Today’s Post by Joe Farace
A brand new 1963½ Ford Falcon Futura was my second car. My Mom, for some reason, knew a salesman who worked at Archway Motors’ satellite showroom in Baltimore; It was so tiny and could only show one car at a time. He made me a deal for around $2600 for a brand new cool Futura model that had bucket seats and was a beautiul shade of metallic blue.
How I Made this photograph: I photographed my 1963 1/2 Ford Falcon, when it was still relatively new, and parked in front of my parent’s home with the only 35mm camera I owned at the time—an Argus C3 that my folks had given me as a birthday gift. The C3 was manufactured by Argus in Ann Arbor, Michigan from 1939 to 1966. The camera was equipped with a 50mm f/3.5 Cintar anastigmat triplet lens that were made, under contract, by Bausch & Lomb, Ilex, and Graf Optica.
The car was photographed using E-3 Ektachrome that was processed by the local Technicolor film lab for free by a relative who worked there. It was a great perk and the reason I shot Ektachrome a lot back in those days. E-3 was not as stable as the later E-4 (1966–1996) process hat followed it, which had a 30-year life. ScanMyPhotos did the best they could with this sixty-year old faded slide.
In today’s dollars the cost of my Falcon would be $26,653. In my area, a 2025 VW Jetta costs about $23,731, so that seems like it’s in the same ballpark. Theoretically a new Jetta would be a better buy since it has many modern features including better safety, disc brakes and a modern drive train. But…Consumer Reports reported that the VW Jetta is one of the top ten LEAST reliable new cars. On the other hand, Mary’s 2016 VW Beetle convertible has been a wonderfully dependable vehicle but has far less (none?) of the electronic doo-dads found on a modern Jetta. Do with that information as you will.
Unlike some of the cars that are featured in this series I have no sad stories to tell about this car and to this day have nothing but find memories of it. In fact, when Mary and I decided to enter The Great Race, I originally went looking for a Falcon Futura to enter in the event. After much “frog kissing” of rusty and fake Futuras I gave up and bought the 1953 Packard Clipper that has been featured here as well. PS, we never entered The Great Race, that’s a story you’ll find in the Packard post.
The Car
The Ford Falcon was a line of cars that Ford produced during the 1960 to 1970 model years. Although it was preceded by AMC’s Rambler American, the Falcon was the first compact car marketed by one of the Big Three American manufacturers.
The original 1960 Falcon was powered by a 95-hp 144 CID straight-six engine that had a single-barrel carburetor. My car had the optional 101-hp, 170 CID six cylinder engine. The car featured the same kind of unibody construction that Ford introduced for the 1958 Ford Thunderbird aka “Square Bird” and Lincoln Continental. The car had a coil spring front suspension and leaf spring rear suspension with drum brakes front and rear. A three-speed manual column shift was standard and a two-speed Ford-O-Matic automatic, which my car had, was optional along with the classy whitewall tires you see on my car.
The bucket-seat “Futura” model, the mainoption my car had, was offered with a upgraded interior, factory-installed safety belts, different side trim, and different emblems. I think that an AM radio and heater were also an option. Halfway through the model year—the ½ year designation my 1963 car carried—Ford redesigned the roof line at the back window to look more like a Thunderbird design.
Barry Staver and Joe Farace are co-authors of Better Available Light Digital Photography that may be an oldie but, I think anyway, that it’s a goodie. Used copies start around twelve bucks from Amazon. No Kindle version is available