitiated: (Mis) conceived as a Dodge-, DeSoto-, Olds- and Buick-fighter by the Dearborn powers that be, the poor Edsel never stood a chance. Mostly what it did was cannibalize sales from Mercury at the upper end of the model range, and Ford at the lower. The brand was was so unloved that even Ford President Robert McNamara confided to an associate at its introduction that the machinery to phase it out was already running! Talk about no respect.
Since there were no dedicated Edsel plants, they were built alongside both Fords (for the Ford-based Pacer and Ranger) and Mercurys (Citation and Corsair), causing the assembler to have to interrupt his routine, and sometimes to forget to install some parts. The Edsel also suffered from parts that wouldn’t fit together correctly. Hampered with controversial styling, a dreadful name and dubious features like different-just-to-be-different Teletouch drive, the Edsel was indeed euthanized in its third model year, living it out as a Ford whose disguise was thinner than 99-cent store gravy. The inaugural 1958 model is the one most people think of when the marque is mentioned–that’s the one with the free-standing horse-collar grille, officially known as the “impact ring”, and boomerang taillights, and of which our splendidly restored feature car is an example.
Photo courtesy of flickr commons
I shot this wagon at the Vintage Travel Trailer Show during Palm Springs’ annual Modernism Week. This particular example is a nine-passenger version, making it the rarest of 1958 Edsel wagons; only 779 were produced, of which maybe a dozen survive. Like all 1958 Edsel wagons, it shares its body with the Ford wagons, including its 116-inch wheelbase, and measures 205.4 inches in length. This particular example has the one-year-only Teletouch push-button automatic transmission (cool feature: a series of planetary gears in the steering column keeps the buttons stationary as the wheel turns) mated to the E400 5.9-liter V8 and Edsel-exclusive floating-drum speedometer (it glows when a preset speed limit is reached). Our featured Bermuda also sports the optional ($27.70) spinner wheel covers and back-up lights (an $8.50 option).
The Bermuda was a 1958-only model; the following year, the Villager took over as Edsel’s lone wagon offering. While unappreciated in its day, the Bermuda is a sought-after collector car today as one of the rarest models of a rare brand.
And besides, you’ve just gotta love those tail lamps…
I like the Edsel, but was never wild about the crazy tri-tone on the Bermuda. However, this one is downright pretty. ☺
It does look quite fetching on this example, doesn’t it? Great shade of turquoise too.
I have a portfolio of images of this car, shot back in 2008, at
http://automotivetraveler.fotki.com/1958-edsel-bermuda-/?view=roll
I can’t help but love it. I suppose it was the Ford Flex Platinum in white pearl with chrome 20″ wheels of its day. It always amazes me how Detroit went from things like this to the clean/restrained models of five years later.
I often wonder what would have happened to Edsel if Robert McNamara had kept his mitts off. He, more than anything else (including sales that weren’t up to expectations) was the main reason for the marque’s demise. Can you imagine an automaker today already laying in plans to discontinue a marque a couple of months after its been introduced?
Edsel, more than any other brand, suffered from “Hollywood box-office syndrome”: When the opening weekend (aka, the introduction thru Christmas season) performed well under predictions, it’s branded a failure. Move on, nothing to see here.
And yes, the Falcon (McNamara’s baby) succeeded – in stealing sales from the full-size (high profit) line.
Agreed. While McNamara’s concern with brand proliferation was probably correct, that reasoning for killing Edsel was probably wrong. Edsel actually sold pretty well for a new brand in its debut year which was also a recession year for the car industry as a whole.
In the big picture, all of Ford’s mid and top price brands were suffering at the hands of GM and Chrysler’s Chrysler branded products, a situation that didn’t really improve until the 1970s. The idea that they could have been sitting on Ford, Mercury, Edsel, Lincoln, and Continental as brands may have looked very GM like, but was probably wrong. Cutting the lackluster Mercury brand as old news that wasn’t working very well may have been a better choice at the time. The downside of the Edsel brand may have been that to me the name always seemed kind of dowdy, even if it was named after a man worthy of respect that lived too short a life.
Honestly, I think the ’58 Edsel was a pretty decent looking car for a model year known for its excess, especially at GM. My biggest nit-pick is that I think the REAR of the non-wagons was a little odd. The front is sort of handsome.
McNamara was not necessarily against brand proliferation; the only thing to which he was categorically opposed was losing money, which the whole affair did.
The fundamental problem with the Edsel, aside from the recession, was that it did not accomplish (and would not have accomplished, even without the recession) its original goal. The issue wasn’t simply Edsel, but that Mercury tried to push upmarket at about the same time, with disastrous results — they became too expensive for existing customers and found out the hard way that suddenly upping your prices doesn’t automatically make you an upmarket brand. So, instead of boosting their mid-price business, Ford ended up losing a fair chunk of what they already had. On top of that, splitting Mercury and Lincoln into separate divisions and adding Edsel and Continental divisions added a bunch of extra overhead costs.
Whatever McNamara’s other political motives (and I suspect there were some), he would undoubtedly have looked at the above — which actually started a year before Edsel launched (Mercury went upmarket for 1957) — and said, “This is chaos, it’s losing money, and we should cut our losses.” He only pushed lost causes when they were his own ideas…
Truly a magnificent car! Thank you for sharing this.
Weird thought of the day: Does the next to last picture, showing the radio, look vaguely like the rear of a 1964 Galaxie?
It sure does. That guy got promoted from radios to rear ends!
Hehehe
Nice catch! It most certainly does.
I’ve always liked the 1958 Edsel more than that of either the 1959 or the 60 Edsel.
That closeup of the radio is especially neat. I didn’t realize Ford ever had a ‘seeking’ radio.
You really have to wonder what HF2 was thinking. It’s not just the overall market segment fading in a recession. You can forgive a lack of psychic ability.
The real strangeness was the decision to fill the segment with a middle-priced car that had space-age styling and space-age gadgets. Ford ALREADY HAD that car: the ’57-59 Mercury. So it should have been obvious that Ford didn’t need ANOTHER middle-priced car with space-age styling and space-age gadgets. What’s more, Mercury filled the role rather attractively, so an ugly car filling the same niche was just plain crazy.
My opinion for the reasons behind the birth of Edsel is simple jealousy of GM. GM had FIVE successful car brands (plus GMC), whereas FoMoCo had only THREE.
Ford figured if GM could differentiate enough to serve 5 different markets, so could they.
I think it is rather more complicated than that. Ford’s and Chevy’s were very competitive (in sales) for some time trading places as first and second.
However:
In the early 50’s Chrysler corp was #2 in sales at times because they did have 4 brand names (Imperial was a Chrysler then). While Desoto was not a big seller, Dodge and Chrysler did well.
Mercury sold fairly well, but only compared to Buick or Oldsmobile or Chrysler, it was not a strong mid-range seller for Ford Motor Company.
Even though Plymouth is third during much of the 50’s, adding Dodge sales onto Plymouth does not put them into second place ahead of either Ford or Chevy.
The primary reason that GM had 40 to 50% of the market is because Mercury is not competitive with GM’s midrange (Pontiac, Oldsmobile and Buick) and Chrysler, by the end of the 50’s, is well behind even Ford Motor Company.
So:
Ford wanted to strengthen their midrange to be more competitive with GM. Why Edsel failed is not clear to me. The first year sales were not bad, but then sales went down, perhaps because the market place became aware that Ford’s management was expecting it to fail.
Checking on my numbers, Chrysler was ahead of Ford before 1950, not after. However, Ford’s sales during the 50’s were generally less than 30% of the domestic market not including imports. Chryslers sales were more like 20% or less. But imports were growing during the 50’s, reaching something like 10%.
A lot of Edsel’s failure was a combination of over-promising and too much expectations.
1. The Edsel got a LOT of publicity during 1956-57 that Ford was coming out with a new automobile that was going to be a complete game changer. Totally different, totally new, and would make the rest of the auto industry completely obsolete and send them back to the drawing boards. And when it finally arrived . . . . . . it was just another automobile. Styled differently, a bit more glam (which wasn’t necessarily a good thing by 1958), but just another car. Four wheels, a steering wheel, nothing that the competition didn’t already have. Couple in the Eisenhower Recession of 1957-58, and suddenly what looked like a sure hit in 1955 (middle priced cars, everybody wanted something more prestigious than a garden variety Chevrolet, Ford or Plymouth) didn’t work anymore.
2. Given #1, when the Edsel didn’t take off like the Mustang six years later (which is what was really expected, although nobody had the analyzed the market that well back then), it was immediately deemed a failure. And, what would have normally been considered a respectable performance for a brand new marque at any other time, became an albatross hanging around the neck of the brand.
A couple of other things to consider: In 1955-57, the newly formed American Motors was desperately hanging on. Dropping Nash and Hudson to put everything into Rambler was a desperation move. Which, to AM’s amazement, worked! Better than they had expected or dreamed. Suddenly, lots of customers who were expected to leave GM and Chrysler for Edsel were buying Ramblers instead. And anyone in 1959 who would tell you that that’s what was planned, were damned liars.
The Edsel was the first indication that it could take too long to bring a new car to market. If it had come out in 1955 or even 1956, it would have probably sold respectably. But it didn’t come out until late 1957, and the market had started to move.
Also, I think the market was starting to get tired of longer-lower-wider glamor barges. The classic 50’s automobile (fins! chrome! size! status!) peaked in 1957 with the Forward Look. Customers started wondering if those ‘right-sized’ 1955 cars weren’t really all the more that they needed. And the mid-sized models that appeared a few years later (62 Fairlane, 64 Chevelle, etc.) were proof that they weren’t necessarily wrong.
Perhaps if the Edsel had been a small car (compact) then it might have been a whole different story.
Mercury was a new brand just before the War, so there was a very limited brand loyalty there. Ford’s midrange was weak and did not really get better.
The 1958 recession hit mid range cars hard across all makes. It was also a fairly conservative market- “Daddy bought Buick, so I will too”.
Throw an new, unknown marque into that mix, whose only real defining feature was a curious grille, especially after the extreme hype and it isn’t too surprising sales were not up to expectation.
I wonder if Edsel had started as a four door variant of the 1958 Thunderbird, or a Falcon based compact,wether things might have been different?
Sort of, but it was well-founded jealousy. Ford knew that GM’s mid-price brands basically owned their highly profitable market segment (which was 25 percent of the U.S. market, give or take); that Mercury was really only competitive with the lower end of that range; that there was a huge price gap between Mercury and Lincoln; and that even if they added new Mercury or Lincoln products, they didn’t have nearly enough dealers to really increase their market share.
Those factors, which are hard to argue, were the original impetus for the Edsel project; that it didn’t actually do all those things (and that the ones it did, it didn’t do well) was the result of a lot of internal infighting and mixed messages.
The standard radios in 1946-1948 Fords were signal-seeking units. They must not have been that popular as they were dropped for the all-new 1949 models.
There were hard numbers underlying the business case for the Edsel. A much smaller percentage of Ford owners traded up to Mercury as compared to Plymouth owners who bought Chryslers or Chevy owners who moved up to Buicks. Basically, if a Ford man got a promotion, he celebrated by going to a GM or Mopar store. The problem was that to sell against established brands like Buick and Chrysler would take an exceptional product, and the Edsel wasn’t, or at least wasn’t perceived as such. Muscling into a market dominated by competitors with a well established image and reputation can be done, but it requires a full-court press with a rock-solid product. Lexus, for example.
I really like the taillights on this Edsel. They remind me of business signage of the fifties.
As in neon lighted arrows blinking in front of a motel.
I agree. I’ve seen hotel signs like that.
Vegas, baby!
I’m afraid I’ve never visited Vegas. I’ll have to visit one day. 🙂
Incredible wagon! That piece is eye candy, whether you like Edsels or not.
Perhaps my favourite Edsels are the 1958 and the 59. Although I’ve seen pics of the 1960 Edsel, I’ve never seen one in person.
I think only 3000 Edsels were built for the 1960 model year. So, by this time very few would probably still exist.
They’re gorgeous looking cars,especially the Starliner based model.Rather unfairly dismissed as warmed up Fords.
Amen to that! ’60s have a certain elegance to them, more upscale than a ’60 Ford.
Imagine the taillights w/ turn signal on. When the left one is on it flashes RIGHT, like this >.
When the right on is on it flashes LEFT, like this <.
I like the Ford's better.
I noticed the same thing – they are pointing in the wrong direction! I’ll be this confused the hell out of lots of drivers following these things at night. These cars were designed by committee, and it shows, but I still think they are beautiful in their own fugly way. The woodgraining on this Bermuda model is particularly nice.
The wagon tail lights are completely different from the sedans. The design is interesting, and since the opposite tail light will be iluminated (at the low setting) there should not be any confusion as to the driver’s intent.
Great find. I don’t see a hitch but it would have been fun to see hooked up to a vintage Airstream. To me Edsel’s look like Ford bought every JC Whitney accessory in the book and stuck them on the car. The push button shifter in the center of the steering wheel is a nice touch.
When I was in high school, about 50 years ago, I spotted an Edsel wagon outside a multi-family house a few blocks from my family’s house. That one was the nearly as rare 2 door Roundup wagon. I so wanted my father to pick it up as a second or third car…and it was for sale for only $700.
I actually like these but didn’t know about the 3-tone until recently. Some color combos (like this one) work, others don’t.
BTW, for tv trivia buffs: FoMoCo provided cars for The Donna Reed Show and for at least 1 season Doctor Stone drove an Edsel Bermuda. It was eventually replaced by a Comet wagon.
Edsel is not the only U.S. brand to put transmission pushbuttons on the steering wheel hub, at least if I remember correctly. I think Mercurys had a similar feature, only the buttons for Mercury were in a line, not arrayed around the hub like a phone dial.
The 1958 Mercury Park Lane Coupe had them to the left of the steering wheel. I believe the housing also housed the parking brake.
Long time Edsel fan here,it’s a better looker than a lot of 1958 cars,the monstrous Lincoln and ostentatious Oldsmobile for example.
I would strongly agree with you, Gem. The front of the ’58 Edsel is … odd, at best. To put it kindly, it’s an acquired taste and not many people acquired it!
But … from the sides and rear, I think the Edsel is probably the best-looking American car of 1958, other than the Chrysler offerings (which were warmed-over ’57s).
The ’58 Mercury was positively horrible, the ’58 Lincoln was a chromed whale, and even the ’58 Ford looked heavy and chunky from the front. And the less said about the ’58 GM offerings (those terrible Oldsmobiles and Buicks!) the better.
The ’58 Edsel is a model of tasteful restraint compared to, say, a ’58 Buick Century: http://www.oldride.com/library/1958_buick_century.html.
The book “Disaster in Dearborn” is required reading for anyone interested in the Edsel story. The “E-car” was originally supposed to be an upscale luxury car, positioned between Mercury and Lincoln. Complaints from dealers and internal politics led Ford to try to shift the E-car to the mid-price field, and move the Mercury upmarket instead.
The 58 Fords and Mercurys weren’t that bad Gerry,I’ve never been much of a fan of GMs 58s though.
Do you like early ’60s Fords? The Edsel’s lead designer, Roy Brown Jr., went to FoE after the project was done and was there for a number of years.
I’m a fan of American & European Fords from the mid 50s to 70s.Roy Brown was involved with the Cortina(the tail lights on the Mk1 were very American looking).He was also responsible for the Mk4 Zephyr & Zodiac(often described as a British Edsel).Dad hated the Mk4 Zodiacs but I’m a fan and had a very nice 68 Zephyr 6.
3 of my favourite cars are Edsels,Mk4 Zephyr s & Zodiacs and the 70 Dodge Coronet?Superbee.
I like the Mk4s; not the prettiest but with a nice long bonnet. Never seen one in the flesh.
This car sums up the late 50s so well. So many oddball “futuristic” ideas crammed into one car, things that are so strange to those of us living in the actual future.
Pushbutton tranny controls where the horn button ought to be… The oddball (in a cool way) speedometer… Garish ladled-on chrome trim… “Daring” styling… Simulated woodgrain paneling AND a two-tone paint job… Such over-the-top optimism. if we build it, they’re sure to buy it. Why wouldn’t they?
BTW, It’s great to see the Imperialst byline again, and thank you for reminding me that I needed to buy a copy of Bruce McCall’s Zany Afternoons, which includes the old Naitonal Lampoon ’58 Bulgemobile parody. If you don’t know what I mean, here’s a link:
http://www.diyautoftw.com/showthread.php?83-From-the-mind-of-Bruce-McCall-The-1958-Bulgemobile
Thanks for the compliment!
Strangely, on the ‘new’ 1958 Edsel wagon, Ford chose to use the rear sheet metal from the 1957 Ford – even though 58 Ford wagons got a facelift in that area.
It does add weight to the theory that Ford was trying to cut its losses even as the cars were being introduced.
Interesting observation but probably wrong. The sheet metal on the ’58 Ford is the same; the tail lights are different though. I believe the ’58 Ford wagon did get a “facelift” and that part of the statement is correct but I also believe the sheet metal is the same as the ’57 Ford and the ’58 Edsel wagons.
However the ’58 Ranchero, using the same tail gate as the ’58 Ford wagon, did not get that “facelift” that was given to the wagon. Rather, the Ranchero got the same tail lights as the ’57 Ranchero (and ’57 Ford wagons).
The 58 Ford wagon had the same rear metal & lights as the 58 sedan.
https://img.mecum.com/auctions/CH1010/CH1010-97888/images/CH1010-97888_4.jpg
The 58 Edsel wagon however appears to be using 57 Ford sheet metal.
http://assets.hemmings.com/story_image/80430-500-0.jpg?rev=1
I have long been fascinated by the design compromises found on station wagons. The unique low volume hindquarters are expensive on a per unit basis and have to mate up with pieces from other models.
I can’t decide if these taillights are the best or the worst possible adaptation of what was conceived as a 57 Ford taillight hole.
I watched a few episodes of the 1980’s spy series ‘Smiley’s People’ this weekend, and one segment showed a Volvo 240 wagon tooling around Bern, Switzerland.
Thanks to my CC education I couldn’t take my eyes off that sloping rear door profile.
There was a Bermuda before the Edsel, and it could arguably be said a more fitting body style aportioned it. Willys applied the name to their face lifted hardtop in 1955.
The awful Brewster Buccaneer was known as the Bermuda when the Royal Navy got them during the war.They soon wished they hadn’t and after a few were used as target tug the rest weren’t even flown and ended up being used for instruction of fitters and mechanics.
Like a directional sign to a supermarket in 1958…..
Louis Market (the separate bar and grill being torn down is pictured in the background) was an Omaha landmark that also opened in 1958. The sign may be reused in the development of a gas station / c-store. Progress, sigh.
I was a young car nut when the Edsel was introduced and I liked the car – perhaps more than the ’58 Mercury.
There was a nice AMT 1:25 scale “friction” model of a ’58 Edsel convertible (yellow and white) in my childhood collection; it was one of my favorites.
In my childhood town the Edsel line was added to the fleet available at the local Lincoln-Mercury dealer. In my current home the history is that the local Plymouth-DeSoto dealer dropped those lines in order to sell the newly introduced Edsel line. When I got there the dealer was selling L-M; how the transition to L-M from Edsel happened I do not know.
And I certainly agree with those who state that the ’58 Edsel was a good and even restrained design – for 1958. It is, to these old eyes, much more attractive than most of GM’s 1958 offerings; the ’58 Cadillac being the only one that I respect at all.
This is a great posting and discussion.
The AMT model also came in a coral pink and white. I still have mine, albeit sans hood ornament. I was still young enough to play with it as a toy when new, alas.
I don’t know if Edsel could have survived even if McNamara had been more supportive. The reputation it got during the debut year was so damning. I well remember contemporary comedians getting mileage out Edsel jokes. You had to be around then – the jokes became part of daily conversations. In a short while the brand name was just totally unsupportable due to the riffs on its odd appearance. And first year quality problems, while perhaps overstated, were widely discussed.
I always felt bad for the Ford family in the sense that the naming, meant to honor the beloved Edsel, had the opposite effect.
A generous, heartfelt comment (about Edsel the car and Ford the family) and I agree. The photo of your Edsel promo is appreciated!
You are right about comedians and Edsel jokes. I remember. Those comic lines later became ones about Corvair, Pinto, Audi and Toyota. And prior to that there were the original car jokes by Jack Benney about Maxwell, most then contemporary comedians about Ford Model T (“Tin Lizzie”) and a generation or so later about the Volkswagen “beetle”. They were wrong in joking about two of those three; maybe the Edsel will be respected sometime.
For that matter, wasn’t Edsel Ford II in his early teens when the Edsel car had its’ run?
All I can say is that I love these. If I were to buy any 1950s wagon, this would be at the top of my list, not that I would likely be able to find one considering only 2,235 were produced in total.
The 60 Comet was to be offered by Edsel. Even the tail lights were coded with Edsel part #s.
And the Comet name was supposedly chosen in part because it was also 5 letters. Supposedly the tooling was already done when they decided to drop Edsel so they needed a name that would fill the holes that the tooling was designed to punch. Of course since Americans were fascinated by space and Mercury was a planet so it fit the theme. Of course the Comet was not a Mercury in 1960 but was sold at Mercury Lincoln Comet dealers.
That upright grill was the grandaddy of all the other Brougham-tastic grilles that followed in the 70s!
That “floating drum” speedo looks like a compass from a ship, those tail lights, well……….
I like the “floating compass” speedometer.
Those “compass” speedos on Edsels reminded my of the drum spedos on many 1920s cars. Kinda retro for a “futuristic” car, But then again Composite headlights from pre 1940 came back in the 80s!
Fabulous car, Tony. One of my most glorious adolescent achievements was getting ahold of one of these wheelcovers. I saw one on a stranger’s 63 Plymouth and worked out a trade. Mine was color keyed to a white car. That raised spinner was really cool.
The second hald of the 1950s was indeed a train wreck at the Ford Motor Company.
Brake lights that say: The Future! (But not really.) A giant fake wood insert panel that says: The Past! (But not really.)
If you could sum up what’s charming AND maddening about American culture in one tailgate…
Someone was at Modernism Week in Palm Springs! It looks familiar we were there too. So many great cars and vintage travel trailers that complimented the home tours and talks about a great period in American industrial and architectural design.
CC effect strikes again as the current Classic American magazine I’m reading has a wagon theme and there’s a gorgeous coral pink Bermuda.