A Ford Thunderbird just like this is what my parents brought me home from the hospital in back in early April of 1964. My father had just gotten a fat bonus check from raking a client over the coals and he blew a good portion of it on it along with putting a substantial down payment on an inground pool my mother wanted. Mom wanted the plushier looking "landau", she had a tendency to appreciate things that were Liberace gaudy, but the John Wayne meets Frank Sinatra of a man my father was, he put his boot down and insisted on the hard top. Good for you, dad.
Of course, that's complete nonsense. My father was far from a corporate raider, frankly, I don't know what he did for a living, and I was brought home in either a worn out, early '50's Desoto or a 1961 Rambler Classic. And I can't say which one of those bombs I would have preferred to have spit up on my mother in. My mother claimed I was a cranky, colicky baby, I love that fact, and I'd say a major reason for that was that I didn't approve of the car they had.
If my parents were of the means to afford a new Ford Thunderbird when I was born, honestly, GM girl that I am, I would have much preferred they'd have a Buick Riviera. But I wouldn't have kicked one of these out of my basinet. Sigh. I sometimes wonder what my life would have been like growing up had my parents been wealthy and indulged themselves and their three sons materialistically. Knowing what I know now, whomever it was who said money can't buy happiness really did know what they were talking about. Although, it can make things seem a whole lot easier. If not fun. Having money means you just have one less thing to worry about and growing up in that household, there was a whole lot more to be concerned about.
Not that the Ford Thunderbird was ever meant to be a "driver's car", but the new-for-'64's obliterated any pretense of performance the "bullet 'bird" it replaced did. Weighing 4,700-pounds with a full-tank of premium gas, the near two-and-half-ton curb weight due to the hefty unibody it shared with the Lincoln Continental, the oh-so-softly sprung '64 sprang from zero-to-sixty in 11.5 seconds. The quarter mile breezed by eventually at 18 seconds and 76 miles-per-hour. Despite the zoomie sheet metal, top speed was just 105.
The good news was it was closed, bank vault quiet at speed. Nice to know new-born me wouldn't have had to endure any undue road noise on the jaunt from the hospital to our North Shore mansion with the inground pool under construction in the backyard.
Oh, sorry. I keep forgetting none of that ever happened.
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