There are a lot of misconceptions about 1964 1/2 Mustang Indianapolis 500 Pace Cars. We're here to dissolve these myths.
In the spring of 1964, the official Indianapolis 500 Pace Car was going to be Ford's 1964 Galaxie 500 convertible. In the mid-1960s, Ford was ushering in a new era in an exciting campaign known as "Total Performance". Ford had long had a dishwater boring image because the late Robert McNamara, who was running Ford during the 1950s saw automobiles as a mode of transportation and little more. McNamara has long been known as the father of the Falcon. Thank goodness Ford had great styling and quality going for it or sales would have been lackluster at best.
It was a ambitious young marketing spark plug named Lee Iacocca who would effect a white hot change in Ford's image when McNamara left to become President John F. Kennedy's Secretary of Defense during the Vietnam era. Iacocca would replace McNamara as head of Ford Division. He would also give most Ford Division nameplates a shot of adrenaline including McNamara's Falcon with a fastback roofline, V-8 power, bucket seats, and a host of other elements including more displacement and power. Then, Iacocca would get to know a hot shot racecar builder and driver from Texas named Carroll Shelby.
When Ford discovered the madness for its new Mustang, it moved quickly to get Mustang in front of as many people as it could. Galaxie was sidelined as the official Indy Pace Car and Mustang took its place.
At the Greatest Spectacle In Racing, there were a total of 38 '64 1/2 Mustang convertibles officially in attendance. All were Wimbledon White. Interior color was as varied as the Mustang's option sheet because the 35 Indy 500 Festival cars in attendance were not built specifically for the Indianapolis 500. Ford pulled these cars wherever it could find them in inventory and shipped them to the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. They would be sold at auction after the race. Indy 500 Pace Graphics were slapped on them and they were paraded around the track prior to the race. Aside from special graphics, these cars were not modified in any way. All were Wimbledon White - not Pace Car White. DSO codes and VINs of these cars remain unknown unless factory documentation surfaces.
There were also three specially modified Wimbledon White Mustang convertibles Ford ordered specifically to pace the race. Vehicle identification numbers were 5F08F100240, 5F08F100241, and 5F08F100242 with date codes of "09C" and DSO codes of 89. These were all "F" engine code 260-2V convertibles with specially modified hand-built 289 High Performance V-8s under their bonnets. Although it has been said time and time again these engines were built by Holman & Moody, this has not been proven by anyone. We've also been told by Ford insiders Ford Engine Engineering built the Hi-Po engines.
Only one of these three pace cars is known to survive - 5F08F100241 located in Florida. After the 1964 Indy 500, it went to Sebring as the track's official pace car, which is how it wound up in Florida. The whereabouts of the other two remains unknown. Although 100241 is restored in Pace Car White, its original factory color was Wimbledon White, which is the color it was at Indy.
There were also approximately 200 Indianapolis 500 Pace Car hardtops produced in Pace Car White (Color Code C for '64 1/2 only). These cars were 260-2V, automatic cars with white interiors with blue appointments.
Hardtops were the result of two Ford Division sales competitions within the company known as Checkered Flag and Green Flag. These contests were held at the same time during April of 1964 and all Ford dealers were given the opportunity to participate. Dealers who exceeded their sales objectives by the greatest percentage were given the opportunity to compete against other dealers in their sales districts. Those who won were flown to Detroit to be recognized by Iacocca himself. What's more, Checkered Flag winners each received one of the Pace Car White hardtops. Green Flag winners were given the opportunity to buy one of the cars at a $500 discount below dealer cost.
Ford had it all figured out and produced 180 of these hardtops, assembling them in mid-April. There were five hardtops allocated for each sales district. What Ford didn't anticipate was redundancies. Some districts wound up with ties and dealers that exceeded expectations, making it necessary to produce approximately twenty more units date coded May 1, 1964 with DSO codes of 84, making them the most unusual pace car replicas.
Because a lot of folks stripped these cars of their Indy 500 graphics, they've lost their identity through the years. The festival convertibles are impossible to identify without some type of documentation or owner trail because once these cars were stripped of their graphics, they became annonymous. The two missing pace car convertibles with 289 Hi-Po engines are easy to identify thanks to their 5F08F100240 and 5F08F100242 vehicle identification numbers.
Pace car hardtops can be identified by their "C" color codes and mid-April or May 1 or 1964 assembly date codes. You may own one and not know it or know someone who has one. We'd like to know all about your Indy Pace Car Mustang finds. Write to us here at our website at www.mustangmonthly.com or Jim.Smart@sorc.com.