Fifty Years of Mustangs: A History of Scale Model Mustangs

MUSTANGS! Over the centuries, mustangs have come in a number of different configurations. Some have had hooves. Some have had wings. But...horses and airplanes aside, the Mustangs that really hit like high-energy lightening bolts, were the ones produced and first released to a “car-hungry” nation by the Ford Motor Company in April, 1964. Television commercials, news magazine covers and high-energy radio ads created near-total, fever-pitch anticipation! Those unique and special first Generation One Mustangs were something almost transcendent, exhilarating and energizing for the U.S. car-buying public. Never before had Americans been given access to their own personal, sporty and classy “time machine” and certainly nothing like the new Mustang since the specialty rides of the 1930's and '40's! Fifty years of Mustangs, takes an in-depth look at the first five decades of this automotive icon with a literal, global following. If you're a Mustang fan, you'll find historic information on many of the full-size versions from the first half-century of production. But the truly unique aspect of this tome is that visually, Fifty Years of Mustangs' scale replicas provide a veritable cornucopia, running the full gamut of scales, eras shapes, colors and materials. As we'll see in this book, plastic model car kits have been quite prominent and prevalent for those 50 years. Whether it was AMT, MPC, IMC, Revell, Monogram, Pyro, Lindberg, Testors, Palmer, Ertl, Tamiya, Model King, Gunze Sangyo, Nitto Kagaku, USAirfix, Renwal or you name it and we can pretty much guarantee its existence at one time or another. Then for good measure, some resin kits and quality die cast examples have been included from such sources as Starter, Precision Miniatures, GMP, Danbury Mint and Automodello etc. for example. Considering the amazing quantity of Mustang scale model plastic kits, the numbers become truly overwhelming when we fold in all the other Mustang scale replicas (diecast, resin kits etc.) and the countless pieces of Mustang collectible memorabilia. The job of documenting the whole affair is quite challenging. Coming closest to that kind of effort might be Mustang Collectibles which I authored for Motor Books International back in 2002. But, then...just imagine all the brand-new stuff that's been produced in the years since then! Primarily, and much like the self-published “decade series” Harry Pristovnik and I have been generating recently (The Nifty '50's & The Sizzlin' '60's), this new 50th anniversary of the Ford Mustang book will cover the highlights from concept vehicles to the latest offerings just prior to going to press. Though it would be nearly impossible to provide photos and text about every item that's ever been available...we have made our best efforts here, to see that you experience as much of the “Mustang aura” as is possible...limited of course by just ink on paper. Whether you are a model car builder, model kit collector or mostly an accumulator of “Mustang stuff”, we hope you'll find what “floats your boat” right here in these freshly printed pages. Read more