This is one o the first full-size 1970’s Ford wagon I’ve seen, and it is probably as close as I will come to seeing one of my childhood Matchbox toy cars come to life. Note the background of the photo, there is more to come.
This is the Matchbox car in question, a Mercury Villager. It seems to have the surrounds for the fake wood paneling, but obviously that is beyond the scope of a simple diecast toy. The ‘flexible’ scale of the Matchbox car does not give any impression of the actual size of the car, relative to others, because all of the cars have to fit in the same size packet. In the background is a cement mixer truck, which is actually shorter than this Mercury.
If you noticed in the opening shot, there was a Morris Mini hiding behind the Ford. The contrast is pretty striking, nearly twice the length, nearly four times the weight and eight times the engine capacity! Double the number of seats, at least.
It looks like this is a Californian car, which would be a good place to source one with a mild climate, no salt and plenty sold there originally. I suppose that this means it may not have the best engine option, as they often weren’t available in California. I also don’t know exactly what year this is; is there is much more than grille minutiae to distinguish them?
I do know that by this time Ford had stopped importing the full-size US cars. Because of the growth of the local Fairlane, the last one they brought in was the 1972 – I will do a feature on this car soon(-ish).
The baroque, broughamy details of the Country Squire don’t do anything for me, neither does the fake wood. Ford Australia tried this for a short period only in 1964-65, but only managed to sell 1,198 of the Falcon Squire wagon.
The closest local equivalent was the Fairmont station wagon, which was the highest trim level and came standard with the two-way tailgate that was otherwise optional. The wheelbase was 116″, a 5″ stretch over the standard sedan and shared with the more luxurious Fairlane. Family friends had one of these when I was growing up, to haul their four boys.
This show is one you never know what you are going to come across. It is an everyone-welcome affair that raises money for the Peter MacCallum cancer research and treatment hospital here in Melbourne, and it is always well-attended. I think I will have to do some more writing… what to do first, unusual ‘normal’ cars or the real head-turners?
Further Reading, a couple of other cars from this show:
Short Car Day At CC: Suzuki Mighty Boy – Shortest Ute Ever
Cohort Sighting: 1970 AMC Ambassador – Are You Sure That’s Not An Australian Car Of Some Sort?
The Country Squire is a ’75 to ’78 model – there was no quickly discernible differences during those years.
Would you believe your Cougar matchbox is a mid-sized offering? The Cougar was based on the Torino.
Pulling ads for 1975, the standard engine was a two-barrel 400 (6.6 liter) with an optional 460 (7.5 liter). Curb weight for his Squire is 5,039 pounds. You can figure about 100 of that is the faux wood!
“Would you believe your Cougar matchbox is a mid-sized offering? The Cougar was based on the Torino.”
Right – the car that Matchbox was based on (the Mercury Cougar Villager) was not actually a variation of the Country Squire that is the subject of this post. It was a size smaller, although it does have very similar design language.
That Matchbox has come up here a few times in the past. In real life the Cougar Villager was a one-year-only model. The Matchbox version stayed in production a lot longer than the real car, and is probably more commonly seen today than the real car.
To make a long story short, the Cougar Villager was the equivalent of the Ford LTD II wagon. The LTD II was built from 1977 to 1979, and was a rebodied version of the previous Torino which attempted to straddle the line between midsize (which is what the Torino had historically been considered) and fullsize (because in terms of exterior dimensions, it was the closest thing Ford had to the new downsized GM B-bodies, hence the name “LTD II”) . The generation of Ford’s Thunderbird personal luxury coupe prodcued from 1977 to 1979 was closely related. During those three years, the Cougar name was used on Mercury’s versions of both the Thunderbird and LTD II.
The LTD II/Cougar wagons didn’t actually have the complete new body. They just had the new front clip, mated to the old Torino wagon body. The wagons were dropped after the first year (1977) due to the arrival of the new Ford Fairmont and Mercury Zephyr wagons.
The coupes and sedans continued through 1979, after which they were dropped without any direct replacement. By then, the Panthers had made them no longer needed in the full-size market, and the mid-size market was moving to smaller cars, like the downsized 1978 GM A-bodies.
One detail, the LTD II/Cougar wagons used the *Montego* wagon body, which had always lacked the prominent crease over the rear fenders characteristic of the Torino and wiped away from the LTD II.
I believe the 351 was offered on the 1978 LTD Country Squire.
I believe this is correct. For the previous few years, the 351 was standard in coupes and sedans, the 400 in wagons. For ’78, in an apparent nod to fuel economy, each dropped down a notch, sedans going to the 302, wagons to the 351. So if this is a ’78 (it seems that it might be a ’76, a ’77 or a ’78), it could have the 351.
I learned here recently that for 1975 only the LTD with the hidden headlights contained body color stripes in the corner lights while the base LTD was just chrome. In 1976-78 they did away with the body color in the corner lights, which would make this one a 76-78.
The 75 brochure shows both styles.
Thanks Jason. As XR7Matt says below, the difference in the Matchbox car is indiscernible. It is interesting that the Villager wagon is 223″ long as a midsize but the Country Squire is 225.6″ long as a fullsize – arguably the difference in real life would be indiscernible too! I don’t think I am alone in thinking things were a bit out of whack.
The so-called “midsize” cars of the mid 70’s were massive by any stretch, whether you’re talking about the Torino/LTD II platform or the colonnade A platform on the GM side of the fence. It always sticks with me that, after the B-body was downsized for ’77, the “midsize” A-body cars were both larger and heavier than the “fullsize” B-body cars with which they shared showroom space. In the ’78 downsizing of the A-body the cars lost over a foot in length and close to 1000 lbs.
This was parked in the parking lot of a car show I went to recently.
I spent lots of behind the wheel time in a 74 like this, same color to boot. It was the delivery vehicle for the company I worked for from 1980-83. Interesting comparisons I was able to make between it and the 74 Impala my Dad had. The Ford rode so smooth, even with a load of CCTV equipment in the back. Even with far more miles on it than Dad’s Impala, the Ford seemed far better built and much more solid. My fathers number one complaint with the Impala was how poorly it was screwed together. He always was glad he did not trade our 68 Impala in on the 74, and always referred to the 68 as “the good car”. Our Impala had the F41 suspension (yes it was available before 77) that I convinced my Dad to order so, the Chevy out handed the Ford by a huge margin. The Ford wallowed and pitched and the steering seemed very vague and disconnected. the Chevy also had better brakes. I have yet to drive a car with brakes as good. As far as acceleration went, neither car was very quick. The Ford had a 400 and so did our Impala. Both were terrible on gas. These pictures sure brought back the memories! As an aside, this generation of Country Squire is available in various scales as a 3d printed model from jahn3d.de through Shapeways. They aren’t cheap and require painting to finish but, they make lots of models that are typically not made anywhere else.
I wouldn’t bank on that being an original California car — the plates come back to a 1996 Ford Bronco (which last passed smog in 2001), meaning the owner probably bought them off eBay.
Also, that’s a whole lot of car; at 225.6 in (5730 mm), it’s longer than a brand-new Suburban. I’m sure much of that is due to the massive 5-mph bumpers, but the car is still simply gargantuan.
Thanks for that info, that makes sense, as does it having had a blue & yellow plate originally.
Actually the owner is taking a bit of a chance, because we have to display plates front & rear here (same throughout Australia).
Interesting that the Australian Falcon Squire with Di-Noc didn’t sell well. The same pattern decoration only lasted for a slightly longer time on the Mk.I Cortina Super estate, from 1962-64, though that was the version Corgi chose to do.
https://drive-my.com/images/mews2015/drive2015/1960-load-luggers-3.jpg
Woody wagons were never a thing here, so rather than recalling old times, I guess people thought they just looked strange. I don’t recall seeing any old ones around when I was growing up, and then Holden started making wagons in ’57, they were just steel with or without chrome trim – no fake wood to be seen. Even Holden’s later luxury Premier wagons never used wood trim.
Ford added fake wood to the new Falcon Squire in ’63 for the XL series, but despite living in Melbourne IIRC I only saw one of them back in the day. Dad dismissed the woody look as American, in the tone of voice he used for huge cars, tail fins and yards of chrome. The later XM and XP Squires weren’t popular either, though optioned-up Falcon Deluxe wagons were everywhere. Later Fairmont wagons, with no wood, proved fairly popular. Were Aussies turned off by the woody look, or was the ‘luxury wagon’ idea ahead of its time?
Ford also offered the Corcel Belina in Brazil with woodgrain, briefly because it didn’t catch on there either. I’m surprised they didn’t try it in Germany…and fairly sure that it was considered worth a try because it would’ve been cheap to implement and was so popular back home.
I also only ever saw one, rusting in the 80’s down the coast somewhere. Your dads view is traditional Australian, and certainly at that stage in history, things such as fake wood were seen as “trying it on” or “a bit overdone”. The luxury wagon idea was indeed ahead of the times – for those times are now, when as a very rich country, we buy badges (the “wood” of now) in numbers outsize to the population.
The view of America, though, largely remains in milder form, and is often misunderstood by them; friendly, ofcourse, but slightly wary.
I wonder how long the matchbox was made, I somehow had that Villager despite growing up in the 90s/00s, IN FACT I had it when my mom had her green Mercury Villager minivan!
As mentioned, the Villager was midsized based, but it really doesn’t matter. The 72-79 midsize body was massive, Ford styling in the mid 70s interchangeable, and the biggest differentiation was size. With the tiny details of a matchbox car you’d easily assume it could be full sized based, I certainly did before I knew any better. I didn’t even realize there had been a Cougar based wagon at the time. I wish I still had it, but like most of my hot wheels/matchbox cars it probably met a grizzly end in a vice, on fire, or “painted” with a sharpie.
Matchbox had made an earlier Mercury wagon, a ’68, also in green. I remember the tailgate window was open and there was a dog with its head out the window – an extra touch of realism!
Matchbox came out with a Sable wagon around 87. I think they did the Sable instead of the Taurus because of their popular Cougar Villager, which was probably done because of their popular 68 Commuter. I grew up in the Villager era and still have my old beat up one. I have since acquired a mint version of the Villager as well as the green 68 and the Sable in white (not sure if it came in any other colors). I think the tradition ended as I’ve never heard of a 97 or 2007 model.
One dog?
We had that Matchbox wagon, and I thought I remembered there were two dogs poking heads out the back. Now I need to search for an image.
I think you are right. Matchbox did a 72 Olds Vista Cruiser a few years ago that had one dog in back.
Just looked at my car, the Olds is a 71 and actually has 2 dogs, similar to the 68 Mercury.
May be my memory, wasn’t sure how many dogs. But I remember I found an offcut of woodgrain shelf paper, and turned my Commuter into a woody.
Yep. Had that one myself.
Hilarious responses, because I too remember the metallic green and two dogs. Which reminds me of a joke….
From some online research, the Villager was #74 in Matchbox’s 1-75 lineup from 1978 to 1982. Since the real car lasted only one year (1977), it was already gone by the time the Matchbox version debuted.
It’s possible the casting was re-used by Matchbox later on in the ’80s or ’90s, after its original owner (Lesney) had gone out of business, as that certainly happened with some models. This would seem an odd model to bring back later, though. It was an odd car for Matchbox to make a die-cast model out of in the first place.
It was most likely gifted to me as a handmedown, my parents always went to flea markets too so it’s possible that’s where it was aquired, new in box.
Thanks MCT, that original timeframe ties in with when I would have got the model.
Matchbox had a “thing” for Ford station wagons. That was possibly because the Ford name was recognized in both the United States and Europe, which were Lesney’s (the parent company of Matchbox) main markets at the time.
The first American car in the 1-75 line-up was a 1956 Ford station wagon, which was then followed by a 1959 Ford station wagon.
There was a gap of several years before the Mercury Commuter wagon appeared in 1969.
I also had the Cougar Villager, which was one of my favorites. Funny story though–mine was actually found inside the ’79 Fairmont that my Dad bought in ’83 or so. I guess the previous owners had kids and that particular matchbox was left behind. Their loss, my gain!
Still have it, though over the years it was repainted twice and then partway chipped back down to bare metal. I acquired a near-mint version on eBay that is on one of my display shelves, right next to the ’88 Sable (also a favorite though the original was lost).
Great writeup ~ hard to choose which direction to head in now. we’ll be here waiting & watching though .
-Nate
I can only imagine how striking the scale of one of these must be to someone in a country that never got them. These things are just huge.
By 1978 I was thoroughly sick of these. Although I had really liked the looks of the big Fords up through the 72 models, the 73 restyle did nothing for me and the 75 facelift was not something I saw as an improvement. They were certainly nice cruisers, however, much more civilized (in terms of a smooth, quiet ride) than anything coming out of Chrysler or even GM at the time.
Boy was that brown paint popular. I have only recently recovered from the overdose of earth tones I was exposed to in the 70s.
We DID (very rarely) get them in Israel and they still looked totally out of scale among the sea of smaller Fords, Israeli Sussitas, Peugeots and Subarus which infested our streets in the 70s…
Huge, yes, but that green XB Fairmont wagon in the second-last photo isn’t radically smaller. The exoticness comes from their tariff-driven rarity when new. In fact, most people who ever rode in one in Aus are silent on the subject, because…well, when folks here say that a large wagon resembles a hearse, they are not necessarily being metaphorical.
The Falcon wagon is listed at 200″ length, which is over 2 feet shorter. The interior would be about a foot shorter, so the even allowing for the bumpers there is a lot of extra length that doesn’t do much for you.
Yes, the ’73 on Fords were very heavy handed.
But the Chrysler wagons could go around corners
It must be the warm glow of childhood memories, but I love this car. I’m not usually a fan of brown paint, or fake woodgrain, or mid-70s full-sized Fords, but on this one it all works. My friend Graham’s Mom had a ’75 in brown (hers had the full-on Squire Luxury Landau trim), and I remember riding around in it as a kid, in the “way back” of course, with no seat belts.
The closest equivalent in size to the green Fairmont station wagon shown would be a 68-69 Fairlane/Torino wagon, considered to be an “intermediate” sized car in the U.S.
The full-sized Country Squires pictured don’t have the optional vinyl roofs. Aside from the added profit, I never could figure out why someone thought the Squire needed a vinyl roof.
I’m guessing most wagon buyers outside the United States thought that fake wood paneling on the outside of a car was an unnecessary decorative touch. Yet that Fairmont has a vinyl roof.
The biggest Country Squire I would drive was a 69 the body shop gave me as a loaner car. Even though it had a 429 engine, that was one slow wagon…until you REALLY stomped on the gas pedal. And for a car only 5-6 years old, that was one tired looking/driving car.
I might own 1 of the Fox-bodied wagon variants, but if I was looking for an old(er) Ford or Mercury wagon, I wouldn’t buy anything newer than 1968. After 68 the cars get bloated in size and strangled in the engine compartment.
Vinyl roofed wagons were extremely rare in Australia. Wagon buyers didn’t seem to go for purely decorative options. A friend once had a blue ’74 Falcon wagon with a white painted roof; his was the only one I ever saw with two-tone paint.
I had a 74 Falcon wagon in GS trim, no woodgrain but plenty of black stripes and air scoops on the bonnet two way power tailgate that worked and power windows that didnt it was yellow and ex Hertz retals, nice car to cruise and travel in it was even good on gas getting 22mpg with a 302 motor.
From what you’ve mentioned over time, kiwibryce, that must be the nicest car you’ve had by some margin. (Not having a go, btw. Your stories of worn-out wonders are themselves wonderful and keep ’em up please!)
A white roof happened a bit to try and keep the cars cooler in pre-AC days of course, and I agree that vinyl roofs were very rare.
The 72-on Falcon wagon is a few inches wider than the 68-69’s and the wheelbase is 2″ longer. The earlier Falcon & Fairlane were sold here too, although only a Falcon wagon on the same wheelbase as the sedan.
My folks had a 1968 Country Squire when I got my license, so I spent many miles behind the wheel. Also drove a 1969 and a 1972 a number roof times. The ’68 was a wallowing and understeering beast, though the 390 gave it reasonable poke and a limited slip rear with studded tires made it very good in the snow. The ’72 was a very nice driving car compared to the other two, though it’s 400 had been quite strangled by emissions gear. The later versions, such as this CC Outtake subject, seemed monstrous and garish vs the older ones.
Wow, nearly 40 years later it finally occurs to me why this generation of Ford Squire looked off to me. The upper trim line on the paneling doesn’t follow the body lines *at all*. That gentle upward bulge in the top edge of the paneling as it moves from the front door to the rear quarter has nothing to do with any line on the car, unlike on the 69-72 Country Squires.
OK, I can see that Ford pressed some fake hips into the sheetmetal of the boxy wagon and that the wood trim kinda sorta follows those, but even on the plain side wagons, those creases do nothing but fight the basic shape of the wagon.
The Mercury Colony Park’s “wood” follows the sharp kickup at the back door and thus accentuates the car’s lines rather than fighting them like the Ford version does. Wow.
If you look at the wood paneling outline on the 1971 and later Pontiac Grand Safari wagon, it appears to follow a very similar path as the 1973 and later Country Squire. Suggesting Ford copied Pontiac. The difference is, the Grand Safari had a character crease at the top of the rear quarter panel that the Pontiac’s wood paneling follows. The shape looks very natural on the Pontiac. While it looks very sloppy on the Country Squire. As you pointed out, the paneling on the Ford does not follow the contour of the sheet metal ‘kick’ at the base of the ‘C’ pillar. Nor does it have that rounded fender top contour of the Pontiac.
Odd, as Ford was not afraid of having the wood paneling on the Torino wagon follow this ‘kick up’ more precisely.
I could never attempt to rationalize, or defend Ford styling decisions of the early to mid 1970s. I thought most of their domestic styling efforts during this era were half baked, bloated, and/or unattractive. Malaise as its finest.
That is an attractive Poncho. On the flip side, the ’76 Grand Safari’s square-headlight face was obviously of a different era from the rest of the car.
I love it! Ford billed itself as “The Wagonmaster” and a case could definitely be made that they made the best wagons in the 70’s, as least until the downsized GM offerings.
My only exposure to one personally was in the 90’s when a friend’s mom picked up a mint, low mileage 77 CS in red with a 460. Beautiful survivor, but unfortunately they bought it as a cheap used driver. It was kept outside and not maintained real well. I washed and waxed it a couple of times for his mom, just as a labor of love (for the car, not his mom!). I moved away not long after, so I don’t know what ultimately happened to it. I like to imagine it ended up with a wagon collector in climate controlled storage.
IN 2010, Matchbox issued a 1971 Oldsmobile Vista Cruiser with simulated wood paneling. I recall a number of 1970s die casts had paper decals for graphics, that easily faded or washed off. While others did have graphics printed on their paintwork. I suspect the technology was available if they wanted to simulate wood paneling. The added cost may have been the deciding factor.
It probably wasn’t beyond the realm of possibility to tampo print die casts with complex graphics in the Seventies, but it would probably have had a high failure rate and been expensive to execute. Hot Wheels began using tampos in 1969, but they were simple stencil-type designs that didn’t require precise registration like a photorealistic woodgrain pattern.
I have that Vista Cruiser in green – matches the green Cougar Villager I played with as a kid and still have. The detailing on the Vista Cruiser is quite good. I wish matchbox would do more like that.
Daniel are you interested in selling the gold wagon?
The late 1960s Mercury wagon was another popular die cast in the 1970s. Only I recall having the same vintage Mercury wagon made by two different manufacturers. Matchbox and a Hong Kong based maker called Playart.
This was the Matchbox version…
And this was the Playart version. The tooling was different, as were other details, like the wheels. The Playart version seemed to be police or fire examples exclusively with holes in the roof to accommodate the police/fire lights.
I just checked online, and Playart offered Mercury wagons without the roof holes as well…
I suspect the Playart version has been struck from the Matchbox wagon. Not the original die, but the actual toy itself hence the thickening of proportions on elements such as the pillars (with larger wheel wells and flares added). I’ve noticed this technique seems to have been used a lot on cheap toy cars emanating from China.
Matchbox also made the 68 Merc wagon for their larger Speed Kings range, as well as a 1-75 sedan with dome light (later a twinsonic).
I’ve just remembered, Matchbox also made a 1-75 police wagon with twin domes – albeit at different mounting points from the Playart version.
Speed Kings Mercury twofer…
I have the absolute giggles here, I love this site, truly! Who the hell else knows or writes or even has ever known or thought about such stuff? Apart from me – and you lot.
My giggles are driven too by two things.1) None of these is the metallic green wagon with the TWO dogs of memory and 2) What the hell is with every Ford wagon model being a shade of It’s Not Easy Being green?
Yep, this site is tops for this sort of arcana. The green wagon Daniel shows is the one with the two dogs. Here it is in its original wheel version.
Excellent, yes! The very one I….umm…borrowed from my non-car same age 6y.o.cousin And, fancy that, even two different types of doggies, which I thought I remembered but didn’t trust enough to state.
Matchbox offered that shade of bright metallic green on a few cars during the early to mid 70s. Among the ones I collected at the time, was this Capri.
And the ‘Tow Joe’ tow truck.
The California plates don’t mean much in the case of the Country Squire—-only that it’s been registered in California for maybe the last 25 years. We’re about to go to “8AAA000” and tend to go through each round every six years or so (depending on new car registrations—the past few years have been so hot we blew through the 7s in just over four years)….so 4BGB771 is probably from 1992-ish.
If this were registered originally in California and were still wearing its original plates, they’d be the yellow on blue. I had a ’75 Ford Mustang II with the plates 625 NCS. 1976 or later would be somewhere between there and 999 ZZZ. In 1978, they began the seven-character plates, but still yellow on blue, the sequence that we’re still in, beginning with 1AAA000.
It’s possible that this was an original California car that came back home in the 90s, but the plates it’s wearing don’t give any indication one way or the other.
The cursive ‘California’ script used on today’s license plates started around the mid 3’s somewhere in 1993. As stated somewhere above, that plate was registered to a ’96 Bronco so I would place it at a 1995 issue date. You are correct about having blown through the 7’s so quickly! We were excited to get a 7AWW plate around early 2013.
Dino: Thanks for that. Missed the comment about the Bronco until you pointed it out. Entirely possible the Squire never spent any time in California, since the plates were probably bought online, and period-correct blue plates are readily available. An odd choice to go with the whites.
By the way— I call the cursive font “Lipstick Seismograph”.
Re. the scale of Matchbox’ models: the smaller cars which had to fit in a standard-size box were indeed stretched or shrunk to fit, but the bigger Super Kings were not, and I believe the trucks were more or less 1/64, and reasonably accurate when they first came out. I used their Scammell Contractor pipe hauler to create a model of one of the first Contractors ever made and exported to Israel back in 64, and whereas you cannot achieve the same results as a modern printed model, the only options were a far more expensive model of a wrong version or make one from scratch. I am not THAT dedicated.
The big water in the background is the Danube (simulating the Sea of Galilee).
The real thing (pic by Hanan Sadé)…
Great find. I had the same Matchbox car. And plenty of seat time in those behemoths. Down here, they look humongous.
I had a 1975 country Squire,huge is an understatement. 4×8 would fit in the back with rear seat folded down and tailgate shut. I’m sure the tailgate was dual,swing out or drop down. Gas mileage was pitiful in town,so I bought a Datsun 510 wagon for city and work travel. I didn’t pay a lot for it. $1600 I think from a car lot. I owned it for 5 years until the kids got older and I could afford a newer car.
Sarah Jessica Parker owns a Country Squire of this vintage. I don’t think that she daily’s it, but it was featured in her episode of Jerry Seinfeld’s “Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee”. https://www.crackle.com/comedians-in-cars-getting-coffee/2493024
I think the Matchbox car represents the one-year-only 1977 Mercury Cougar Villager( I know-Cougar and Villager in the same sentence?).