Happy Birthday Mustang

A week or so back, I mentioned that our family has a lot of birthdays in April, including our daughter Tiffany’s birthday on April 15^th. But I failed to mention that this year April 15^th was also another important birthday. It was the 58th anniversary of the Ford Mustang.

I love classic cars, especially old Mustangs, and I have had a bunch of them over the years, everything from show cars to daily drivers to hulks that were just bought to cannibalize when restoring something else.

My first Mustang was a 1967 coupe, which I bought right after I got to West Point, and I drove the wheels off of it. Since then, I have had 14 (yes, really) 1967 Mustangs, both coupes and fastbacks. Again, several of those were bought as parts cars for restoration projects. I also had a 1969 Mustang Mach 1 and four or five 1966 model years. Through all of that, I have never owned a Mustang convertible. I don’t know why I never got around to acquiring one over the years.

I don’t have a classic Mustang these days, but my garage queen is this 2018 EcoBoost Premium that I bought new and still has only 1,600 miles on it.

The first Ford Mustang sold, a sky blue convertible, was actually sold two days before the official date they were supposed to go on sale when a 22-year-old Chicago school teacher named Gail Wise saw it in a dealer’s backlot and plunked down the sticker price of $3,447.50 without even asking for a test drive. I’m not sure where that car is now, but as of 2018, Gail and her husband still owned it, and different experts valued it at anywhere from $350,000 to $450,000. That’s a pretty good investment if you ask me!

I have never met Gail, but a few years ago, I met another lady with a Mustang convertible who had an interesting story to tell. This beautiful old 1965 ragtop was parked next to me at a grocery store, and I couldn’t help admiring it. The lady who owned the car came out, and I complimented her on her nice ride. She said it was a gift from her husband, and I said she must have been a very good girl. She smirked at me and said, “No, he was a very bad boy.” Then waved as she drove away.

And finally, here’s a chuckle to start your day from the collection of funny signs we see in our travels and that our readers share with us.

Today is your last chance to enter our Free Drawing for an audiobook of Adam Gaffen’s Into the Black: Tales from the Cassidyverse. Science fiction fans are going to love this one, as Kendra Cassidy’s dream to drag humanity to the stars, as well as the dreams of her crew are revealed. It’s an old-fashioned whodunit, with an extra dose of interplanetary politics thrown in for good measure.

To enter, click on this Free Drawing link or the tab at the top of this page and enter your name (first and last) in the comments section at the bottom of that page (not this one). Only one entry per person per drawing please, and you must enter with your real name. To prevent spam or multiple entries, the names of cartoon or movie characters are not allowed. The winner will be drawn This evening. Note: Due to the high shipping cost of printed books and Amazon restrictions on e-books to foreign countries, only entries with US addresses and e-mail addresses are allowed.

Thought For The Day – I wonder what the part of my brain that used to store people’s telephone numbers is doing these days.