same here too: alone in my room and i could barely hear from the laptop speakers. Popped my headphones in and problem solved. Other than that, i really enjoyed it; looking forward to the next one
It was still a case of overpromising and underdelivering. The intense ad buildup and the timing meant that people were expecting, and wanting, something really different. When it turned out to be a Ford with a different nose, people walked away.
Funny how three out of the four names Ford came up with ended up eventually getting used by one car company or another. I'd drive a car called the Dearborn Diamante.
Ford Corsair was a Ford of England car. AMC Pacer, Ford Ranger, Chevy Citation. The poet actually came up with some names that were used. "Cresta Lark"? GM of England produced a car called the Vauxhall Cresta and of course Studebaker came up with the Lark. And Chaparral was the name of a great series of racing cars in the mid to late '60s which was actually named for a bird native to the Southwest also called the Roadrunner.
Ultimately ALL 4 became car model names, even if none would be the brand name. The Pacer (Fishbowl) was taken by AMC, Citation by GM's Chevrolet and Ford retained the other two: Ranger as their small and then midsized pickup and Corsair as Lincoln's compact crossover.
Roman, please do more and make them more frequently. It might not be realistic to expect them weekly, but don't feel they should only be bookends for the seasons
I actually own a 59' Edsel Ranger 2 door coupe. It has the optional "mileage maker" inline 6, and the three on the tree. I love her, I named her "Donna" after Ritchie Valens' song that came out the same year. Bought her for 1,200$, and drove her off the parking lot. About a mile and a half later I was calling my dad to come with the tow rope, the fuel guage didn' work, had enough gas in it to put around the lot and start up for show. Still have it and Donna's my daily driver.
I want as many more of these.. "Pod-docs With Roman" as I can get. I can listen to Roman talk about this stuff all night long. And bringing Mr. Regular in to do some would be awesome too. ^^
I love these short docs, but you forget to mention at the end that the Edsel failure had a silver lining for Ford. All the tooling build-up and factory logistics that Ford had done when they expected the Edsel to be a hit, was quickly re-purposed for the '59-'60 Falcon, and actually helped Ford keep up with production demands when that car became a hit.
Not all -- only about half. The body tooling, much of the Edsel-special engineering, the branding, most of the paints, and the entire Edsel Division executive staff were all discarded. In all, a $100-125million loss, equivalent to as much as $1.1 billion today. The Falcon was orig. intended as a "small Edsel", so they just had to badge-engineer that to roll it out as a Ford.
Well anyways, in the end, all the tooling, people, and assets went into the Falcon, which sold 400k units as soon as FoMoCo killed the Edsel. The Falcon of course allowed the situation where the Mustang could come to be. So the investment into the Edsel division brand can be seen as parallel to Coca Cola's New Coke brand debacle that later allowed the company to become more of a classic than ever before. It was, in the end, a huge return on investment that's difficult to quantify, and undoubtedly historic.
I have heard more than one of the ford leaders say the reason the Mustang was such a Hit Was because of what Ford would learn from the mistakes they made with the EDSEL! find out what the people want and build a car to fill that need!
They invested $250million in the Edsel, but only recovered $100-125million of that by re-using the tooling and having additional production capacity available. Hardly any of the senior Edsel people remained at Ford to be "reused" or have the company benefit from lessons learned. No formal postmortem was conducted, and the trace of the Edsel investment ultimately "recovered" remained subjective and very approximate. A deadweight loss of $125million in 1958 is the equiv. of $1.1billion today -- wow, that's Elon Musk territory. Not anyplace a car company wants to go, even if they managed to get back pennies on the dollar as a consolation prize.
@@roberthaworth9097 The only thing that ford didn't continue to use other than the body was the idiots that built the car, If ford would have kept those guys they would have proven that they didn't lurn any thing. One of the first things Lee Iacocca looked at was why did Edsel fail, make sure it don't happen again that is how the Mustang was the most successful Car ever built!
I love these not-the-usual videos, the audio blogs, the car chronicles, that one film noir styled thing you guys did about Pontiac. I think they're great, really. Just thought you should know!
Great video on how the Edsel got it's name. Left out is that is was, in the beginning, a separate division within the Ford Motor Company. But with sales floundering, it was grouped into a new division combining Mercury, Edsel, and Lincoln. Wags called it "Mel."
Despite other commenters talking about podcasts, this is the form factor I'd most prefer for this. ~20-40 minutes, single subject at a time, with all the background and context nicely packaged into a single video. Despite watching RCR I still know nothing about engines and how cars run, and it's not really in my area of interest, but hearing people talk about these subjects with passion is what I enjoy. The history behind these vehicles, the differences between them, the thought processes that went into the designs, all of this interests me, and I love to hear about these oddities in vehicular history.
Edsel was envisioned as full make, not a "Ford Edsel" as the headline indicates. Corasair, Ranger and Pacer were actually Edsel models before being repurposed as a Ford pickup and an AMC disastermobile.
As an european that never heard of any of those cars (Edsel or Dale) this series is so awesome because it sheds light on a part of car culture that usually stays hidden for people like me. Good work Roman I'd be glad to have some more of these.
One of my youngest memories is going to and Edsel enthusiasts car show where they played "The Blob" on an outdoor screen. I heard about how these cars were a failure, but seeing them so young I'm sill enamored by them, cool looking things. Always good to be more informed. Thanks!
It's interesting that some of the names that were suggested by the poet were actual car names: Civique -- Honda Civic Diamante -- Used by Mitsubishi Chaparral -- Used by Jim Hall for not only an IMSA car but for an early 80s Indy Car. And isn't "Corsair" coming back in the Lincoln division?
As a model car collector myself, I wish more manufacturers picked up on the idea of giving away model cars when you test drove the real ones. It would motivate me to test drive new cars at least, even if I have no intention of buying.
Polish Dog although that would be ideal, the problem is time is money and that takes up their time, they'd rather flog the car and give you the toy than just give you one without you buying anything
They're still out there. Search eBay for Edsel under Models & Kits > Promo and you can find a number of them. The problem with the models was that they're made of plastic, so a lot of them cracked or warped over time. They're also friction toys so that mechanism can break, too. Good ones are pretty expensive.
Good story, Mr. Roman. In case you wish to continue this series, some stories to consider might be Mr. John DeLorean's exploits or, perhaps something more curious, such as those of the Tucker, or the Cord :)
That poet's ideas for names sounded like she was giving it a boxing nickname. Here he comes, the Dearborne Diamante, the Regna Racer, the Fooooooord Edseellllllllllllllll!
The 58 Edsel was a truly beautiful car. I was very impressed with the car, seeing several on display at the Edison Museum in Naples Florida about 5 years ago. The detail on the steering wheel is like a piece of jewelry. The over all design is far more beautiful than any of the lozenge cars foreign or domestic that litter the highways today. The 60 Edsel Villager Wagon is one of the most beautiful station wagons ever produced. Mechanically, the car's biggest problem was the push button transmission in 58'. Was it not for the transmission, I would love to drive a 58' Edsel. I remember seeing a white 60 Edsel right in front of me driving through Coral Gables in 2020. Dual rear mounted factory slanted antennas, the car was so beautiful that I wished I could have followed it to where it was going. The first 58 Edsel prototype did not have the horizontal left and right grill openings. The lack of grill opening caused overheating, so the left and right grills were added. This actually made the final version more attractive than the first prototype.
A 1960 Edsel Villager wagon would be extremely rare. Any 1960 Edsel is rare. The final one rolled off the assembly line on November 30, 1959. But to be fair, the 1955 Chevy Nomad was a better looking car. The 1956 Ford Parklane and 1957 Del Rio were also nice.
Interesting show! One successful legacy of the Edsel is the Comet, which was planned for the Edsel division, but was too late to add a boost to sales. I think Ford pulled the plug on Edsel, because the division was simply no longer viable due to the recession of 1958-1961. Lincoln & Continental merged during this time as well. People wanted cheaper, economical cars like the Comet, and Falcon, rather than splurging on an upper-mid-range vehicles like the Citation, or Corsair. If you look at the 1960 Edsel Ranger, and 1960 Ford Galaxie, they are essentially the same car, from a styling perspective. This is how down-market the Edsel division had gone from launch, to closure.
This was a fantastic dive into the old Edsels. I think a website exists where some of the remaining cars are tracked as to whether they still exist or not.
I REALLY enjoyed this story Roman! I had always kind of been curious about the Edsel. As I was saying to Mr. Regular earlier, you both have an extremely interesting way of conveying information, facts, humorous observations in a format that makes for very good story telling. I couldn't tell you if I enjoyed this so much because the story was interesting or in the way it was presented. But I leave you this evening knowing way more about the Edsel story and all the issues that were stacked against it at the time. I'm definitely going to take your suggestion and read up on this some more after this. Thank you Roman! - Andrew in California
You say this is, by no means, fully comprehensive but there was a lot of detail in there and You really are a chirpy upbeat kind of chap. Rather amusing for a car history film. Jolly well done old bean and Good afternoon from the UK.
could do a video about the pinto and how ford's real fuck up wasn't its design as much as omitting the gas tank bladder and airbag system that it was originally supposed to have, the former of which virtually eliminated its gas tank problems and would have made it a remarkably safe car for its time. (most economy cars back then were absolute death traps, the pinto merely happened to have the propensity to also burst into flames) then again i pretty much covered the entire video with that one summary, so maybe not.
I love it Roman. To me the history of cars is just as interesting as the cars themselves. Keep these episodes up. Ooh I just had a thought, do the Tucker next. That'd be a fascinating one.
Funny thing is, the Edsel is probably my favorite product of the 1958-59 Ford stable. Never liked the '60 model, but I appreciate it for the rarity factor.
these are awesome roman, keep them coming. I'd like to see the stories of recently defunct companies like scion, saturn, or pontiac, with the in depth/detailed coverage we've already seen in these videos.
My dad is restoring a 1958 Edsel 4 door right now. When It first showed up I was really excited by those interior features like the steering wheel push button shifter but he deleted it and added a floor shifter from a mustang 2 instead. when I asked him why he said its because the public hated them because the servos would always lock or miss shifts. Even so I would have liked it if he kept that in. The Edsel is an interesting car and I'm glad my family is bringing one back from the dead.
Great story Roman. Part of Fords problem was that Edsel was actually a car brand like Ford or Mercury, and creating a new brand has always been hard as evidenced by the fates of Saturn, Scion, and Eagle. The Edsel models were the names you mentioned: Pacer, Ranger, Citation, and Corsair. Just as GM had Buick between Chevrolet and Cadillac, Ford felt it needed a premium brand positioned between Ford and Lincoln . After the Edsel debacle, Mercury filled this niche with cars like the Cougar and Montego. Why Ford didn't figure this out the 50's is a mystery. I'd love to hear about more car histories.
Nice work Roman. I believe that they used the names Pacer, Citation, Ranger, and Bermuda for the models of the Edsel. Also there were a few 1960 Edsels that made production. Also after the Edsel was cancelled Ford continued the two new Edsel models, the 60 Comet and Meteor as Mercurys.
One of my best friends cousins has a 1958 Edsel. It was his first car. His family has 12 kids, he was the oldest, and it’s not mean to say they aren’t very wealthy. His dad bought it for around $700. Yes, $700 for a running, driving, and stopping Edsel. We are now in our mid 20’s, and he drives that thing EVERYWHERE. He drove it to college, a state away, and he drove it back upon graduation. It’s still his damned daily driver. How it’s running still, I have no idea, but he keeps up with the routine maintenance, and says he will drive it until the body panels finally rust off. Essentially when the doors fall off, he will retire it. Amazing.
Many younger people don't know what the Edsel was. Growing up when I did, it was common to hear someone talk about something and say, "Boy that copy machine was a real Edsel!"
@@alexbenjaminlubbers Neat! I'm 56 and I was born two years after they started making them. But I did hear that expression, of something being an Edsel. Here's one for you - have you heard of "Carter's Liver Pills?" They always used to say, "Well, he's got more of those than Carter has liver pills. I had to look it up.
I am still laughing about the accurate Reading Pa. description. I went to KU and love Berks county references and I really enjoyed both of these podcast style videos. Extremely well done.
I really like these videos! Although I have never driven an Edsel, I have sat in one. It seemed like a really well built car. The main thing I remembered of it was metal. Everything was metal. The dash was all metal, the door panels were all metal. It was like the Eddie Bauer edition of the Sherman tank.
I actually got to work on a "59 wagon at a shop in Bridgeport Texas in the early 2000"s. It was pretty solid and I liked the push button shifter in the center of the steering wheel. I'm not a Ford guy but I was a bit impressed by it.
You were impressed by the 59 Edsel, really because it's a better looking car than a lot of people want to admit. As far as design goes, the Edsels were more appealing than most cars on the road today.
I'm sold on more of these. A nice break from the ordinary, and it's nice to see Roman do his own thing. He's more than just the songs, he's got his own little barb to stick to history and vehicle design that while along the same track as conventional RCR in terms of taste, it's got a different kind of delivery. It's like eating nothing but Carolina-style barbecue and then having a bit of Virginia-style barbecue. Different, but still delicious and enjoyable. Also, Crystal Cave? Wouldn't have pegged you for a cheese head given Mr. Regular's East Coast origins.
Roman, these are great, keep them up. proud of you.
blackops2815 Is that an h3h3 reference?
Great Moves!
One problem with this video, it's too quiet for me to hear it properly on the toilet with the vent fan on
Lazar Nedeljkovic So you have a vacuum cleaner for a fan?
tolga1cool kinda not really
Lazar Nedeljkovic I had the exact same problem... stole my wife's Bluetooth speaker, boom problem solved
Lazar Nedeljkovic im having this exact problem
same here too: alone in my room and i could barely hear from the laptop speakers. Popped my headphones in and problem solved.
Other than that, i really enjoyed it; looking forward to the next one
Strangest thing about the Edsel is that it failed despite not actually being a particularly bad car.
Mike S can't unsee the vagina
Mike S I'm seeing a bit of Alfa in there, but the rest of the car is definitely not Alfa.
Henry Kincaid
Maybe that's been Alfa's secret all along - grilles that subliminally project vaginas into our minds.
Simon Coles I love the car myself. ..It's a great classic car if you want to be different!
It was still a case of overpromising and underdelivering. The intense ad buildup and the timing meant that people were expecting, and wanting, something really different. When it turned out to be a Ford with a different nose, people walked away.
Funny how three out of the four names Ford came up with ended up eventually getting used by one car company or another.
I'd drive a car called the Dearborn Diamante.
Personally, I like Pluma Piluma 😁😁😁
A currently drive a Pittburgh Plumbing Fixture.
Yup, because those were all pretty decent names. So is Corsair, but the Corvair made it unusable.
Ford Corsair was a Ford of England car. AMC Pacer, Ford Ranger, Chevy Citation.
The poet actually came up with some names that were used. "Cresta Lark"? GM of England produced a car called the Vauxhall Cresta and of course Studebaker came up with the Lark. And Chaparral was the name of a great series of racing cars in the mid to late '60s which was actually named for a bird native to the Southwest also called the Roadrunner.
Ultimately ALL 4 became car model names, even if none would be the brand name.
The Pacer (Fishbowl) was taken by AMC, Citation by GM's Chevrolet and Ford retained the other two: Ranger as their small and then midsized pickup and Corsair as Lincoln's compact crossover.
Roman, please do more and make them more frequently. It might not be realistic to expect them weekly, but don't feel they should only be bookends for the seasons
I actually own a 59' Edsel Ranger 2 door coupe. It has the optional "mileage maker" inline 6, and the three on the tree. I love her, I named her "Donna" after Ritchie Valens' song that came out the same year. Bought her for 1,200$, and drove her off the parking lot. About a mile and a half later I was calling my dad to come with the tow rope, the fuel guage didn' work, had enough gas in it to put around the lot and start up for show. Still have it and Donna's my daily driver.
logan scott Make a bid please I'd love to see it!
I really do love this series
*Buttons on steering wheel*
Here he comes! Here comes Speed Racer! He's the demon on wheels!
Ironically, As a kid, I heard "Mach 5" as "Mark 5" - By 1977 there WAS a car called Mark V. A Lincoln....Made by Ford! LOL!
These car stories and Mr.Regular's audiotapes are phenomenal, they really add something to the channel!
Need more of these! I already know these stories, but you have a unique way of telling them. keep it up!
Cool to see Edsel get some attention. I really like Edsel's design.
I want as many more of these.. "Pod-docs With Roman" as I can get. I can listen to Roman talk about this stuff all night long. And bringing Mr. Regular in to do some would be awesome too. ^^
It is rare for RUclips content to be so intellectually satisfying. Keep it up guys!
I love these short docs, but you forget to mention at the end that the Edsel failure had a silver lining for Ford. All the tooling build-up and factory logistics that Ford had done when they expected the Edsel to be a hit, was quickly re-purposed for the '59-'60 Falcon, and actually helped Ford keep up with production demands when that car became a hit.
Not all -- only about half. The body tooling, much of the Edsel-special engineering, the branding, most of the paints, and the entire Edsel Division executive staff were all discarded. In all, a $100-125million loss, equivalent to as much as $1.1 billion today. The Falcon was orig. intended as a "small Edsel", so they just had to badge-engineer that to roll it out as a Ford.
Well anyways, in the end, all the tooling, people, and assets went into the Falcon, which sold 400k units as soon as FoMoCo killed the Edsel. The Falcon of course allowed the situation where the Mustang could come to be. So the investment into the Edsel division brand can be seen as parallel to Coca Cola's New Coke brand debacle that later allowed the company to become more of a classic than ever before. It was, in the end, a huge return on investment that's difficult to quantify, and undoubtedly historic.
Only Coca Cola tastes way different than it did in 1979
I have heard more than one of the ford leaders say the reason the Mustang was such a Hit
Was because of what Ford would learn from the mistakes they made with the EDSEL!
find out what the people want and build a car to fill that need!
They invested $250million in the Edsel, but only recovered $100-125million of that by re-using the tooling and having additional production capacity available. Hardly any of the senior Edsel people remained at Ford to be "reused" or have the company benefit from lessons learned. No formal postmortem was conducted, and the trace of the Edsel investment ultimately "recovered" remained subjective and very approximate. A deadweight loss of $125million in 1958 is the equiv. of $1.1billion today -- wow, that's Elon Musk territory. Not anyplace a car company wants to go, even if they managed to get back pennies on the dollar as a consolation prize.
@@roberthaworth9097 The only thing that ford didn't continue to use other than the body was the idiots that built the car, If ford would have kept those guys they would have proven that they didn't lurn any thing. One of the first things Lee Iacocca looked at was why did Edsel fail, make sure it don't happen again that is how the Mustang was the most successful Car ever built!
Love these videos! Whenever you get a chance to do these, they're great, keep em coming!
I love these not-the-usual videos, the audio blogs, the car chronicles, that one film noir styled thing you guys did about Pontiac. I think they're great, really. Just thought you should know!
These "Car-Docs with The Roman" are awesome!
Roman, consider this the one aggressive youtube comment showing my love for these videos;
I fucking love this give me more of these types of videos
Big fan of history lesson. Liked listening to it while studying. Big fan of the show, and always will be
Not going to lie, Thunder Crester is an awesome name.
Sounds like a character from "He-Man".
If they had removed "hurricane" from the poets suggestion of hurricane aquilla and gone with just "aquilla" it would have been a cool name
Turtle top
The longer I look at the ford logo it less and less looks like a word
Michael V A P O R W A V E
FORD is more than a word, it's art!! haha
The 2003 logo looks like someone printed it on a cheap printer which is running out of ink
I would thoroughly enjoy it if you had time to make more of these videos. Thank you Roman
Great work Roman! I really like this series! I am already looking forward to the next one!
Great video on how the Edsel got it's name. Left out is that is was, in the beginning, a separate division within the Ford Motor Company. But with sales floundering, it was grouped into a new division combining Mercury, Edsel, and Lincoln. Wags called it "Mel."
Roman, have you ever considered making podcasts?
Peter Schmidt I'd sub to that! These are perfect and this story is very relevant to my major.
I really like these. Can't see them ever being super popular but I hope you keep them up.
The names that poet imagined so sound just like shitty 90s car names.
I'm imagining Korean cars for the European market.
Despite other commenters talking about podcasts, this is the form factor I'd most prefer for this. ~20-40 minutes, single subject at a time, with all the background and context nicely packaged into a single video. Despite watching RCR I still know nothing about engines and how cars run, and it's not really in my area of interest, but hearing people talk about these subjects with passion is what I enjoy. The history behind these vehicles, the differences between them, the thought processes that went into the designs, all of this interests me, and I love to hear about these oddities in vehicular history.
Funny how most of those ended up being car names. Pacer, Ranger, ext...
they ended up being edsel names too. Edsel pacer, ranger, etc.
Edsel was envisioned as full make, not a "Ford Edsel" as the headline indicates. Corasair, Ranger and Pacer were actually Edsel models before being repurposed as a Ford pickup and an AMC disastermobile.
@@seed_drill7135 also the citation which Chevrolet is trying to forget!
Corsair was also used on separate Australian and British Ford's
Great to see that Ford brought back the Corsair name for Lincoln's newest small crossover/SUV.
As an european that never heard of any of those cars (Edsel or Dale) this series is so awesome because it sheds light on a part of car culture that usually stays hidden for people like me. Good work Roman I'd be glad to have some more of these.
Great job,Roman! This was really enjoyable and fun to listen to. More please!
loving these. keep them coming when you can. cheers.
I like it. You should do more car histories. quality over quantity tho.
4am upload as always that's why i don't sleep, thanks RCR :D
taunusv4power it's 1 in the morning where I'm at but yeah thanks Richard Childress Racing oh sorry Regular Car Reviews man I gotta sleep
+automan224 hahahahaha!!!
automan224. lol west coast dido on the sleep....night John boy
These history videos are fantastic, and I definitely look forward to them as much as a normal RCR video.
Future topic please. Sunbeam Tiger the only Chrysler owned but Ford V-8 powered British made Corvette killer designed by Carl Shelby sold in USA.
Another strong contribution Roman! I hope you will continue to do more of these.
Love your storytelling, Roman. Keep it up.
Please keep doing these. I wish there was a class taught by you about what not to do in the auto industry. Looking forward to another installment.
One of my youngest memories is going to and Edsel enthusiasts car show where they played "The Blob" on an outdoor screen. I heard about how these cars were a failure, but seeing them so young I'm sill enamored by them, cool looking things. Always good to be more informed. Thanks!
It's interesting that some of the names that were suggested by the poet were actual car names:
Civique -- Honda Civic
Diamante -- Used by Mitsubishi
Chaparral -- Used by Jim Hall for not only an IMSA car but for an early 80s Indy Car.
And isn't "Corsair" coming back in the Lincoln division?
1:10 As a toy car enthusiast, I wonder if any of those Edsel scale models are still around
here's my toy car
Here's my model car with my toy car inside my real car.
As a model car collector myself, I wish more manufacturers picked up on the idea of giving away model cars when you test drove the real ones. It would motivate me to test drive new cars at least, even if I have no intention of buying.
Polish Dog although that would be ideal, the problem is time is money and that takes up their time, they'd rather flog the car and give you the toy than just give you one without you buying anything
They're still out there. Search eBay for Edsel under Models & Kits > Promo and you can find a number of them. The problem with the models was that they're made of plastic, so a lot of them cracked or warped over time. They're also friction toys so that mechanism can break, too. Good ones are pretty expensive.
If these mini-docs became a regular thing, it would be the best late Christmas present I've ever gotten.
Great story, Roman! Loved the Blazing Saddles reference, too!
I like these roman, its a nice to have something like this to randomly posted. adds something different in the usual routine
Good story, Mr. Roman. In case you wish to continue this series, some stories to consider might be Mr. John DeLorean's exploits or, perhaps something more curious, such as those of the Tucker, or the Cord :)
great bit of history, Roman. definitely want more of this.
That poet's ideas for names sounded like she was giving it a boxing nickname. Here he comes, the Dearborne Diamante, the Regna Racer, the Fooooooord Edseellllllllllllllll!
do the history of AMC
The 58 Edsel was a truly beautiful car. I was very impressed with the car, seeing several on display at the Edison Museum in Naples Florida about 5 years ago. The detail on the steering wheel is like a piece of jewelry. The over all design is far more beautiful than any of the lozenge cars foreign or domestic that litter the highways today. The 60 Edsel Villager Wagon is one of the most beautiful station wagons ever produced. Mechanically, the car's biggest problem was the push button transmission in 58'. Was it not for the transmission, I would love to drive a 58' Edsel. I remember seeing a white 60 Edsel right in front of me driving through Coral Gables in 2020. Dual rear mounted factory slanted antennas, the car was so beautiful that I wished I could have followed it to where it was going.
The first 58 Edsel prototype did not have the horizontal left and right grill openings. The lack of grill opening caused overheating, so the left and right grills were added. This actually made the final version more attractive than the first prototype.
A 1960 Edsel Villager wagon would be extremely rare. Any 1960 Edsel is rare. The final one rolled off the assembly line on November 30, 1959. But to be fair, the 1955 Chevy Nomad was a better looking car. The 1956 Ford Parklane and 1957 Del Rio were also nice.
Interesting show! One successful legacy of the Edsel is the Comet, which was planned for the Edsel division, but was too late to add a boost to sales. I think Ford pulled the plug on Edsel, because the division was simply no longer viable due to the recession of 1958-1961. Lincoln & Continental merged during this time as well. People wanted cheaper, economical cars like the Comet, and Falcon, rather than splurging on an upper-mid-range vehicles like the Citation, or Corsair. If you look at the 1960 Edsel Ranger, and 1960 Ford Galaxie, they are essentially the same car, from a styling perspective. This is how down-market the Edsel division had gone from launch, to closure.
1:56 *Zündapp
Great storytime! Love that you do these now. :)
Love the long form series - would love to hear your take on things like the Yugo, John DeLorean, Malcolm Bricklin, the entire Malaise era...
This was a fantastic dive into the old Edsels. I think a website exists where some of the remaining cars are tracked as to whether they still exist or not.
Please share the history of the Ford GT40
Great video. I'm loving these history podcasts so far? Do you think you could do one about the history of AMC?
RCR Stories Series = LazyGameReview's Tech Tales Series with slight vlog feel.
I REALLY enjoyed this story Roman! I had always kind of been curious about the Edsel. As I was saying to Mr. Regular earlier, you both have an extremely interesting way of conveying information, facts, humorous observations in a format that makes for very good story telling. I couldn't tell you if I enjoyed this so much because the story was interesting or in the way it was presented. But I leave you this evening knowing way more about the Edsel story and all the issues that were stacked against it at the time. I'm definitely going to take your suggestion and read up on this some more after this. Thank you Roman! - Andrew in California
it's only my opinion, but chevys from this area had the nices body styles, ford kinda messed up their cars in that times.
Poland Garage I think the 1958 Dodge Coronet was one of the better looking cars at that time
Poland Garage the 55 Chevy has a special place in my heart
Hudson Hornet, Chevrolet C100... CAR PORN!!!
59 Impala.
1958 Plymouth Belvedere was the best looking 50's cars.
You say this is, by no means, fully comprehensive but there was a lot of detail in there and You really are a chirpy upbeat kind of chap. Rather amusing for a car history film.
Jolly well done old bean and Good afternoon from the UK.
You are an exceptional orator & if you haven’t done professional vocal work in television & movies, you should. You have a gift.
Fascinating. I knew nothing about the Edsel until this. I'd love to hear more of these!
could do a video about the pinto and how ford's real fuck up wasn't its design as much as omitting the gas tank bladder and airbag system that it was originally supposed to have, the former of which virtually eliminated its gas tank problems and would have made it a remarkably safe car for its time. (most economy cars back then were absolute death traps, the pinto merely happened to have the propensity to also burst into flames)
then again i pretty much covered the entire video with that one summary, so maybe not.
Great stuff, Roman! I'd love to hear more pod-docs from you.
Ive never been much of a car guy but this 'docuCast' scratches an itch I never knew I had
Moar! Give us MOAR!!! Good work, Sr. ! 👍
I love it Roman. To me the history of cars is just as interesting as the cars themselves. Keep these episodes up. Ooh I just had a thought, do the Tucker next. That'd be a fascinating one.
These videos should be a second series on this channel and be uploaded weekly.
I never thought about this, but some videos about car history and culture done by The Roman and Mr R would be fantastic.
I didn't realize these videoes would be a regular thing, It's great! keep up the good work!
Funny thing is, the Edsel is probably my favorite product of the 1958-59 Ford stable. Never liked the '60 model, but I appreciate it for the rarity factor.
You did a good job on this, with your wit. Verbally and in print too.
I had fun following along.
these are awesome roman, keep them coming. I'd like to see the stories of recently defunct companies like scion, saturn, or pontiac, with the in depth/detailed coverage we've already seen in these videos.
My dad is restoring a 1958 Edsel 4 door right now. When It first showed up I was really excited by those interior features like the steering wheel push button shifter but he deleted it and added a floor shifter from a mustang 2 instead. when I asked him why he said its because the public hated them because the servos would always lock or miss shifts. Even so I would have liked it if he kept that in. The Edsel is an interesting car and I'm glad my family is bringing one back from the dead.
Great story Roman.
Part of Fords problem was that Edsel was actually a car brand like Ford or Mercury, and creating a new brand has always been hard as evidenced by the fates of Saturn, Scion, and Eagle.
The Edsel models were the names you mentioned: Pacer, Ranger, Citation, and Corsair.
Just as GM had Buick between Chevrolet and Cadillac, Ford felt it needed a premium brand positioned between Ford and Lincoln . After the Edsel debacle, Mercury filled this niche with cars like the Cougar and Montego. Why Ford didn't figure this out the 50's is a mystery.
I'd love to hear about more car histories.
Roman - Do John DeLorean, and if possible check out the DeLorean factory in Humble, TX. Great job!
that was probably one of the best histories of a car I've heard in sometime.
Ummm ok. Coming from a homophobe like you I will take that as a huge compliment.
Nice work Roman. I believe that they used the names Pacer, Citation, Ranger, and Bermuda for the models of the Edsel. Also there were a few 1960 Edsels that made production. Also after the Edsel was cancelled Ford continued the two new Edsel models, the 60 Comet and Meteor as Mercurys.
Such a brilliantly told story. Honestly, this so surprised me. 👍
This has been in my "watch later" since it's upload. Glad I watched it. It's great content! Would watch more like this.
One of my best friends cousins has a 1958 Edsel. It was his first car. His family has 12 kids, he was the oldest, and it’s not mean to say they aren’t very wealthy.
His dad bought it for around $700. Yes, $700 for a running, driving, and stopping Edsel. We are now in our mid 20’s, and he drives that thing EVERYWHERE. He drove it to college, a state away, and he drove it back upon graduation. It’s still his damned daily driver.
How it’s running still, I have no idea, but he keeps up with the routine maintenance, and says he will drive it until the body panels finally rust off. Essentially when the doors fall off, he will retire it.
Amazing.
yeah Roman. I'm a mailman..and these kinda stories make the day go by easier
Many younger people don't know what the Edsel was. Growing up when I did, it was common to hear someone talk about something and say, "Boy that copy machine was a real Edsel!"
I mean, I was born in 1993 and I know what the Edsel is, haha.
@@alexbenjaminlubbers Neat! I'm 56 and I was born two years after they started making them. But I did hear that expression, of something being an Edsel. Here's one for you - have you heard of "Carter's Liver Pills?" They always used to say, "Well, he's got more of those than Carter has liver pills. I had to look it up.
Thank you for making this one, was waiting for it for a long time.
I really like these short documentaries. Please do more!
Once again, awesome job. Enjoyed as much as the Dale. Please keep it up!
Mr Regular i stay up every sunday just to watch your videos
i regret it every monday morning but ill never stop doing it🚗.
I am still laughing about the accurate Reading Pa. description. I went to KU and love Berks county references and I really enjoyed both of these podcast style videos. Extremely well done.
Great video Roman! If possible, please do one on the Tucker 48!
I really like these videos! Although I have never driven an Edsel, I have sat in one. It seemed like a really well built car. The main thing I remembered of it was metal. Everything was metal. The dash was all metal, the door panels were all metal. It was like the Eddie Bauer edition of the Sherman tank.
this makes for a great listen, hoping for more of these stories in the future!
These are pretty good, Roman. I hope you'll sprinkle more of these amongst the general RCR videos.
I actually really wanted a regular car review of the Edsel! Got this instead. Not complaining. Thanks Mr. Roman!
I actually got to work on a "59 wagon at a shop in Bridgeport Texas in the early 2000"s. It was pretty solid and I liked the push button shifter in the center of the steering wheel. I'm not a Ford guy but I was a bit impressed by it.
You were impressed by the 59 Edsel, really because it's a better looking car than a lot of people want to admit. As far as design goes, the Edsels were more appealing than most cars on the road today.
I'm sold on more of these. A nice break from the ordinary, and it's nice to see Roman do his own thing. He's more than just the songs, he's got his own little barb to stick to history and vehicle design that while along the same track as conventional RCR in terms of taste, it's got a different kind of delivery. It's like eating nothing but Carolina-style barbecue and then having a bit of Virginia-style barbecue. Different, but still delicious and enjoyable.
Also, Crystal Cave? Wouldn't have pegged you for a cheese head given Mr. Regular's East Coast origins.
I really enjoyed this. I like the Edsel and Fords in general, and the local jokes made things even better!
The Edsel (really any one of them) is my dream car and I want to learn how to fix up and maintain one and turn it into a daily driver
please keep these up! Theres so much great automotive history out there...chevy corvair next? The rise of the beetle?
Surprisingly interesting. Quality show, would watch more. Cheers.