How Documents Become The Keystone to Your Favorite Car

Ford’s Greatest Misdirection — The Mustang I Concept. Image courtesy of The Henry Ford Museum

“It says Mustang on it, but it’s not like any Mustang I ever saw”.

We’ve likely heard something like this at one time or another and perhaps we’ve shaken our head because the answer is obvious, but sometimes we’re also just as baffled.

Many of us recognize the car in this illustration as the Mustang I show car, touted, in one of Ford’s misinformation programs as the sports car that they would introduce. Of, course, the car that debuted is the car we all know. But that Mustang I story is clarified and justified by the documents that surround it.

Those documents separate it from a group of pictures that tell us nothing about it. Without the documents created for it or the articles written about it back when it was released, the Mustang I might never be known as
real or fabricated at some later date.

If You Collect Cars, You Collect Documents.

If you are a collector car owner or just one who admires a specific brand or model, there’s a good chance you have a bunch of “materials” to support that vehicle of yours ‐ print advertising touting your car’s best features, the brochure that the back in the day salesman handed out to prospective buyers,
the owner’s booklet, and even the service manual are likely in your possession, or…