My first car was a used '70 Maverick, thick sheet metal that survived teen-age boy driving. For college I upgraded and sold the well-worn Maverick to a wino for $100...but that wasn't the end! One night a couple years later, there it was at a 7-11 with new owners, a young couple, and they loved it. Very tough cars!
Ditto... Bought mine as a high school senior in '86 for $400 from a little old lady (no joke). It was in great condition (Bonus: I found a cool green sweater under the seat). On the last day of my first semester in university, I was sitting, celebrating with friends, when we heard a huge crash and excitedly looked out the window and I yelled "My car!". It had been hit so hard where it was parked out front that oil was streaming from the engine. It was totaled. Sad day; it had been a very good car. Fortunately, the guy had good insurance and I was given an all-power Ford LTD rent-a-car until a check came for $1200! That was enough for me to buy my dream car: '68 Mercury Cougar. Thank you, Maverick. I wish all my stories of disasters in life ended this well. ; )
@@michaelmoraga2926 now this is crazy, '68 Cougar was my dream car too, I couldn't be very stealthy though coming in late and bang-bang the headlight doors would come down. That's a very cool story you shared.
I was 12 and already a hopeless car nut when the Maverick was introduced. I used to “hang out” at a small town Ford dealership on Saturday when my parents went to town. This old dealership had an elevator and cars were parked in the basement. Back about 2 weeks before the Maverick was introduced the salesman who befriended me said that they had a Maverick and would I like to see it. I know what this sounds like in 2024, but in 1969 parents had far fewer worries. Anyway, we went into the basement and there sat an Anti Establish Mint Maverick. It’s among some of the happiest memories of my childhood!
Base price of a '70 Maverick was about $16k in today's money. And you got a penalty box on wheels. Most would have sold for about $20k in today's money. They weren't reliable at all by today's standards. If you lived in the north with salty roads, it would compost itself in about 3-4 years. At least they were gutless with terrible handling as compensation.
My mother traded in a 1963 Corvair for a new 1970 Maverick. It was a great copper bronze color with gold pinstriping. It was unusual with a 250 six and auto. Gave it to me in 1973.
A lot of people upgraded to the 250 straight 6. The standard 200 cid was a weak sister. The 194 slant 6 standard on Dart and Valiant, and the 230 straight 6 standard on the Nova and Ventura II left it in the dust. The Mopar 225 slant 6 and GM 250 straight 6 were both common upgrades that did make the cars safer. Smart money bought the small V8 in all 3 lines. The Ford 302, Chevy 307 and Chrysler 318 used less gas than the 6s and had enough go to get out of their own way
My friend had a rusty Maverick. His rear leafspring hanger was broke. He leveled the car with 2x4's. Worked until he hit a good pothole. Wood exploded out the back. He replaced it with more wood. Lol
Most of the first gen Mustang project cars are gone. All that's left is complete rusted-out wrecks or 'restorations' of various quality. Because of the continued popularity of the first gen Mustang you can buy EVERYTHING needed to rebuild a first gen Mustang. Lots of people have noticed that Falcons, Comets and Mavericks are the same as the Mustang under the skin. That means that all the mechanical bits that work with an early Mustang work with the other Falcon based cars so now people are restoring those cars.
My Dad bought one of these off our neighbor , drove it a while , then sold it to my buddy. The thing was a rust bucket at that point , and the gas tank was held in with baling wire at the end of his ownership. 😂
There is a 1974'ish Maverick driving around this Midwestern town. It has a wooden replacement bumper. The old one rusted away, and I wonder if he can't find another one in a junkyard that isn't completely rusted.
With the amount of rock salt that was thrown down in the Midwest and northeast back then, little wonder they rusted out. Remember a good number of them in Albuquerque yards circa ‘00, they had perfect bodies.
@@raymond_sycamoreUnlike copyright, you actually have to *use* a trademark in your business if you want to keep it. Ford thus has a reason to recycle old names, even for different classes of vehicles.
The small bumper Maverick really took hold in Brazil, lasting in 1970 form well into the 1980s. It’s amazing what a front spoiler, a 2” lowering and wide wheels does to these cars. Many had the 302/4sp combo which made them quite formidable in a sea of anemic 4cyl offerings from competitors. Great content! Thank you
Yeah, they're as loved here as the Mustang itself in the US, it was Ford's muscle car option against Chevrolet's Opala SS [which had a 250-ci i6, but was lighter] and our Dart/A-body-based Dodge Charger R/T.
@@michaeltutty1540, that was made by an aftermarket company, Linked to a Ford delearship. And Yes, it was gorgeous and now expensive in the collector car market.
@@Roddy_Zeh, and with the 302 “canadian “ engine with quadrajet Holley carbs and front disc brakes with dual calipers ( my father worked at Ford and help the devolopment) it was the king of tracks, specially in 24hs races All over the country. Good times and thanks for the memories.
@@Victor-Lag There's a garage near here that works with classic cars, but the owner is specialized in Ford, and the Mavericks are his #1. There's even a Maverick race car famous amidst the fans, the "Febre Amarela", literally the Yellow Fever.
Remember that a successful executive made 30 grand a year and a high school teacher made 9 grand. So about 22% of a high school teacher's yearly pay. Not bad. Inflation Calculator-Bot says $1,995 in 1970 = $16,600 now.
I had a friend who had a 1970 Maverick with a 351 Windsor and a 4 speed. It was Grabber Blue and had rhe hood with the little scoops. This was in the late 80's and it was really fast and took alot of cars by surprise pulling away from a traffic light. I haven't seen a Maverick in probably 15 years.
My now late older brother bought back in 1976 a lightly used 1973 Mercury Comet GT with a 302 h.o. v-8. It was in Dark green with a medium green striping. A 4 on the floor manual and high back buckets. It was one of the first cars he bought out of high school. It was a cool looking and still decent performance car. I remember him putting on a bigger Holly 4bbl. Carburetor and a Hurst shifter kit in it.😎
In my opinion, The Falcon chassis was yesterday’s Fox body in that it was used in several cars from compact to midsized. Falcon, Mustang, Fairlane, Torino, Granda , and even the Lincoln Versailles along with their Mercury counterparts.
And not just in the US. Ford Canada shipped first gen Falcon tooling to Australia. Eventually Ford Oz worked the car into something uniquely Australian and the Falcon nameplate went on to become one of the best selling car lines in Australia. The Mad Max 'interceptor' was a 70s vintage Australian Falcon. The first gen body style Falcon was also produced in Argentina until the early 1990s. The Argentine Falcon was purchased in large numbers by the government and used by right wing government 'death squads' and become notorious as a result. Don't believe me? Google, " The Ford Falcon Death Cars of Argentina".
I came here to say exactly this. I believe the Maverick coupe would end up being the smallest and narrowest of the Falcon derivatives. One source counted as many as 18 variations of wheelbase and track width.
@@HAL-dm1eh I’d match the Ford 6 with the Chevy 6 any day. And I think the 302 351w were just as good as the Chevy small block. However, I think the Oldsmobile V8 was superior to both of them.
And I’d like to add, for no good reason, that I love the second gen Camaro and firebirds, early years. But the maverick, not so much. GM really did go through a golden era in design back then.
Thank you for featuring this Maverick. I found one abandoned on 99E just south of Oregon City back in the 90s. Took it home and somehow got a title. Needed a head gasket, carb and transmission, all easily done with hand tools and help from friends. She was my daily driver for over a year and even made it over Mt Hood a few times. What a great little car.
LOL We lived in Gladstone in the early '70s and drove 99E back and forth to my grandma's house in Canby all the time. I can picture right where you found it!
@@ue4058 That's cool man. I have fond memories of Canby too. I was astonished at how easy the Oregon DMV was to deal with. Plates remain on the car for life, no annual safety inspections and insurance is optional. Do you recall the BP station on 99e in downtown OC? I was a pump jockey there in '92. Loved the drunks that would stagger over from the Spinning Wheel.
As I recall, one of the new Maverick's promotional gimmicks was the vehicle's owner could do much of the routine servicing him/herself -- saving money doing self-maintenance on such a simple machine.... Remember?
That's EXACTLY what I saw too! Never spotted the similarities before Adam suggested the riddle. I fully expected a pic of the first generation Camaro, NOT the Toro. Both the Maverick and Toronado were in my family when I was a kid. That 69 Toro was AMAZING!
I agree the two have some similar lines, but there's one catch: the generation of Camaro that resembles the Maverick didn't come out until about a year after the Ford debuted.
My first car was a 1971 Mercury Comet, a Maverick with a different front hood. I bought it in 1976 from a Ford dealer for $1,050. After the down payment, it cost me $49.50/mo. for 18 months.
I never noticed the similarities before. Now I can't unsee it. My best friend's mom bought a '72 Mercury Comet in bright yellow with a black interior. Just a badge engineered Maverick. It was sporty looking, but not fast & with no AC was super hot inside with those black vinyl seats!
@@louislepage5111 just throw something out on the internet. At least 50 people will believe it without as much as a critical thought in their simple little minds.
The main target for the Maverick was the VW Beetle in 1969. The Ford was $200( 10%) cheaper than the Chevy II, and Valiant Duster. Only the Rambler American was about the same price $1995, and it was going away for 1970. The Beetle was about $1900 to start vs the Maverick. I owned both 1970 models. The beetle was what it was... a reliable commuter car. No radiator or real heater, dubious safety in a collision, 32 mpg on highway, a semi-auto transmission and some kind of A/C system that was substandard. It had little storage and cramped. For the same money, the Maverick sat two adults and 2 kids got 25 mpg with the manual tranny, easily fit three overnighters and a real heater, with a MarkIV under dash A/C unit available at the dealer and a fine C-4 auto tranny available for less than the VW units. VW needed valve adjustments every tuneup (12000 miles). Ford had one of the finest 6 cylinders ever made, the 7main bearing 200ci. It had hydraulic lifters, and AM radio was standard. Only issue I saw with the Ford.... control arms would squeak unless you drilled grease fittings in through the shock towers, and no glove box. VW had better quality control at delivery. But, for the money Maverick was the buy of the year in 1969/70. Rust... either one had issues with salted roads in time.
I had a 1972 Comet version in the late 1970’s. Six cylinder three speed manual. Slow but reliable. Good gas milage for the time. It was a two door coupe as well.
My father purchased a Ford Maverick with a manual transmission in 1970. Shortly after he purchased it, it would only go into 2nd gear. He got it fixed. A few years later my brother was driving it in Northern Michigan when the transmission completely failed and the car was junked.
I can agree with you 100%. In 1966 when the Toro came out I loved them. When all my friends were into Mustangs and Vets I was lusting after the Toros. It was way ahead of its time in styling and engineering.
If you are going to be like Kamala and steal, er, borrow, stuff, you couldn't do any better than the Toronado. Maybe 'inspired' rather than steal. The styling is much better than most of the cars today. The standard tires were a 6.45 x 13 if my memory is correct. 14 inch were available, Base price was $1,995.
A little Falcon trivia: When Ford replaced the Falcon with the Maverick, they shortly labeled the economy version of the Torino as the Falcon. They're pretty rare, not that anyone would want one.
Our neighbors had a brown Mercury Comet in the early to mid 1980s. They kept it spotless inside and out. Their daughter would come and pick up me and my siblings for church in it.
The credit buster special back in the day. The only new car my father ever owned. I liked the metal door handles but hated the 3rd/4th degree burns you got in the summer with thier plastic- vynal seat...
When I was 9 years old my mom got a new red 72' Maverick two door with 302 and that thing was a hoot,, a few years later i learned it would just smoke the tires right off of it ... lol I took my driving test in it...
My sister received one of these for college graduation. It was gold with black and white plaid upholstery and a three on the tree. She taught me to drive in this car. She watched from the window as I backed it into the tree by the drive, laughing! I think it's only options were a radio and a cigarette lighter. She drove it for four years and traded it for a year old 73 Riviera during the oil embargo. I don't think two cars could be greater contrasts!
Me dad bought me a new 1972 Maverick for college, It was white with a tan leather look roof and trim Shag carpet with soft vinyl bucket seats like leather. It had a 302 V8 so it would fly down the road. I got 2 speeding tickets to prove it. stayed in the family for over 10 years. We loved the little car.
Ford sold a lot of these cars because of a very early spring time introduction in 1969. I really like the Maverick Grabber with the muscle car hood and 302 V8 that came out in 1971.
What I remember about the Maverick’s launch was the brand new 1970 model year debuted in the Spring of 1969. I was 12 at the time and we were just getting used to 1969 and suddenly there was a car model available from the next decade!!
I was in high school when the Maverick was introduced. One other guy in high school was gifted by his parents with a red one and we loved it. We also enjoyed the dashboard on here, with it seeming so similar to the new Hornet.
My Dad had a 4 door 71 Maverick 200 six for his insurance route car that he bought at a Southern Bell auction. I learned to drive on it at age 13. I hated that car. The rear springs sagged so bad that I was afraid my arm was going to drag the road when laying it on the window edge while driving. The 4 wheel drum brakes just slowed and there was no braking to them. It was fun starting it up on a cold morning though. 30 pumps of the 1 barrel and a tricky feathering of the pedal for about a minute would allow it to run on its own and 5 minutes later it would actually pull itself out of the driveway. It ran a long long time though. We wished it would break. We hoped and prayed it would quit running so we could get a decent car, but it just kept on running. Even boiled the oil once when the fan belt broke but it just kept on going a long time after. Finally sold it to buy a truck to pull our fishing boat.
Funny you should mention how he got it - my dad was a supervisor at Southern Bell - and a Maverick was his first "supervisor" car (before the promotion he drove a van). After that, believe it or not, he was assigned a Pinto, then a Chevette, then a Chevy S-10. My oldest brother bought a 1971 Ford LTD (or Galaxy) from a Southern Bell auction and my first thought was "wow - this must have been a vice president's car or something".
I had a mercury bobcat . Same as a ford pinto. It had a v6. I worked in a college town, used to hang out outside pawn shops waiting for college kids to pawn their car stereo equipment. Took out the back seats, built a base box with 2 18 inch base speakers where the backs of the back seats used to be . A couple of rockford fosgate boxes with 8 inch speakers on the back deck. Door speakers, midrange and tweets, active crossovers, about 800 amps total , good times. Best bass cd (or cassette) been a long time ago😂😂 try it. Tanya tucker greatest hits 2. Honorable mention, paul revere, beasty boys.
My father offered to help me finance a '70 Maverick because he didn't want me in a Camaro. As I remember the Maverick it was slow, marshmallow suspension, turning radius the size of a football field, ten turns of the steering wheel lock-to-lock, super cheap interior, bad ergometrics, etc. Needed a shot of starting fluid down the carb after every heavy rain. The Ford dealer gave me a complimentary toy Pinto when I collected the Maverick. I didn't get the connection. The toy Pinto probably would be worth money now. I kept the Maverick for three years. It really wasn't a bad car for reliability, unlike the Vega which I bought on the advice of car enthusiast magazines. I wish the US auto industry had built better "starter" cars during that era and staved off the Japanese takeover. I still miss the Maverick at times, after all these decades. I was a teenage kid, and it was my first car.
I worked as a salesman at an Oldsmobile dealership in 1972. I also special ordered a 1972 Maverick with a V8 and a number of options including power blue paint with a white painted top. The owner of the dealership gave me a hard time but I was selling lots of cars so he really didn’t care. I loved the styling of the Maverick and I’ve always thought the Toronado was a beautiful car but I always thought the Maverick looked a bit like a Camaro. However, I do see what you’re talking about.
Ford marketed the North American Granada as a Mercedes look-a-like. You can see the TV commercials here on RU-vid where Ford compares the Granada to the Benz.
Are you kidding the Granada looked like a shoe box. typical 1970's -80's style, make a box that you can cram many people into. Style and contour don't matter.
I have to say that I see a lot more Camero styling in the Maverick than Toronado. The proportions, build quality, features, and ingenuity of the Toronado and its' GM stablemates were well above Vega and Maverick level. And in hindsight, I'd much rather have a Maverick than a Vega. I'm a multi-generational, lifelong GM guy, but I'm not stupid.
Ha! Never even bothered to notice the resemblance to the Toro. Even the rear bumper that had upswept ends! I bet one of these with a hopped up 302 would be fun!
A buddy of mine in high school in the '80's had a '73 also with a 250ci. He had modified it with a cam, headers and other stuff and it would scream. Back then I couldn't see the appeal, but now I'd have it in a second.
@@RRaquello It's one of those cars that people didn't think would be considered kinda cool 50 years after it was produced, so not many people kept them or restored them for future admiration. It's a shame too, because that 2 door small bumper version looks way cooler now than it did back then.
@@jamesrodriquez2863 The one our family had was bright yellow with a black interior. It looked like a giant banana. I was too young at the time to notice any performance issues, like whether it was slow or had a cranky transmission, but it was no fun sitting in the back seat on a hot day with those tiny rear windows that barely opened an inch and no AC.
In the early 80s I was at a gas station in New Jersey just outside of NYC. A young couple pulled in with a beat to heck Maverick and asked me for directions to the George Washington Bridge. I eyed the car with suspicion. I gave them directions and asked them if they were planning on driving that car into the city. The man replied, "Why not? It got us here from California." I looked at the plates...yup, California. I couldn't believe it.
When the government required five mile per hour impact bumpers on both ends it really ruined the looks of the car.My father had a 1975 Maverick four door with the only six still available in California the 250 cubic inch version with the only available automatic transmission. Gas mileage was very poor and required more expensive un leaded fuel for first year catalytic converters.
I never understood why Ford just didn't keep the name "Falcon" for the Maverick - because that's basically what it was. A lot of people are/were leery of "new models" and naming it "Falcon" would've alleviated some of those fears because the Falcon had built up a pretty good reputation by then.
Ford still had a "Falcon" in the lineup for 1970. It was a very basic version of the Torino. Little remembered today, it was discontinued the next year, I believe.
@@benjaminrobinson3842 Yup. The Falcon nameplate was hung on the base Fairlane. Soon after both the Fairlane and Falcon names were discontinued and it was Torino from that point on.
Change for the sake of change. It did seem stupid. Similar was the change from Cavalier to Cobalt. Why was that necessary?!? Even worse - the Pontiac G cars, G5, G6, etc. WTF?!?
First Mr. Wade--noticed how many comments you got with this video in the first ten minutes. I personally never cared for the Maverick although my experience was only driving them into the small garage I worked at during high school to change tires. The dashboard quality with the use of metal facing seemed so cheap. In later model years didn’t Ford finally add a true glove box instead of the parcel shelf under the dash? However maybe the idea was to force buyers to declutter more frequently rather than like myself only tidying /purging unused pencils, pens and maps, etc from the glove box and covered storage consoles when we trade our vehicles😊😊😊😊😊😊.
They also stole the characteristic from Dodge, at the time, of metal that rusted so fast you could hear it rusting. Ours was a rust color so you couldn't tell, but people with yellow or blue colored Mavericks that were stored outside would actually have rust form under the paint before the paint even failed. I aslo remember the floor was always wet. They made a lot of them, they just didn't make them well.
My dad had one , and I was working in a NYC hotel where Henry ll had a penthouse suite. I so wanted to tell him what a piece of shit the maverick was. But I didn't want to get fired.
I always saw the Maverick as a bigger Pinto, so never gave it much thought. Looking at it in this video and I see it had some nice lines, like the Vega did.
@@jeff7.629On top of that, the Pinto platform promised (relatively) better fuel economy, which suddenly became a lot more important about when the car was introduced.
@@benjaminrobinson3842 True. The Mustang II had a vastly improved front suspension and rack and pinion steering. The Mustang II front suspension was so go that for decades hot-rod and custom car builders grafted the Mustang II suspension onto their projects.
I was a technician at a Lincoln Mercury store back in the '70s. I can remember the last Mercury comets on our lot. We could hardly give those things away.
I never noticed the resemblance to the Camaro until seeing these photos. The body lines and the rear end as well as the shape of the taillights. My parents had a 68 Camaro for years and there are many similar shapes and lines.
@@bulbman256 It looks like a normal column shift automatic. But the selector display reads "P R N H 2 1". To start off, you would pull the lever down to "1". And just like a real stick, when the engine is at the right rpm, you move the lever to "2", and when ready again, move up to "H", where "D" would normally be.
I didn't care much for the Maverick when it was new, but in retrospect, it looks quite good. At least the pre-73 small-bumbered cars. I can't think of many early, giant bumpered cars that look good.
The Maverick was widely panned for decades. Until we were expected to accept much inferior automobiles, in terms of reliability, longevity, and cost of maintenance. And in retrospect, it turns out that this is the kind of car that Ford-- or any automaker, for that matter-- should never have stopped making. My goodness, don't we know that today? With our fashionable, people-pleasing vehicles whose engines last fifty thousand miles if we're lucky.
These things were cost cutting garbage. The base price works out to around $16k in today's money, and that was for a bare bones stripper (unassisted drum brakes and steering, vinyl bench seats with no seat adjustment, no carpets, no right side rear view mirror, no rear defroster or radio, three-on-the-tree and the 200 cu. in. six pot). Most would have gone for around $20k. They were gutless, but still not fuel efficient, and forget about any safety features. If you bought it new in 1970, you'd be lucky if it was still road worthy by '74. If you lived in road salt country, the car would have been compost by then.
My late grandmother bought a 71 Maverick Coupe, brand new. She even had it equipped with the under-dash AC. She passed in 1993 and my aunt ended up with it. One of the things I always noticed about Mavericks is that Ford must've had a glut of those taillight fixtures, as they were the same ones used on the Pinto.
The car I drove to college in 1977-1979. 1974 Comet. The 250 straight 6 was gutless. The car fortunately was metallic brown that hid the rust. Unassisted disc brakes and a pull from dash emergency. Dealer installed a/c was broken and complimented the all vinyl seats. Overheated in traffic. The Maverick / Comet line did not age well with the government mandated laws of the era.
The 66 Toronado was my Mom's favorite car on the road. We were very poor and when the Maverick came out in 69 she bought a new Maverick and was proud to point out its Toronado styling cues.
I learned to drive in an beat up 1977 Ford Maverick, it had been my mom's car, and I was just happy to finally be old enough to drive a car, my dad kept it as a second car until the transmission failed in the late 80s, and he junked it
I was working part time at a So Cal Ford dealer when the 302 V8 first arrived and that was a big deal, made the little Maverick a lot cooler and @ $1995 was a deal for a basic car that looked better that most of the imports and entry level American cars back in 1970 and 71.
I never thought about it until you said that they had stolen from GM and you showed the backend and suddenly it hit me that it looked like a tornado. I had never noticed that before.
Had a friend whose family got a Maverick right after they came out. It went from point A to B, but not much style or grace. Used to be hyped as a “simple machine” that was easy to work on and easily fixed. They never impressed me much, but it has been almost 55 years.
I enjoyed your video. I am of the era of the Maverick / Comet. I must admit, I like the look of them, especially the earlier versions with the simpler bumpers... and the 2 door version is much nicer looking than the 4 door. Great analysis comparing it to the Tornado.
My parents had a 73 Comet, the Mercury branded version. Thing was gutless, which was probably good as it's the car I learned to drive in. No way I could possibly get into trouble with it, it went zero to 60 in an afternoon.
As a kid, my family went almost directly from a Ford Falcon to a Ford Maverick, and even though they were basically the same car, the Maverick seemed to be so much smaller inside. The Maverick was the first new car we ever had. I mostly remember what I didn't like about it. First, we had five kids in the family, so it was too small for us--four kids in the back seat and one between Mom & Dad in the front seat, it was quite a squeeze even though we were all little at the time. I hated those back windows. They were little triangular things you couldn't roll down. You just kind of pushed them open and you hardly got any air back there, and that was in a car with no air conditioning so you needed big windows. Also, the car was yellow, but it had the black vinyl interior like you see in this video, and you left that thing parked in the sun for 10 minutes and it turned into an oven. My memory of it is as a very uncomfortable car and I was glad when Dad traded it in for a (used) Plymouth station wagon after owning it only for about two years. So why did Dad buy such a small car for a big family? I guess it was all he could afford.
Nicely done video about a compact car that was quite popular. My mom bought a new green coupe in 1970, I was 19 in Nov. that year. I was allowed to drive it and really liked it. One of my aunts had one, too. It’s sad to see a car nameplate turn into a pickup truck, but it’s a sign of the times we live in now.
My sister had a Maverick when she went to college. 200 C.I. six and three on the tree, dad paid $1000 for it when she went away and she sold it a few years later for the same. Darn good car.
I couldn't drive until 1972 but my school parking lot was full of Mavericks. Sometimes Ford just gets it right. Pinto?...maybe not even though it was a hit. Maverick?...Great car for the times.
A customer of my father's business in the late 1970's drag raced a Maverick with a Ford 302 4bbl and 4 speed and won a trunk full of trophies at the strip by dialing in consistent times.
