Danville Street Sighting - 1969 Ford Fairlane 500

 Wow, I have truly been delinquent this year. It's been a good ten months since our last post, but I'm still here and still photographing cars. It's Halloween time, so let's get into the spirit of sorts with a little orange and black. Here's a 1969 Ford Fairlane 500.

San Ramon Street Sighting - 1967 Ford Fairlane Ranchero

I love the '67 Ford Fairlane. I've been a big fan of them for about ten years now, and I also dig the Ranchero coupe utility pickup-car thingy produced from 1957 to 1979. So it figures that I like the 1967 Ranchero based on the Fairlane.

Oakland Street Sighting - 1958 Ford Fairlane 500 Victoria

In my early days of researching for interesting local cars, I took to Flickr and found some photos of a blue 1958 Ford in San Francisco with a padlock on the driver-side door. Not since the Mr. Bean TV show had I seen a car with an actual padlock on it. I found where it was photographed but the car wasn't there. Years later I was driving through Oakland on my way back from Berkeley and there it was. It's rough, but it's a pretty cool old beast.

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.

San Francisco Street Sighting - 1966 Ford Fairlane 500

Readers may notice that my photo quality and quantity have gone down a bit this week. I'm using up some archive material, much of which was photographed in 2007-08, long before I even started this blog. In fact, the reason I photographed this 1966 Ford Galaxie 500 sedan as much as I did was because my friend was making driveable virtual vehicles in the online community SecondLife and was interested in textures for his models. Basically he needed a good front, side and rear shot, as well as a wheel photo, which could then be mapped onto the 3D model to make it look more realistic and detailed. Only one of my sets of textures ever made it into SecondLife, but that's beside the point.

San Francisco Street Sighting - 1959 Ford Fairlane 500 Club Victoria

I'm hit or miss on the majority of vehicles - sometimes I only like one model year of a particular car because it has just the right combination of styling, features, dash design, whatever. For example, the 2004 Pontiac Vibe. I liked the '04 model because it had white gauge numerals instead of red. I already liked the new-for-'03 body style, but hated the gauges. In 2005 it was facelifted and I never liked it again.
You may be saying that has nothing to do with the 1959 Ford Fairlane 500 pictured below, but it's more relevant than you might think. I've been called a Ford fanboy, and in some cases it's true. However I don't fawn over every Blue Oval creation, and have been particularly ambivalent about the 1959 Fords.

Santa Cruz Street Sighting - 1956 Ford Fairlane Victoria

I've been saving this one for a long time. Almost a year ago, my friend and I went to Santa Cruz and were wandering around downtown looking for something to do. Lo and behold, this beautiful 1956 Ford Fairlane Victoria came rolling down the street. No sooner had it parked than my friend and I started taking pictures.