Ahhh, The Lines....

Back in my younger days, when my 'front porch' wasn't nearly as large, I recall sitting in high school in college English class during my freshman year. Now I went to a Catholic high school---great education but of course, very strict. Sister Mary was the teacher...but we used to call her Sister Booger as she had this bad habit of pickin' the old schnoz right in front of the class. Anyway, I got to sit near the large bank of windows that dominated the south side of the classroom. Outside, and right next to my high school, was the local Lincoln-Mercury dealer. It was an odd building because the lot was sloped upward toward the back, so that the cars were actually parked on the dealership's roof. Wouldn't you know it, but they used to park all those brand new 1983 Cougars right on top of that building. And wouldn't you know it....I was distracted the whole time that year in English class. And not just because the girls wore short uniform skirts either (that's a WHOLE other story there).

Now at this time I was not a car guy, believe it or not. I had no idea who made what, and the only cars I was even vaguely familiar with was the GM products that my parents owned. They had some cool ones ('64 1/2 Mustang, '61 Corvette, '75 Monte Carlo LANDAU baby! but alas, no swivel buckets) and some not-so-cool ones ('80 Bonneville with a sickly 231 V6 comes to mind). But that was about all I knew as far as cars went. So why did those Cougars on the roof capture my attention so much? What was it that MADE me look at them? Why did I sit and draw them all over my notebooks? After all these years I think I've figured it out.

The lines.

Sure, you hear people say all the time, "Look at the lines on this baby, huh!" Usually they're referring to something that was produced WAY before you were born. I'm not disputing that older cars (pre-1973) didn't have great lines, as a lot of them are simply awesome. So awesome in fact, that they look as fresh today as they did when they were new. And you know what----you can add the 1983-88 Cougars right in there with the best of them. Some would say that these cars are "too new" to say that. Are they really? The 1981 Trans Am has some great lines, and it's only 2 years older than the 1983 Cougar. So why does the T/A get more recognition? This is exactly my point..why indeed.

Our cars (and please include the Thunderbirds in there too) STILL look brand new. The soft rounding of the fender tops, the agressive taper on the hood lines, the small grille, the long hood/short deck, the aircraft style doors, the hidden windshield washers, the side lines that hold your eye...all are classic body styling cues. Need proof? Take a good long look at a 1963-67 Corvette coupe and pick out most of the above. The simple fact is, we are driving modern-day classically styled cars. Name any other cars produced in the mid-80's that have withstood the test of time as well as ours. Hard to do, isn't it?

The problem here seems to lie within the general public. In this era of shorter and shorter attention spans, our cars have somehow gotten lost in everyone's collective memory. I've said it before and I'll say it again, we are just at an unlucky time period right now. Our cars are too "old" by today's standards, but too "new" for most car clubs. Nevermind that the 1983 model is now 17 years old or anything! I for one am damn proud to park my Cats next to any other car out there and say that I can hang with them in the styling department. That's a feeling you can't replace. I sure hope you all feel that way too.

I don't think there really is a short-term solution, other than to buy as many Cougars as you can and drive them everywhere. The more people see our cars, the more they'll jog their memories about them. For now, we are probably about 3-5 years ahead of our time. Things tend to happen in 20-year cycles in this country (never thought I'd see the day when disco was back in!). So will it be with 1980's Ford cars next decade.

Rest assured...we WILL have the last laugh.

Until next time,

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