With Thanksgiving fast approaching and the smells of a kitchen at full tilt infiltrating the nostrils of the suddenly hungry everywhere, it is no surprise that turkey is on the brain. Smoked, deep-fried or good old-fashion roasted, it is the mainstay, the anchor of the meal. So cut me a little slack for entering “sports car turkey” into Google one evening after I had consumed a few rounds of the drinkable Turkey. Honestly, it was the accident of a brain that was running a million miles a second and fingertips that were getting a delayed and garbled message.The result, however, was surprising: an actual car appeared, and it wasn’t bad. A little tiny for my frame, probably, but the shape was pretty decent. It reminded me of a slightly scaled down Ford Capri, with some hints of Datsun, and had a name I had never heard of. And after skimming through an article or two, I knew I found something: Turkey’s only sports car, the 1973-76 Anadol STC-16.

Photo: anadol-stc16.com

Anadol was a short-lived auto manufacturing arm of Ford Otosan, and has the distinction of being the first mass-market Turkish automobile company and the second Turkish auto manufacturer. Production started with the Anadol A1 series in 1966, and by 1973 the company had felt that they could afford to let their hair down and try something other than a somewhat stodgy Renault-designed car. Hence, the STC-16: powered by a 1.6L Ford four, backed with a four-speed, driving the rear wheels, hand built, in fiberglass, looking like this. For a car manufacturer that hadn’t even seen one decade of manufacturing pass that typically cranked out 3,500 cars a year, it was a pretty stout effort.

Roughly the size of a Mazda Miata in all aspects, the STC-16 was an interesting piece on it’s own merits, but from a country not known for their automobiles, it presented well. The name was originally meant to stand for either “Sport Turkish Car 1600” or “Sport Touring Coupé 1600”, but soon gained the local nickname “Süper Türk Canavarı” (“Super Turkish Monster”) and in Europe, was known as the “Moslem Corvette”. All things given, the STC-16 should have had a hell of a run, but only 176 were ever made, a consequence of bad timing, development costs turning into a high purchase price, and a small firm overreaching their ability to fund the fun. In 1973 the first oil embargo hit, and while the STC-16 would be considered a sporty economy car in the eyes of Americans, in Turkey it was a fuel drinker nobody wanted to be near. Even if they did want it, the price, which in today’s U.S. dollars would be about $29,000, was well beyond affordable for the average Turk.

Now, here’s a thought: Anadol was sourcing parts from Ford, namely Ford Europe, to help build cars like the A1, A2 and STC-16. That 1.6L has to be related to something in the 1970s Escort engine lineup…in fact, a few STC-16s were built up to competition specifications, complete with a 140 horsepower variant of the 1.6L. Imagine if Ford Otosan had the ability to fund further development of this little beast…

Photo: anadol-stc16.com