For me, the mid 60’s revolved around high school ball games, sock hops, rock n roll music, muscle cars, and Vietnam. It was a gentler time through the eyes and ears of youth. The years have flown by, and even my grandchildren are too old to participate in high school ball games. Sock hops are wonderful faded memories. Our 60’s music endured the test of time and is still enjoyed by all ages. Vietnam, which appeared in our Weekly Readers and on the evening news for so many years, is a sad memory. But, as far as muscle cars go, I still see some of those beautiful examples of engineering, tooling down the highway as if to say, “Remember when?”
Arguments over the detailed definition of a muscle car and which cars met those criteria first can be found all over the internet. Even the companies who built these beauties argue for the honor of being the first to introduce a muscle car, sighting production models before the mid 60’s that met “their” definition of a muscle car.
Ford, Chrysler, and GM were fierce competitors for those fascinated with “muscle cars” in the mid-’60s. I realize I’m leaving out cars that were probably your favorite; forgive me … but here are a few I knew and loved. In 1964, GM introduced the Chevelle Super Sport, the Pontiac GTO, and the Oldsmobile 442. Young and old alike were clamoring to buy these beautiful, fast automobiles. Ford had several iterations of high-performance cars, but the 1965 Ford Shelby Mustang (COBRA) was considered their first true muscle car (by some). Chrysler developed the Dodge Charger in 1966, and the race was on … literally, at most red lights.
Allow me to say I am not in any way a mechanic, nor am I an authority on the combustion engine or much of anything else. But I have driven most versions of the muscle cars of that era at one time or another and even tore the clutch out of a few, to the regretful dismay of the owners!
I went out with a young man who drove a very fast Chevy SS. He called me one day and said he wouldn’t be able to see me for a while. It seems his mother borrowed his beautiful car one morning while he was still sleeping. She heard a bumping noise in the backend of the car. Being a good mom and not wanting her over-6’-tall little boy to be stranded should the car break down, she took it to a mechanic friend. The noise wasn’t a problem for the car, but it sure was for my friend. In his trunk, rattling around, were all the big trophies he had won at the drag strip and was hiding from his small-in-stature but not-small-in-anger Southern mom!
