Dad Should Have Bought That ‘Hot’ 1964 1/2 Ford Mustang

The Ford Mustang is celebrating a special birthday this year. This perpetually youthful car—the one that started the pony-car craze—is now a sexagenarian. It’s 60 years old.

Hard to believe. The car has been around as long as things like Pop-Tarts, Lava Lamps, and (but not quite) Madonna!

It’s difficult to overstate what an impact the introduction of the Mustang made back in 1964. To say it was a sensation with the public doesn’t quite capture its initial reception, but maybe the numbers do.

It sold 22,000 the first day. For context, in one day the Mustang outsold every Mini, Jaguar, Alfa Romeo, and all but one Genesis for all of 2023, in many cases by a wide margin.

Released in April 1964, it still managed to sell 263,434 copies by year’s end despite the shortened sales period. Within 18 months, over one million Mustangs had been sold—extraordinary numbers, especially when you consider that Ford had only expected to sell 100,000 that first year.

Part of the secret of its success can be explained in the original print ads. Along with a striking photo of a white coupe shot in profile against a black background, there were four numbers prominently featured: 2368, the price of the car.

For that low entry point, you got a sporty coupe that was unlike anything the country had seen before. Plus, the marketing was great, by promoting “Mustang is designed to be designed by you.”

Ford had positioned the car so that just about anybody could see themselves in it. If you just wanted a small, stylish commuter, a more performance-oriented variant, or an upscale version as a mini-Thunderbird, the car would fit your lifestyle and taste. It was a car that appealed across social hierarchies. It was simply the hot car to have.

But more than anything, it was the way the car looked. At that time, if you wanted something really stylish you paid for it, with inexpensive cars tending to look it. But the Mustang was a car that was as stylish as anything on the road and one that most could afford.

This was fundamental to its success: it looked more expensive than it was. With distinctive proportions—being credited for the trend toward the long hood and short rear deck look—it was also deceptively simple in its design.

It didn’t rely on anything dramatically different or controversial, yet appeared fresh and new just the same. This, despite the fact that the Mustang was based on very humble Falcon components. This practice of putting a more expressive body on a conventional chassis would become commonplace in the industry.

The success of the Mustang obviously inspired a whole rash of competitors in a few years, or as fast as other manufactures could react. It changed the industry, but the car that led Ford to build it in the first place was one of the casualties.

The Chevrolet Corvair had been gaining sales partially by the sporty Monza variant, appealing to a younger demographic, and Ford realized both the potential of the market and that they had nothing to compete with it.

And while some claim it was Ralph Nader’s criticism of the Corvair in his book Unsafe at Any Speed, it was really the impact of the Mustang and GM’s decision to refocus their resources on a more direct competitor, the Camaro, that put an end to the Corvair.

Over the past 60 years there have been many variants of the Mustang, as it morphed into vehicles very different from the original and not always for the better.

Initially, it got more aggressive, emphasizing performance, with larger engines and more power as it entered the muscle car era.

When the second-generation Mustang II was introduced in 1974, the goal was to right size the car to compete more with the foreign competition and deal with escalating fuel prices.

Here was a car that had none of the inherent grace of the ‘64, and although a car of its time, seemed more the result of a product planner’s spreadsheet than the heir to the legacy of the original.

But maybe I’m a little prejudiced. For in 1964 my father was in the market for a new car, and I remember going with him for a test drive in the new Mustang. I don’t recall the color of the car or really any of the other details about it.

But I remember sitting in the back seat as we headed down a street while onlookers, one by one, slowly turned their heads to stare at the car, and how that felt.

My father eventually bought something else, a Volvo 122S, which was perhaps more sturdy and practical. But I was disappointed because I wanted him to get the Mustang.

It was, after all, the hot car to have.

Dave Rand (pictured right) is the former executive director of Global Advanced Design for General Motors.