Stalking the Mark III

Spies who stay out in the Detroit cold these days are working overtime trying to turn up intelligence about the final styling and appearance of the new Continental Mark III. As it happens, Ford Motor's Lincoln-Mercury division is shielding the Mark III like an H-bomb until its well-publicized first appearance at the Chicago auto show late this month. Last week, however, at least one spy managed to foil Ford's counter-intelligence and photograph a Mark III during trial spins at the company's Dearborn test track. The picture shows a very stylish car indeed.

The Mark III is the third in a line of elegantly customized Lincolns, originally conceived by Edsel Ford. It will be produced only in a two-door model, which will weigh in at $8,000. The pitch is clearly for buyers who until now have fallen for luxury hot-rods like Cadillac's front-wheel-drive Eldorado. To win them to Continental--or at least lure them into a Lincoln-Mercury showroom--Ford's engineers and stylists have aimed at "elegant perfection." Says Marketing and Product Planning Manager Ralph L. Peters: "We're going all the way with this car."

The Mark III's most obvious feature is a vertical hashmark grille in shimmering metal that closely resembles the grille of a Rolls-Royce. On its 117-in. wheel base, the car mounts an eight-cylinder, 460-cu.-in. engine specially designed to provide improved combustion and cut exhaust fumes. Other features, including interior warning lights, air conditioners and radios, have been adapted from either the smaller Thunderbird or the bigger Lincoln.

One reason for such adaptations is that the Mark III has been engineered with profits as well as esthetics in mind. The Mark I, which in 1959, along with the Olivetti typewriter and Mies van der Rohe's Barcelona chair, was voted one of the ten best designs of modern times, sold only 5,300 after Edsel Ford introduced it in 1939. The Mark II, which featured simply sculptured "slab sides" instead of the chrome that was the rage in Detroit in 1956, sold 3,000 over a two-year life span. But Ford estimates that 15,000 Mark IIIs will be sold in the car's first year. Beautiful people have begun to buy beautiful Mark IIIs even before the formal introduction. Entertainer Sammy Davis Jr. ordered one for April delivery in London and the Shah of Iran reportedly has also bought a Mark III.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.