(EXPANDED FROM 9/8/2021)
Bill McGuire’s (2021b) story about the Mercury El Gato got me thinking about Ford’s conflicted design direction in the early-70s. The concept car hinted at what the 1969-70 Cougar might have looked like if had followed in the footsteps of the Ford Thunderbird.
In a 1970 reskinning, the T-Bird temporarily dropped its traditional broughamtastic two-door notchback in favor of a semi-fastback that was vaguely similar to the second-generation Buick Riviera. Ford may have panicked when sales of its iconic personal coupe fell to the point where the Riviera surpassed it in 1969.
Was the El Gato partly inspired by the Buick Riviera?
The El Gato borrowed a fastback roofline from the 1969-70 Mustang, albeit chopped. The resulting design had a distinctly Riviera vibe, particularly with its V-shaped rear end. Indeed, the sweepspear side sculpting — which was drawn from the standard Cougar — looked more like a Buick than the Riviera did.
Although the El Gato’s sweapspear is obscured by a side stripe, it arguably works better aesthetically with a fastback than with the notchback roofline used on production models. Might Mercury have been better off adding a fastback to the Cougar lineup than giving one to the mid-sized 1968-69 Cyclone, which looked awkward and sold poorly?
McGuire suggests that the El Gato’s pronounced snout was influenced by Ford President Semon “Bunkie” Knudsen, who reportedly pushed for the Thunderbird’s remarkably pointed beak (go here for further discussion).
Also see ‘Honest passion for Bunkie’s beak?’
I wonder if the former General Motors executive also advocated for the fastback on the T-Bird and El Gato. And was the return of the notchback T-Bird in 1971 an outcome of Knudsen’s firing from Ford on Sept. 11, 1969 (Wikipedia, 2021)?
This raises a timing question about the El Gato. McGuire says the concept car was unveiled in February 1970. That was presumably well after the 1971 Cougar’s redesign had been approved. What’s curious is why the El Gato deviated so sharply from the new styling direction of the forthcoming production models.
Other Ford concepts deviated from forthcoming cars
The El Gato was not the only Ford concept car of that time period which did not reflect very well the styling of next-generation products.
As a case in point, the 1970 Mustang Milano adopted a much less massive fastback shape than the 1971 redesign. Perhaps just as importantly, the concept car included a hatchback that would have greatly improved the Mustang’s versatility (McGuire, 2018b).
With some justification Mustang Illustrated Editor Bob McClurg argued that the Milano was the “car Ford should have built” (Kohrn, 2005). However, it should be remembered that this was only a two-seater that “would have never been sports car enough to compete with the Corvette,” noted Wallace Wyss (2021).
Also see ‘Lee Iacocca got lucky with the 1964-66 Ford Mustang’
A year earlier, the Ford Ranchero Scrambler displayed a cleaner and more angular look than the reskinned 1970 models (McGuire, 2018a). The same could even be said for the over-amped 1969 Super Cobra show car shown below (McGuire, 2021a).
Knudsen brings a GM designer with him to Ford
Part of why the Milano, Scrambler and Super Cobra did not more strongly reflect future production models may have been because these concept cars were designed by Larry Shinoda, who was brought over from GM by Knudsen (auto editors of Consumer Guide, 2009).
Also see ‘David Halberstam: Why Bunkie Knudsen ‘never had a chance at Ford’’
In a videotaped interview late in his life (see below), Shinoda talked about how his designs were informed by his belief that form should follow function (Gage, 2021). While his Ford concept cars hardly come off as the automotive equivalent of a Swiss Army knife, they were relatively trim and clean for that era. Perhaps this didn’t go over well with management that was increasingly drawn to bigger and glitzier designs.
Shinoda was fired after Knudsen was given the boot. One report stated that the designer was shown the door only one day after Knudsen (Rothenberg, 1998). However, Shinoda said that it happened a few weeks later (Gage, 2021).
A more prosaic explanation for the concept cars being stylistic dead ends was that they were based on existing hardware rather than the larger, new-generation Mustang and Torino bodies. However, that still raises the question: Who was responsible for doubling down on bloat? Was it Knudsen or his successor as Ford President, Lee Iacocca?
Of course, Shinoda didn’t design the El Gato, which was larger and more baroque than the Milano. Yet even the concept Cougar ended up looking positively lithe next to the ungainly 1971 models. We assess the damage here.
NOTES:
This story was first posted on Sept. 8, 2021 and expanded on Jan. 23, 2024. Dimensions are from the Classic Car Database (2021) and production figures from Gunnell (2002).
Share your reactions to this post with a comment below or a note to the editor.
RESOURCES
- Auto editors of Consumer Guide; 2009. “Larry Shinoda, Designer of the Ford Mustang Boss 302.” Dean’s Garage. Posted Nov. 24.
- Classic Car Database; 2021. “Search for specifications.” Accessed Sept. 7.
- Gage, Dennis; 2021. “Corvette Sting Ray History | Greatest Car Designers – Larry Shinoda | Full Interview.” MyClassicCarTV. com. Posted May 11.
- Gunnell, John; 2002. Standard Catalog of American Cars, 1946-1975. Revised 4th Ed. Krause Publications, Iola, WI.
- Kohrn, Wolfgang; 2005. “Mustang Concept Cars, The Milano — 1970.” Ponysite.de. Posted Aug. 23.
- McGuire, Bill; 2018a. “Ford’s Saucy Show Truck: The Ranchero Scrambler.” Mac’s Motor City Garage. Posted Feb. 13.
- ——; 2018b. “Purple People-Eater: The 1970 Mustang Milano.” Mac’s Motor City Garage. Posted Nov. 15.
- ——; 2021a. “Going Thing: The 1969 Ford Super Cobra Concept.” Mac’s Motor City Garage. Posted Feb. 24.
- ——; 2021b. “El Gato! A 1970 Mercury Concept Car.” Mac’s Motor City Garage. Posted Sept. 7.
- Rothenberg, Al; 1998. “Design Debate: Who’s the Father of the Jeep Grand Cherokee?” WardsAuto. Posted March 1.
- Wikipedia; 2021. “Semon Knudsen.” Page last edited Aug. 7.
- Wyss, Wallace; 2021. “Concepts: 1970 Ford Mustang Milano.” Mycarquest.com. Posted Feb. 6.
BROCHURES & ADVERTISING:
- oldcarbrochures.org: Buick Riviera (1968); Ford Mustang (1969); Ford Thunderbird (1971); Ford Torino (1970); Mercury Cougar (1970)
PHOTOGRAPHY:
- fordheritagevault.com: Ford Super Cobra (1969); Ford Mustang Milano (1970); Mercury El Gato (1970)
The problem with Ford 1970’s styling until the down-sizing of 1977-1979, especially the Thunderbirds and the Lincolns, were that the platforms were basically the same, but the front-overhangs kept getting longer and longer. The styling WAS NOT inspired by the Packards or Bugattis of old. The Thunderbirds had stuck with variations in the 1967 restyle, and the 1970-71 Thunderbird, front-end aside, was basically a 1967 T-Bird with a Pontiac-style beak, in my opinion. My uncle and aunt bought a black vinyl roofed, Wimbledon white four-door Landau (I think), but the interior was very much like their 1968 T-Bird Landau. In my humble opinion, the “Bunkie-Beak” was a quick fix that was another styling dead-end. For 1970, it was time for a complete rethink for what had been “The World’s Most Desirable Car”, but Ford’s management was in a civil war between Knudsen and Iacocca.
James, you make some good points. David Halberstam argued that Knudsen was pushed out of Ford for political reasons (go here), but he also made some obviously bad product decisions, e.g., as you point out his beak fetish was indeed a dead end.