In 1970, if you really wanted to impress the neighbors with your upwardly mobile lifestyle, you rolled into your local Mercury dealer and ordered up a family hauler like this. The Mercury Colony Park station wagon with its hideaway lights, wood paneling, vinyl roof, factory 8-track, and thundering 429ci 4bbl big block V8 was the ultimate in comfort and utility. This car was capable of chewing up highway miles like Skittles, hauling a boat, dragging home plywood from the local lumber yard to build that tree-house the kids were nagging you on, and cruising into the city to catch a night at the theater with your wife. From 1957-1991 Mercury’s top of the line Colony Park nameplate was worn by wagons of various girth levels. From the early through the middle 1970s they kept swelling and then started shrinking.
This car rides on a 121-inch wheelbase and this generation which lasted from 1969-1978 were the largest of the long running Colony Park nameplate. Standard engines started with the 400 with the 429 being optional and later on the 351 was made the standard engine but needless to say, this battleship of a car was well over two tons and needed all the UMPH it could get.
This car specifically is pretty amazing. Unrestored and well cared for, the only imperfection we could see was a tear in the driver’s side of the front bench seat. The paint looks great, the simulated woodgrain is holding up well, the engine is grimy but original and the car only has a few more than 100,000 miles on it. All indications are that this thing would be one hell of a cruiser to own the roads in.
Yes, we’d wake up the 429 a little and yes, we’d probably put an overdrive trans in it but other than that? We’d ditch the 1980s Grand Marquis wheels for some steel jobs and that would be that. This monster is 100% BangShift approved!
Thanks for the tip Wookie!
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That’s not too far from me. Wonder how much I could get for a kidney on the black market?
Needs a 4.300″ stroke crank and some Edelbrock heads and intake.
When we were kids there was an early Merc wagon at Loblaw’s and the Y was broken off the emblem so these cars will forever be known as “Colon Park’s.”
He he……………
Sorry, I still think it’s funny 40 years later.
Mercury didn’t have a cutsie moniker for it’s 1970 429-4V . . . but Ford did. They called it the Thunder Jet 429
In high school(1973) I had a 1966 Chevy Caprice wagon, wood grain side panels,seating for 9,power everything, and a 396 under the hood.I shamed more than one hot rod with it and could carry a complete party around with me. I had a Policeman get on to me about doing a burnout,he said it was because it had a bald tire is why it could do it, I said I thought it was because of the big block under the hood. Yep,got a ticket.