Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference. -“The Road Not Taken”, Robert Frost.
The road not taken. The direction not chosen. It’s easy to look at what has been done with success and mimic that same success…it’s easy. One can do it, anyone can do it. It takes guts to take the other path, yet that is an admired trait. You aren’t just doing what everyone else is doing. You have had the fortitude to step up, be different, and to do what others didn’t dare. Inspiring words, aren’t they? In the realm of this hobby, making that call usually inspires others to speak something to the effect of, “You’re wasting your time. Build an (X) and spare yourself.”
It’s not that a Mustang or Camaro won’t take care of your speed fix or be good cars. I’ve owned one of each, and I’ve enjoyed them for the most part equally. But it’s been the oddballs that have endeared themselves better. Cars that have older people telling me stories, cars that have younger people scratching their heads in genuine curiosity. There usually isn’t that much of a difference between a mainstream model and a less-often seen version, but still, the other car is avoided. Why?
This 1968 Mercury Montego is a two-door, rear-drive, V8-powered car from the late 1960s. You’d think that people would be bending over backwards to own it, especially since it’s a Southwest car. But here it is as a Rough Start candidate, and it isn’t even close to maxing out the budget. $3,600 buys you into a classic bit of Lincoln-Mercury, complete with a 302 and an automatic. If you’re inclined, you can even go fix and recharge the air conditioning system and roll in comfort. The orange paint might not be for everyone, but at least it isn’t roasted. Go be different. Enjoy a classic. And you’ll see that Mr. Frost’s words ring true, over a hundred years later.
Craigslist Link: 1968 Mercury Montego
What’s rough about this?
It needs nothing doing to it and is a bargain!
Now I’ll just wait for lame comments from the LS valve cover sniffer group…..
Interesting car in an interesting town… 🙂 I agree with Geordie–if I had the room, I’d be booking a cheap flight to Vegas now…
Or you could go really different and buy the half a Karmann Gia in the background of the lead photo. 1/2 price sale ?
Get rid of the taxi rear bumper for a chrome one to match the front, and it is perfect. As for the LS valve cover sniffer, I am more of a Christie Brinkley bicycle seat cover sniffer.
We built the carbon fiber front bumper used on Jeff Koch’s Hot Rod Magazine “Project Montego”. They put it on Hot Rod TV, and he opened the segment with it and said, “This is my favorite part on the whole car!”. I’ve still got the tooling to build more.
I read that car was stolen then recovered minus the engine. Any idea where it is now? I kept all those “Monte 1 go” articles for some ideas for my own ’71 Montego.
My first car was a 1969 Comet…same little 302 and C4 set up. Lived its whole life in Oklahoma until I got it while serving time in Michigan. One winter there killed that poor car.
Looks a lot better than the later beak-nosed Montegos. Other than an A/C fix – and possibly rechroming the back bumper – I’d leave that one as is.
. . .Hey! ;-D
That\’s a good deal here in the rusty part of the U.S.,
but who is going to fly across the country for a craiglist ad?