Danville Street Sighting - 1965 Ford Mustang GT 2+2 Fastback

Ever have those moments when you forget an anniversary or birthday until the last minute? Yeah, me too. Today is April 17. Happy birthday to the Ford Mustang.

San Francisco Street Sighting - 1965 Austin Mini Cooper Mk 1

Today marks the tenth day of the fabled countdown to Christmas.

On the tenth day of Christmas my archive gave to thee:
A ten footer Mini,
911 stancing,
Jade Mach 1 Mustang,
'77 Lincoln,
Suede Studebaker,
Fine Nomad bling,
Ford Thunderbird,
Beige French shed,
Tuned Chevy LUV,
and a Park Lane down on the street.

We’ve looked at quite a few classic Minis on California Streets over the years. I remember the first Mini post nearly a decade ago, which lumped together three cars into one post. I used to snap pictures of cars all over the place but usually only one or two at a time and rarely more than five. That was before I started this blog. My informal guideline for myself is that fewer than five photos of a subject is not enough for a post here. Fortunately, thanks to reader feedback, I now try to capture as full a walk-around as I can. It can be a little difficult on a busy street, especially a one-way job where people park on the left side so I can’t get my customary left profile shot. Luckily this Mini was parked along the Panhandle park just east of Golden Gate Park, so I could still photograph the left side on public property. You'd think it would be easier to photograph a car only ten feet long!

San Francisco Street Sighting - 1965 Porsche 356 SC

Remember back in the day when you wanted to buy a used car and the first place you went was your local classified paper? That told you what was available in your area, assuming the seller paid the fee for a two or three-line print ad that may or may not include a small photo. That worked for a lot of people who wanted a normal car or truck without having to visit a dealer or hang around the local auto auction. But what about the collector car market? Not so long ago you had to buy Hemmings Motor News or Old Car Trader or the DuPont Registry if you were shopping for secondhand classics or exotics. The really high-end stuff often went to auction through companies like Christie's, Bonham's or Barrett-Jackson, where hundreds of cars would be trucked in to a central location for bidding. With the advent of Craigslist and other online listing services like eBay, now you can search all over the world for the right vehicle and even bid on and buy cars online without having to hire a broker.

Livermore Street Sighting - 1965 Buick LeSabre

I could have owned this car.

In 2009 the Goodguys Rod & Custom Association chose a light blue '65 Buick LeSabre as their annual giveaway car for their Northern California shows. I entered to win it, but it was not to be. I enter most of the giveaway contests and have been a finalist twice (red 1965 Mustang notchback and yellow '69 Chevelle SS 396), but have never gotten lucky. This is the car they gave away.

San Francisco Street Sighting - 1965 Citroën DS 19

All right, I may have cheated some.
Last year a relative invited me to a meeting of his car club, the Arcane Auto Society, in San Francisco. This was what I found parked on the street outside the garage where the members met. It's a 1965 Citroën DS 19. It was not the only club member vehicle I photographed on the street that morning and I'll be happy to share the others with you at a later date. The club meeting functioned as an unofficial indoor car show and was a fascinating assemblage of everything from a right-hand-drive Reliant Regal three-wheeler with UK plates to a Peel Trident bubble car. Regrettably, those were off the street and within the boundaries of a car show and not eligible for blog features at the time, even though they were awesome. Even here, we have rules...

Berkeley Street Sighting - 1965 Dodge Dart GT

I've said here before that the Dodge Dart and Plymouth Valiant twins are small potatoes in the classic car world. They're Chrysler's Ford Falcon and Chevy Nova, grocery getters for the masses in their day that mostly came with conventional styling and engineering, and small-displacement engines tuned for fuel economy. Thousands are on the roads today, often the ride of choice for drivers who want a touch of vintage style but a useful back seat, useful trunk and an old car they can actually drive every day. They came with some of the most bulletproof powertrains in the business, like the 225 slant six and Torqueflite three-speed automatic transmission. As long as the body and chassis don't rust out and no one blows up the engine, these cars pretty much just keep going.

Albany Street Sighting - 1965 Alfa Romeo Giulia TI

The Alfa Romeo Giulia is a surprisingly popular classic import in the Bay Area. Most of them are the sporty coupes, but there are a number of Giulia Super sedans as well. I've previously featured at least two of each, but this is the first Giulia TI I've seen.

San Francisco Street Sighting - 1965 Sunbeam Alpine 1725 Roadster

One of the more intriguing car companies for me is the Rootes Group from Britain, manufacturer of such vehicles as Talbot, Commer, Humber, Sunbeam, Hillman and Singer. The company actually began as a dealership network in 1913, and over the next few decades it grew to purchase a series of British automobile manufacturers. Rootes subscribed, more or less, to the General Motors school of thought: a brand for every purse and purpose, and clearly defined model ranges to fit each application and niche. Rootes was an early adopter of badge-engineering, another GM favorite, and was also an interesting early producer of compact luxury cars.

Rootes operated in various markets around the world with varying levels of success, in Europe, Australia, North America, South America and even the Middle East (the latter by local factories under license). In the late 1960s, Chrysler took an interest in Rootes, both as a captive import for the US market and to get itself a foothold in Europe where Chrysler's American-oriented cars were not marketable. Around this time Chrysler took over Rootes and French carmaker Simca, and made a fine mess of it over the next decade. What little was left when Chrysler was done with it was sold to Peugeot in 1978. In 2007 Rootes ended where it began 94 years earlier, as nothing more than a name on a UK car dealership.

This week we're taking a look at an assortment of Rootes Group cars. First of these is one of the best-known Rootes cars in America, the Sunbeam Alpine sports roadster.

Santa Cruz Street Sighting - 1965 Mercury Monterey

A few months ago we looked at a 1965 Mercury Park Lane Marauder four-door hardtop sedan in San Francisco. Now we're looking at a lower-spec Monterey four-door pillared sedan from the coastal community of Santa Cruz. The Monterey was Mercury's cheapest full-size car for '65, but still came with standard 390 V8 power. This one seems to have found use as a metalhead's rat-rod cruiser.

San Francisco Street Sighting - 1965 Ford Fairlane 500

If you asked me to name a car from the 1960s that was so generic, that if you removed all of the badges the average person couldn't identify it, I would nominate the 1965 Ford Fairlane. I'm a big fan of most of the 1965 Ford Motor Company portfolio, and I love the 1963, '64, '66 and '67 Fairlanes. But the 1965 model has never done anything for me personally. Sure, it has that Big Three Detroit car look, is obviously an easy-to-handle midsize car, and is available with V8 power. However, there is nothing about the styling that really defines it as a Ford. From some angles, it could be a Dodge or Plymouth, or a Rambler.

Oakland Street Sighting - 1965 Ford Galaxie 500

I love the 1965 Ford Galaxie. Yes, I'm biased because my father's first car was a '65 Galaxie, but I also like the way they look. I like the sharply creased body lines, simple and clean without appearing too generic. It's a departure from the '64 Galaxie, with stacked quad headlights, a formal roofline and a slightly jutting coffin-nose grille. The Galaxie was moving upmarket, with the addition of the new LTD as its top model. The Galaxie itself was available with a range of options from stripped fleet special to a nice big family car.

Berkeley Street Sighting - 1965 Pontiac GTO

In my humble opinion, one of the most attractively styled American cars of the 1960s was the '65 Pontiac GTO. Simple, clean lines give the GTO a classic elegance while maintaining a brawny muscle car appearance. Pontiac had one of the coolest sporty cars on the market that year, stuffing a 389 cubic inch V8 and optional four-speed into the humble Tempest body. The GTO package replaced the base Tempest eggcrate grille with a simpler design from the Le Mans, dispensed with non-functional vents and body trim (except for a fake hood scoop, which could be modified into a cold-air intake by dealers) and received heavier duty suspension, brakes and a new dash with more instrumentation. GTOs also got special badging.

Alameda Street Sighting - 1965 Rambler Classic 770 Coupe

For some reason nearly every Rambler Classic I see is a Cross Country station wagon. The sedans must all be parts cars or daily drivers for old ladies in the upper Midwest or something. I've come across one '63 four-door sedan, one '62 two-door sedan, and one '65 convertible. And then there was this handsome 1965 Classic 770 hardtop coupe.

Alameda Street Sighting - 1965 Chevrolet Impala Sport Sedan

Berkeley Street Sighting - 1965 Oldsmobile Cutlass Convertible

To me, car shops are like car shows. It's not because of the one-letter difference between them, but rather because both tend to have an interesting vehicle or two parked outside on the street. Is it cheating to shoot "street sightings" there? I hope not. Some of the coolest and most historic cars eventually break and find their way to the shop to be made right again. For many, that's the only time you'll see them outside of a museum or organized car show, unless you're friends with the owner or something. I don't have that kind of connections.

Santa Cruz Street Sighting - 1965 Mercury Comet Caliente

My love of the Ford Falcon does not always extend to its Mercury Comet cousin. The Comet had some iffy model years, but so do many models. For 1965, Mercury stylists worked pretty hard to differentiate the Comet from the Falcon, and they pulled it off. Whether the full package is attractive is open to debate. However, I do like certain angles of it, and it looks more modern than the '64 which was trying to be a Ford, Lincoln and Mercury all at the same time. The profile has a racy, forward-leaning look while remaining Falcon-practical for family use. The '65 adopts the stacked headlights that became so fashionable in the industry around that time, and in lieu of the Falcon's big round taillamps the rear features a narrow horizontal strip with little rectangular lights in it, beneath a heavy-looking rear panel. It also features more deeply sculpted sides that as far as I can tell, serve no purpose except to enable Ford to use Falcon doors on both cars. The Comet has a stout, mid-size look to it that makes it appear larger than the compact Falcon, though under the skin the two cars are very similar.

Santa Cruz Street Sighting - 1965 Ford Galaxie 500

I thought it was appropriate for my first post of 2013 to be about a white 1965 Ford Galaxie 500. My father was the one who first got me interested in cars at a very young age. The first car he owned was a white 1965 Ford Galaxie 500 coupe with a 289 V8 and an automatic transmission. The Galaxie wasn't kept very long, but it was a nice car for a high-schooler in the '70s. I've loved them for many years, and seeing one at car shows always makes me happy. Not many of them show up on the street, though.

San Ramon Street Sighting - 1965 Chevrolet C-10 Fleetside pickup

I'm a sucker for mid-'60s Chevy trucks. The 1964-'65 C-10 fleetside trucks are some of my favorite pickups, and I have no idea why. I just really like them.

San Ramon Street Sighting - 1965 Ford Falcon

I hate seeing tow tags on cars. It means that the car was left in one spot too long and either someone complained or the police decided it was abandoned. When you see a vehicle with a tow tag, you never know if that's the end of the road for it. There used to be a Chevy El Camino that sat in the same parking space near my local Taco Bell for what must have been years. It was in good shape, but it was always there. When people started throwing garbage in the back, the police tagged the car. Usually when you get tagged, it means you have 72 hours to move it or the city comes and tows the car away. Then there's meter maids, street cleaning, permit parking, you name it, that allow for even less time before the car goes to impound. The El Camino sat for over a week with a tow tag before it disappeared for good.

San Ramon Street Sighting - 1965 Ford Mustang

I dug deep in the archives for this one. I love early Mustangs, but I never wanted to feature a first-generation Mustang, especially not a 1965 notchback. Why? Because it's one of the most cliched "classic" cars. Everyone knows it, knows someone who has owned one, or owns one themselves. They're cheap, practical, quick and good looking. They're everywhere in California. Most of them seem to be resale red with chrome wheels and I don't give them a second glance.
So why am I featuring this one? Because I can. These are old pictures - look at the registration tags, for crying out loud, they're 2007. I happened upon this car while taking a walk over five years ago and decided to photograph it for a friend. Two years later I got a silly notion to start blogging and remembered I had these pictures. So here they are.