It’s time to revisit station wagons in the 1960s, as they were. Just as I’ve done with previous galleries on this topic, this collection of images is not meant to be comprehensive. It’s just a quick visual trip through station wagon choices back in the day. Still, a bit of info and trivia will be offered on each for the uninitiated.
We start with my favorite shot of the bunch in the lede image; a ’64 Ford Country Squire looking pretty in a driveway. The Country Squire was Ford’s top trim model in the full-size wagon segment, with about 46K units sold that year.
Let’s move to the start of the decade with this full-size bowtie offering. A 1960 mid-trim model, either a Parkwood or Kingswood (depending on passenger capability), and for the year Chevrolet moved 212K units in the segment. (A top-trim Nomad was covered previously at CC).
Back to Ford, with this precious Country Squire. A 1960 model sporting a neat combination of lustrous black against a swanky red interior, with what look to be rather jolly passengers. How did Ford fare against Chevy in the full-size wagon sales race that year? For 1960, the Blue Oval moved about 170K units, with 22K being Country Squires.
Staying with Dearborn’s products, a ’60 4-door Mercury Commuter; the brand’s entry-level trim in the full-size wagon segment.
Let’s move to a Flint offering with this Buick Special. A bit hard to tell from this distance if this is a ’61 or ’62 model, or what particular trim this is (plain or Deluxe?). Regardless, in either year numbers for these wagons were relatively modest against the sedans. Far more interesting were the novelties found in the engine bays of these Specials, a story told previously at CC.
We remain in ’62 with this frozen Pontiac Catalina Safari. Catalinas came with some version of Pontiac’s 389CID V8 (offered in various states of tune) and for ’62 the model found about 32K buyers.
What about a Pentastar offering? Here’s a ’64 Fury, Plymouth’s priciest full-size wagon for that year. For ’64, the brand moved about 34K full-size wagons, with 8K being Furys.
Back to Pontiac, with a ’65 Catalina Safari. Sales numbers for the model had come down to 37K for ’65.
More Mopar goodness with this ’66 Dodge Polara wagon; the brand’s entry-level full-size wagon.
To my eye, one of the prettiest wagons ever, if not necessarily meeting sales expectations. A ’68 Buick Sport Wagon, the corporate-sibling of the equally attractive Olds Vista Cruiser. ’68 was the first year of this redesign, and in the case of the Flint version, about 22K units found a home.
Let’s return to the leaders in the wagon-selling business, now with a ’67 Chevrolet model. Not a lot of trim on this one, which hints it’s a Bel Air; the once top trim now standing just above the entry-level Byscaine. As a whole the bowtie division moved about 155K full-size wagons in ’67.
(Also, notice the light-blue mid-60s Imperial by the curbside.)
And let’s close with this ’69 Ford LTD Country Squire, showcasing in this shot its very nifty Magic doorgate. For ’69, 221K full-size Ford wagons found buyers, and Country Squires accounted for 129K sales on their own.
Hi,
Could you post photos and information about the 1965-1969 Ford Country Squire and the 1965 Chevrolet Impala and 1965-1969 Caprice Wagons?
In my opinion these beautiful wagons were the best classic designs offered.
Thanks,
Gary
Didn’t the 1962 Pontiac have a 389 ci engine?
Yes, a 2 bbl 389 was standard with a 4 bbl version optional. Also optional was the super duty 421.
Yes it did.
Typo. Fixed now.
Not a big fan of wagons, but if I have to choose I would take the Polara.
Non-American wagons like the Mercedes and Peugeot 504 and 505 also seemed quite attractive to me.
Speaking of the Polara, in an episode of The Wonder Years, the 1963 Chevrolet Impala was replaced without warning by a 1968 Dodge Polara wagon who was shown as a old “jalopy” in the episode “The Family Car” when Jack Arnold buyed a then new 1969 Ford Custom 500.
https://imcdb.org/vehicle_216802-Dodge-Polara-1968.html
A car is an old car after two years in the 60’s? Wow! What does that say of me driving a 33 year old car as one of my two days a week daily drivers?
I miss big old American Station Wagons .
-Nate
Is it just me, or is the front of that 68 Buick Sport Wagon sitting kind of high? Maybe it’s got something in the back?
It looks like the whole thing is raised, and the front more so.
Speaking of Sport Wagons I saw one of the previous generation just yesterday. I’m pretty sure but can’t be certain that is is the one I used to see frequently, ~10 years ago, in an area a couple of miles from where I saw it yesterday. We had one for a while when I was about 10~12 that was dad’s second car for making runs to the lumber yard and nursery. Now of course I’m going to have to go type “Sport Wagon” into craig’slist and FB marketplace.
I grew up in 1950s-60s Ford wagons (and in a suburb full of young, growing families), so this is all right up my alley. Production figures sure echo what I saw everyday, and what was a comparative rarity.
I see our 1960 Country Squire was 6″ wider and 32″ longer than the recent Escape in our garage right now—I’d love to see one “in-person” someday to be reminded of their size and low-ness…
I have never been able to tell a 69 from a 70 Ford wagon from the back, but the car in the last shot is wearing wheel covers for a 1970.
That 64 up top is indeed lovely. And the 1960 Mercury is the car I still marvel at ever being made because everything about it is just so weird.
Maybe, it’s a late 69 model (a 1969½ model to be precise) who got an early set of the 1970 wheel covers or the guy own a 1969 and changed the wheel covers later.
Still we’re able to tell a 1969-70 from a 1971-72 wagon, Ford used new door handles for the 1971-72 Ranch Wagon/Country Sedan/Country Squire and there wasn’t front vent windows in these model years on the Ford full-size wagons.
Notice the D-pillar in this 1965 Country Squire shown in a screenshot from the cartoon “F is for Family” compared to the one shown in an episode of the Streets of San Francisco.
https://imcdb.org/vehicle_892598-Ford-Country-Squire-1965.html
https://imcdb.org/vehicle_664128-Ford-Country-Squire-1965.html
My Dad traded in his 63 Comet for a new 65 Country Sedan because we took up camping. It was black over red. Then came the 69 Country Sedan. It was Gulfstream Aqua with a matching interior. Both really nice, comfortable, had the small V8, 289 and 302. Good memories.
Our small town neighborhood was filled with Ford, Chevy & AMC wagons.
I don’t remember wagons from the higher priced brands – or even a Plymouth – parked in anyones driveway.
A few blocks away, the town drug store owner was an exception. He always bought a Mercury. With 8 kids, even a big Mercury wagon was a tight fit for his family.
Dad had ’57, ’59, ’63 and ’68 Ford wagons. So many of us boomers grew up with wagons, and so many memories were made in those family workhorses. The ’63 became my first car in college. For me that one has the most good-time memories of all.
I grew up in wagons, they were as ubiquitous as a family with five or more children. Ramblers were cheap and plentiful, Ford and Pontiac was very common and the post-1965 Plymouth/Dodge wagons were also popular. Olds, Buick, Mercury and Chrysler wagons were luxury fashion rides that weren’t often seen in the industrial neighborhoods.
I like wagons. Sad there are so few of them today, but the SUV is really just a modern version.
Did kind of the same thing. My father had a company car so the only car bought in the family was my mother’s car. She didn’t know how to drive when she got married. I don’t exactly know when she got her license or what may have been her first car, Yet, by New Jersey, around 1962, she was driving a white Comet station wagon. By San Diego, the Comet was sold before moving west, she now had a 1968 Plymouth Satellite wagon. By 1974 everyone was grown up and so our wagon life ended until I bought my 72 in January.
Speaking of wagons, my first car was kind of a rare one : 1961 Corvair wagon with a 3 speed on the floor.. After a while the head gasket blew. The only garage in my area had the proper jack to work on it. It has to slide in the back of the car to lift the engine out. It would have been very expensive so I just let it go. It was cheaper to keep replacing the oil it blew out.
The license plate on the 64 Country Squire foils the illusion of this being a 1960’s photo. Massachusetts didn’t issue those green an white plate until the late 70’s.
That ’68 Buick is much prettier than the coupe or sedan versions, with their pointy rear ends.
Someone should have done a poll of how often those roof racks were actually used, if ever. More often than the silly luggage racks on sedans in the 80s.
It’s hard to tell from the picture, but that may be a blue on white plate from the late ‘60s/early ‘70s (which were pretty much identical to the later green on white plates except for the color). I think all green on white plates had numbers in the form of either 123-456 or 123-ABC. The year on the sticker would tell us for certain, but I’m not able to make it out.
It can’t be too old to be that pristine and parked outside, unless it isn’t at home. I can’t make out the car across the street through the window.
I hadn’t even noticed the vehicle across the street visible through the windows. I think what we can see is the tailgate of a Dodge pickup, although that isn’t much help in dating the photo.
I had the exact same thought that the photo was more likely from the blue-on-white era than the green-on-white era based purely on the condition of the car. A car of this vintage in this kind of condition would have much easier to find in Massachusetts during the period when blue-on-white plates were prevalent (1967-73) than during the period when green-on-white plates were prevalent (first issued in 1977, did not become universal until around 1983).
I think you’re right about that being a blue-on-white plate that’s just oddly colored in the photo. Massachusetts had red-and-white registration stickers in 1971, so my guess is that’s when the picture was taken.
I had a brain fart. There is no doubt that that is a blue and white plate even though to my eyes it looks green and white. The proof is that the blue and whites were issued in pairs, one on the front and one on the back. The green and white was issued as a single plate that went on the back and there was no front plate. This car wearing a front plate eliminates the possibility of it being a “greenie”.
What is amazing compared to Europe is that all of these station wagons were 4-door (or “5-door”, so to speak).
These were also available in “The Old Lands”, but 2-door (or “3-door”) station wagons were much more common back then.
VW and Audi didn’t have any “five-door” models on offer in the 1960s; at Opel and Ford, this version was significantly more expensive (and in little demand).
Although Volvo delivered the Amazon station wagon and the 145 “five-door”, they still kept the PV-based Duett with three doors in the range until 1969.
The big exception here were the French. Their “Familales” and “Breaks” were – with the exception of special versions – always “five-door”.
Things only changed in the 1970s, when the VW Passat Variant came onto the market, Volvos became more affordable for parts of the population and M-B set new standards with the S 123 station wagons.
Picture below: Typical European “three-door wagon” of the 60s: Opel Rekord C Caravan.
That’s a direct reflection of the fact that in Germany 2-door sedans were vastly more common in the lower-mid price segment than 4-door sedans. This is in contradiction to France , where 2-door sedans were extremely uncommon, until the subcompacts hatchbacks came along. The 2CV and all its offsprings and all Renaults (until the 5) were 4-door only.
4-door Opel sedans were available, but vastly less common than 2-door sedans. Same with Fords and all other low-mid priced German brands. Why? I’m not quite sure other than just a cultural preference or a habit that got established early on. Mercedes was obviously the big exception, but then they were almost universal in the taxi business and that required a 4-door, and they of course had stayed out of the low end of the market.
The Brits were somewhere in the middle, but clearly leaning more to 4-doors than the Germans, especially the true domestic makers (BMC, Rootes). Ford and Vauxhall were bigger on 2-doors, or split the difference.
Sweden was split for a long time too; the Saabs were all 2-doors until the 99, and even then, the 4-door version of the 99 and 900 series was always less common. Obviously Volvo too started out with just 2-doors, and although 4-doors became the more popular version of the 140/240 series, they still sold 2-door sedan version.
Of course all of this blurred in the ’80s, as the Germans started favoring 4-doors, including 4-door Golfs, and meanwhile 2-door super minis became very popular in France.
One more thing about that 64 Country Squire that’s just a bit off is that it has no inspection sticker. With state registration, bi annual inspections were required and proof of inspection was a state issued sticker glued to the bottom right of the windshield. This car doesn’t have one. Weird.
I think that the last Country Squire is a 1970, not a 1969. The wheel covers are definitely from a 1970.
I loved wagons as a kid, riding in the back of them was sooooo cool and fun, not that we ever had one. Before seat belt laws of course. My Mom was less enthusiastic always fearing the back would pop open and out I’d go. Long odds, but now a bit older I understand a Mothers’ perspective is far different than a 9 year old.
Flash forward 40 some years, well into the BMW world my wife suddenly develops a crush on BMW E39 tourings. Deciphered into non BMW speak that’s 97-03 BMW 5 series wagon. Didn’t break my heart so when one popped up for the right price in ’08 we grabbed it. Now on the second one with ~250K on the pair they’ve served us well, both stylish and practical. But given the seatbelt laws of the era, the grandkids never had the chance to ride in the back, untethered, so to speak. It was so much fun to go sliding back and forth, side to side… Alas, times change, sometimes for better and worse at the same time.
When I started driving in the late 1970s, we had a 66 Catalina SW with the 389. It would do 110 mph (but ‘floating’ best described the handling at that speed) and get 17mpg on a trip. Sold it to a guy in Sweden who already had a 2&4 door, and wanted a wagon. Wish I could drive ‘Blue Thunder’ one more time……
I know that I’ll probably NEVER see a period picture of one of these wagons in the wild, but it sure would be exceptionally cool. My very rare 1960 Edsel Villager wagon. Cousin to that gorgeous 1960 Country Squire posted. Being in production only a little over a month, the 1960 Edsel Villager only saw 275 units built. 59 9-passenger and 216 6-passenger. This one is preparing for a full frame-off restoration.