Lincoln ’s 1961 models had timeless fashion that gave the trade name a template for sorely needed design consistency . But if an impatient Robert McNamara had been a bit more insistent , the arresting 1961 Lincoln Continental – or any other Lincoln – never would have been seen .
During its 80 - plus year , Lincoln has almost gone under three time . On each occasion , it was rescue at the 11th hour . Each " salvation " was followed by cars that were critical or commercial successes .
Classic Cars Image Gallery
Sometime before 1920 , Henry Ford ’s wife , Clara , discovered she like chauffeur - driven cars , which Cadillac produced but Ford did n’t . By 1922 , Lincoln , a new Cadillac competitor , was in bankruptcy and face extermination .
Henry Ford bought Lincoln from the bankruptcy court of justice to get his married woman out of a Cadillac and into a Ford product . Then he turn the daytime - to - daylight operation of Lincoln over to his son , Edsel .
Artistically , Edsel Ford was gift , but by 1935 , after age of build beautiful cars , the Great Depression had reduced Lincoln ’s sales to a trickle and Lincoln was once again in deadly peril . Only the raw mid - priced Lincoln - Zephyr , championed by Edsel Ford and introduced in the nightfall of 1935 , saved Lincoln from certain extinction a second metre .
The marque faced the ax a third clock time in the summer of 1958 , when Robert McNamara , Ford Motor Company group vice president for vehicle operation , told Lincoln management that its product ought to be discontinued because he go steady little hope of override Lincoln ’s long - term loss . ( Lincoln was then on its way to $ 60 million in departure for the 1958 - 60 period . )
The 1961 Lincoln Continental came about as a last - ditch feat to bring through Lincoln by making it profitable . As such , it proved to be a will to the whimsey of the " last prospect " : Not only did it set about a period of rising sales , but it bring home the bacon raw prestigiousness for Lincoln , as well .
But before charging ahead with developing of the 1961 Continental , Lincoln direction wanted to determine why the car - maker had hang behind its competitors . Find out what Lincoln get a line – and how it responded – in the next division .
For more information on cars , see :
Lincoln Institutes Design Study
Lincoln took a hard look at itself before the 1961 Lincoln Continental was planned . In May 1955 , George Walker , a design consultant to Ford since the late 1940s , was hired as the company ’s frailty president of design . Walker ’s principal help were Joe Oros for the Ford line and Elwood Engel for Lincoln - Mercury .
On Engel ’s recommendation , Walker constitute longtime Ford clothes designer John Najjar head of the Lincoln design studio , and Najjar and Engel lay about designing the 1958 Lincoln .
The ultimate unsuccessful person of the 1958 Lincoln , and the recoil it create , resulted in Najjar ’s replacement by Don DeLaRossa as head of the Lincoln studio apartment in October 1957 . DeLaRossa wanted something dissimilar – and smaller , but because of budget and time constraint , he was able-bodied to beget no more than superficial change on the 1959 and 1960 Lincolns .
Ford executive Ben D. Mills bring a report to influence what Lincoln had been doing damage and , more importantly , what had to be done to make Lincoln profitable . Mills , who had been named ecumenical manager of a newly freestanding Lincoln Division in 1955 and who later headed a short - lived Mercury - Edsel - Lincoln ( M - E - L ) group , plant up a modest internal commission .
It let in DeLaRossa , who enlisted the assistance of Gene Bordinat , then in charge of the Mercury studio apartment , to consider why Cadillac had been so successful , and why Lincoln had not achieved the same level of sale , respect , or profitableness .
Bordinat and DeLaRossa finally concluded that Lincoln miss design consistence during the 1949 - 1958 point . Cadillac appealed to the same marketplace year after year with cars that at least looked like they were related . Lincoln did not .
Mills figure the trouble as far more complex . He felt an unduly influential Walker had pushed the 1958 Lincoln on Ford ’s Product Planning Committee without sufficient consideration of its profitability . Mills and McNamara share a worldwide notion that Lincolns were too full-grown , and that they bank on too many design clichés that were potential to go out of style all too quickly .
Mills concluded that the fastest direction to make Lincoln profitable was to extend the meter between model change , a concept that travel against conventional industry wisdom . He propose stretching Lincoln ’s pattern cycle from three to as many as nine years .
At about the same time the study was completed , Bordinat and DeLaRossa play melodious chairs . Bordinat was placed in charge of a consolidated Lincoln - Mercury studio , and DeLaRossa became his executive stylist .
Rulo Conrad , who had been a manager in the Lincoln - Mercury studio apartment and one of the primary designers of the honor - winning 1956 Lincoln , was discover to replace John Reinhart as head of Lincoln ’s preproduction studio apartment . Conrad ’s job was to fill out the next - generation Lincoln that had been started by Reinhart .
The designers in Conrad ’s studio let in John Orfe , Merle Adams , Bob Chieda , Howard Payne , and Joe West . Conrad desperately wanted to change design guidance , but he was told the railroad car he was designing had to show continuity with then - current output Lincolns .
Next , find out how about the excogitation and developing summons for the 1961 Lincoln Continental resulted in two unlike proposal .
1961 Lincoln Continental Development Begins
The car that was originally meant to become the 1961 Lincoln Continental was changed at least three times during its design appendage . When it was completed , there were really two dissimilar proposals , each with a unlike roofline .
Those alternate proposals represented differences of opinion among the designers and management about what the 1961 production Lincoln should front like .
Design chief Gene Bordinat require a fly roof on the approaching Lincoln to counter General Motors ' cantilever - cap four - door hardtop design instituted for 1959 . Designer John Orfe was call for to prepare renderings of a elevator car with an overhanging cap but , except for Bordinat , nobody else care the concept .
Since Bordinat was studio apartment brain , designer Rulo Conrad and clay modeler Doug McCombs struggled on night after night without succeeder essay to come up with an satisfactory winged - roof excogitation .
Not all designers agreed that the next iteration of the Lincoln needed to show continuity with the Lincoln then on the market . Many room decorator matte that Lincoln needed a fresh start , and the sooner the better .
Orfe and Howard Payne , two relatively novel Lincoln Studio designers , were scotch with what their own studio was proposing for the next - multiplication Lincoln . Although they were not alone , they were cheeky enough to express their frustrations openly .
In mid 1957 , they told John Najjar , head of the Lincoln plan studio , and intriguer John Reinhart that they disagreed with the design direction being propose for the next Lincoln . To their surprisal , Najjar and Reinhart told them they could build a full - sized clay mannikin of their estimate for the railway car .
Payne and Orfe were given a little stopgap studio under a stairway in a room that had antecedently been a coffee shop . fit it in between other assignment , they design and – with clay modeller Joe Seibold – built their proposed 1961 Lincoln over a period of about six months .
Design frailty president George Walker and Elwood Engel wish the construct enough to order two full - sized fiberglass models of it work up . Before work up the fiberglass exemplar , fashion designer Ray Slate suggested that stubby Phoebe be bring to the top of the front fender and dropped down over the grille area , disunite the two-fold headlights on either side . Slate ’s idea was incorporate on the the full - sized models , although the stubby fins were later remove during one of the design brushup of the automobile .
Between them , Orfe and Payne had a sum of only three years experience at Ford , and neither had a star for their workplace . Almost immediately after they finished their marriage offer , Engel began workplace on the alternate 1961 Thunderbird that eventually became the 1961 Continental .
One of the most outspoken contestant at Ford ’s Styling Center who had not been directly call for in the design development of the next - coevals Lincoln was Wes Dahlberg . As a resultant role of his dissension with Bordinat , he was promoted out of Dearborn and placed in bearing of Ford ’s design studio in Cologne , Germany . One of the first cars he designed after he arrived there was the Taunus 17M.
As one of George Walker ’s elementary supporter , Engel made frequent nightlong trips to Cologne . One of those stumble pass in June 1958 . Dahlberg ’s head Henry Clay modeler was Fred Hoadley , who company Dahlberg to Germany .
Both Dahlberg and Hoadley recall that during Engel ’s visit , he expressed an unusual pastime in the just - completed 3/8 - scurf theme role model of the Taunus 17M. They call back that Engel returned several metre to study their Taunus 17 M mannequin , and that he ask legion questions about its excogitation .
Dahlberg doubts the Taunus 17 M had any unmediated influence on the design of the 1961 Continental . Hoadley , on the other hand , believes there was a joining , although he is unaware of any direct statement by Engel that confirm this .
Hoadley returned home for a vacation about a twelvemonth after Engel ’s visit and , while at the Styling Center , he see the proposed 1961 Continental for the first meter . Hoadley thought then , and extend to conceive , that the Taunus 17 M – with its directly - inch fenderline and oviform headlamps – had a direct influence on the Continental .
The floor of the 1961 Lincoln Continental ’s development – and its connection to the 1961 Ford Thunderbird – continues in the next division .
1961 Lincoln Continental and 1961 Ford Thunderbird
How the proposal that Elwood Engel ’s design studio intend as a Thunderbird became the 1961 Continental first require some account of the difficulties Joe Oros ' Ford Studio designer had in coming up with an satisfactory design for the 1961 Thunderbird .
By 1958 , the Modern Ford Division nous , Jim Wright , had decided that the 1961 Thunderbird had to be even sportier than the previous example . aim vice chair George Walker and Oros did n’t gibe , but since Wright purportedly had the last word , Oros directed his designers to start body of work on a sporty new four - passenger Thunderbird .
The design of the 1961 T - Bird did n’t make out easy , but after many renderings and 3/8 - scale clay fashion model , the design direction was arrive at during an all - night school term in which designers Bill Boyer and Jim Powers build up a full - sized clay model that established its basic line .
Because the Ford Studio was having so much problem institute a design instruction for the 1961 Thunderbird , Engel decided to plan his own competing proposal .
According to a narration statement Engel gave the Henry Ford Museum in June 1984 , after he return from his oversight trip to Cologne , Germany , he demand Walker if he " could have a studio to develop an musical theme for a novel Thunderbird . " Engel was given a minuscule room in the basement of the Styling Center . ( The room left barely four base on either side of a full - sized clay model . )
The situation was nicknamed the " stiletto " studio by graphic designer Colin Neale and , even though it was later claimed that the name referred to the long , narrow layout of the way , Neale now recognize that the name was coin as an irreverent jab at the yield studios with which they were competing .
Engel resolve to base his 1961 Thunderbird proposition on the recently break Continental Mark II ; the Orfe / Payne marriage proposal ; the Quicksilver , a conception car designed in the Ford Studio that finally became the 1960 full - sized Ford ; and a smattering of features from the Taunus 17M.
The designers assigned to the undertaking were all handpicked . They included John Najjar , Neale , Orfe , and intention analyst Bob Thomas . Designers Dick Avery , Gale Halderman , and Phil Payne – Howard Payne ’s younger brother – came into the studio as the auto was come near completion , but they did very little work on it .
Orfe was assigned to oversee the Lucius Clay modeling . Harry Strickler was the lead modeller on Engel ’s 1961 Thunderbird proposal , and on all the changes the motorcar went through in the studio apartment on its way to becoming the 1961 Continental .
studio apartment clay modelers who work on the machine during its various point include Seibold , Cecil Perkins , Ross McLean , Art Rockall , Wolfgang Konietzko , Ray Trombley , Rolland McDonald , and Toby Melone . The stiletto studio interior designer all confirm that Engel , too , spent much of his time as a hand - on designer work on the alternate 1961 Thunderbird proposal .
Preparing the parcel layout for the 1961 Lincoln Continental would try out challenge for the design team . keep reading for the details .
1961 Lincoln Continental Gets New Design Chief
Development of the 1961 Lincoln Continental extend despite changes in management . When John Najjar was replaced as head of the Lincoln studio , he was reassign to the truck studio . He thought the demotion meant the close of his calling at Ford , but when Elwood Engel got his own studio , he requested that Najjar become his executive designer .
Recalling the 1958 Lincoln they had worked on together , Engel and Najjar agreed that their alternate 1961 Thunderbird had to be " clean with no garbage on it . " The first thing Engel told the intriguer in his studio apartment was that he want their Thunderbird proposition to be alike in design to the Continental Mark II – but " hire to the extreme . "
Engel asked design analyst Bob Thomas to ready a parcel layout for the car , which included steel sides and a Mark II - flair greenhouse ( include curving glass ) coiffe on top of the area between the sword .
Thomas ' first step was go to the Ford studio to get the Thunderbird ’s computer software dimensions . fit in to Thomas , the aim psychoanalyst in the Ford studio apartment told him that the only crucial measurement on the 1961 Thunderbird was the cowl expanse .
So , based on what Engel enounce he wanted , Thomas design the body anatomical structure of the gondola on a heavy blackboard . He laid out the nursery , roof , curved - deoxyephedrine side windows and tumblehome , body structure , and the conformation of the front- and rear - steering wheel cut outs . Thomas enounce he copied the original design of the Mark II windshield , but without the dogleg he thought impeded entryway and passing .
Originally , Thomas suggested the gondola be designed in a wedge shape , and he advocate that the breadth of the car at the cowl be as wide as potential to accent the Continental - style greenhouse sitting on top of the blades . Engel agreed . unluckily , the width of the elevator car at the C - pillars turned out to be panoptic than the package measurements place by Engineering .
What Thomas did n’t actualise when lay out the railroad car ’s package was that the measurements he used were five inches extensive at the cowling than the package called for . ( The wheelbase was set at 113 inches , with a cowl width of 75.4 inches and an overall body distance of 205 inches . )
Thomas recalls that several people , include Walker , asked him if the excogitation was within software limits ; although he always said that it was , it must have do him to recheck the measurements , because he discovered the error the night before the car was to be shown .
By do work almost all Nox , Thomas , Engel , and the Henry Clay modelers were able to rebuild the full - sized clay models to a maximum cowl width of 75.4 column inch . Engel was n’t glad about the mistake , and Thomas recalls being swear out by Engel several times over the course of what wrench out to be a very tenacious night .
In the next section , learn what changes were made to the proposal of marriage before they were presented to Lincoln ’s Product Planning Committee .
1961 Lincoln Continental Design Proposals
The designers in Elwood Engel ’s Lincoln design studio apartment finish two full - sized 1961 Thunderbird marriage offer in Lucius Clay , and they were both quick by recent June 1958 .
On the more conservative proposal ( the one eventually selected to become the 1961 Continental ) , designer Colin Neale design a rearward end with large Ford - similar orotund taillights .
John Najjar suggested a grille he involve John Orfe to plan for the automobile . The grille Najjar proposed had been incorporated on several anterior aim proposals and was commonly referred to as a " Schick razor front goal . " Najjar also suggested a horizontal bar in the midriff of the grill to make it distinctive , and grille blocks inside the wicket to decrease the electrical minor look .
At Engel ’s suggestion , the beltline and fender edges on the more cautious proposal were capped by a narrow banding of brightwork . Engel recount Orfe he got the idea from the Quicksilver , which had been completed several month in the first place in the Ford Preproduction Studio .
Orfe felt the bodysides should come to a point at the front of the car rather than end brusquely , which he think made the gondola smell chopped off and bare . While he was drawing unexampled front ends for Engel ’s nominate Thunderbird , purpose honcho George Walker came in looking for ideas for the Ford Studio ’s Thunderbird marriage offer .
He like one of Orfe ’s rendition with a typical grill and pointed fenders , so he took the lottery ; it became the Ford Studio ’s Thunderbird front end and grille proposal . Engel , meanwhile , vetoed all of Orfe ’s pointed - fender ideas for his alternative 1961 Thunderbird in favor of the squared - off front fenders that became a part of the production 1961 Continental .
Before the competing 1961 Thunderbird proposals were presented to the Product Planning Committee , Walker asked designer Joe Oros to support Engel ’s proposal over that of his own studio designers .
Oros have intercourse Walker favor Engel to come after him when he retired , and although he want to defend his friend , he told Walker he could n’t back Engel ’s Thunderbird because he candidly trust the Ford Studio proposal was the good of the two .
Under continued pressure level , Oros tell Walker the best he could do was persist silent when the planning commission reviewed the contend designs . Which conception would the Product Planning Committee choose ? The solvent is in the next surgical incision .
1961 Lincoln Continental Product Planning Meetings
Two design proposals were presented at a Product Planning Committee meeting in later July 1958 – one of which would be chosen for the 1961 Lincoln Continental .
The more conservative of clothes designer Elwood Engel ’s 1961 Ford Thunderbird proposals was evidence against the Ford Studio proposal at the meeting . One of the first the great unwashed to point out on Engel ’s blueprint was William Clay Ford , who say the marriage proposal was " too gracious for a Thunderbird , " and it " should be the newfangled Continental . "
During the presentation , design frailty chairperson George Walker argued persuasively that Engel ’s proposal be picked as the next Thunderbird . Jim Wright , general manager of Ford Division , was just as persuasive in urging that the Ford Studio marriage proposal be selected .
Henry Ford II , who seemed in a real predicament over which one to choose , finally turned to designer Joe Oros and told him that he had not heard from him yet . Oros hesitated , then tried to avoid a straightforward answer ; HFII sensed what was happening and asked him for a lineal reply . Cornered , Oros responded that the formality of Engel ’s marriage offer would look fine as a Lincoln , but he favored the Ford Studio model because it continued Thunderbird ’s jazzy facial expression .
Ford , who had probably already come to the same end , concord , and Engel ’s rejected Thunderbird proposition go back down the stairs on the freight elevator .
Ben Mills was one of the members of the Product Planning Committee . When he first encounter Engel ’s Thunderbird conception , he think it was a natural for the next Lincoln . He did n’t wish the " shovel - nosed " proposal from the Ford Studio , but on the QT hop it would be take as the next Thunderbird . If it was , Mills had already decide he was pass to seek to requisition Engel ’s alternate T - Bird and turn it into the new Lincoln .
Although Mills voted for Engel ’s pattern as the next Thunderbird , when the Ford Studio proposal win , he immediately tell Engel he wanted his car for the next Lincoln .
When Engel got back downstairs to his studio , the modelers were surprised to see that he was elated . Engel told them that the pattern from Oros ' studio had been chosen as the next Thunderbird , but that both Bill Ford and Ben Mills thought the car they had designed " was too beautiful to be a Thunderbird , and it should become the next Lincoln . "
He instructed the studio staff to replace the big round Ford tail lamp on the mud model with with child chrome caps at the end of the rear - buffer blade , to plan a squashed horizontal tube in the arena between the blades , and to admit a separate grill at the back of the decklid . After that , the car sat wait either destruction or rediscovery .
Robert McNamara , vice United States President in explosive charge of all auto and motortruck program , missed the get together at which the Thunderbird decisiveness was made by the other Product Planning Committee fellow member . Mills does not recall what , if anything , he enjoin McNamara about Engel ’s proposal , but , within the next week , McNamara went to the Styling Center , where Walker conduct him around to the various studio to review the selections the other commission members had made .
When McNamara get to Engel ’s studio apartment , the rear end of the erstwhile Thunderbird construct had already been redone to eliminate the Ford - style taillights and comprise capped blades and a rear grille nacelle .
McNamara front at the proposal of marriage for a few minutes and then asked Walker and Engel questions about it . One of the question he asked was whether it could be made into a four - door Lincoln . Engel said it could , but that it would take about two hebdomad .
Next , hear how McNamara ’s concern about Lincoln ’s win almost conduct to the cancellation of the 1961 Lincoln Continental .
1961 Lincoln Continental Almost Discontinued
het meetings almost lead to the discontinuation of the 1961 Lincoln Continental . Robert McNamara was still new to his post as vice chairman in charge of all gondola and truck program , having latterly replaced Lewis Crusoe , who retired in 1957 due to ominous wellness .
Having manoeuvre the Ford Division before his promotion , McNamara was conversant with its plans , but he wanted a full explanation of what was brewing for Lincoln , so he bring a serial publication of biweekly meetings with Lincoln ’s management . The meetings were attended by Ben D. Mills , general coach ; Harold MacDonald , primary engineer ; Emmett Judge , principal production planner ; and patronage faculty . No one from Styling was included in the meetings .
Because MacDonald expected that McNamara would ask about features planned for future Lincolns , he asked Harold Johnson , his executive engineer for advanced projects , to attend . The subjects for give-and-take at the first meeting included sales , finance , and projections . The 2nd group meeting dealt with new product and plan technical features .
Johnson remembers being very Byzantine in the presentment made at the second meeting , which include such topics as proposed suspension advance and how to install curved spyglass in future production Lincolns . By the sentence the third and fourth Roger Huntington Sessions were agree , they had become presentations with petty discourse , except when McNamara ask questions .
Partway through the fourth meeting , that all changed . According to McNamara , he stopped whoever was making the presentation and aver it was time to " crystallise the deck and put all the cards on the table . "
Everyone but Mills , MacDonald , and Johnson were asked to depart the elbow room , and then McNamara denote that , based on Lincoln ’s dismal financial jut , he had decided to advocate that the car course be terminated . He did n’t wish the focal point Lincoln was heading , did n’t like the fact Lincoln had never made a profit , and he had n’t hear anything from Lincoln ’s management that change his brain .
For a few seconds , Johnson says , you could have get a line a personal identification number drop . Everyone in the room claim McNamara , who was not bonk for his mother wit of liquid body substance , as dead serious . Then Mills , who had come to Ford in 1946 with McNamara as one of the " Whiz Kids , " ask , " Bob , you ca n’t really do that , can you ? "
McNamara responded , " You bet I can do it . " A heated discussion followed , with everyone in the elbow room arguing against McNamara ’s offer recommendation , but none of the disceptation made a dent on McNamara , who give no sign of changing his judgment .
After what seemed like an timelessness , Mills was lastly able-bodied to sway McNamara to back off , something not often done . grinder argued that the Ford family would n’t accord to break Lincoln , especially since the Continental Division had been dissolved only a year and a half earlier , and the Edsel was likely the next to go . Besides , Mills argued , it was unjust to employees , dealers , and customers to stop reach Lincolns " inhuman turkey " without some sorting of forward motion warning .
McNamara reluctantly told mill that he would agree to one more Lincoln production cycle , but only on specific conditions . One of the conditions was that the next Lincoln had to be a lot diminished .
come back the event of that meeting more than 40 years later on , McNamara stress that his biggest business organisation was that future Lincolns had to make a gain . He told Mills , MacDonald , and Johnson that he had recently seen a mud model of a schematic Continental - like Thunderbird down the stairs in Engel ’s studio apartment that had been rule out in favour of a sportier T - Bird proposal .
McNamara told them that if that design could be made into a four - doorway and profitably work up as the raw Lincoln , " without significantly increase its size , " he would " go with the program . " According to Johnson , no one else in the room except Mills knew anything about the clay exemplar to which McNamara was referring , but , as the coming together broke up , Mills change state to MacDonald and Johnson and said , " You ’d better get down there ASAP . Your Job are ignore out for you ! "
It was late when the coming together broke up , so , early the next morning , Johnson and one of his assistant , Bill Davis , hurried to the Styling Center to look at the clay model . When they see it , they decided they really did n’t know what McNamara mean about not making it importantly bigger .
They picked up the software program drawings for the car and returned to Lincoln forward-looking engineering science to canvas them . finally , they decide not to take a fortune , but to only lengthen the machine the bare lower limit needed to make it a four - room access .
Johnson and Davis then return to the Styling Center , where they asked Engel to lengthen the railcar by 10 inches , add two more doors , and also build a separate seating clam base on their hurriedly modified package drawings .
More work would have to be done to ensure McNamara ’s approval , however . The next incision has the full story .
1961 Lincoln Continental Prototype Approved
One hebdomad after the decision was made to enlarge the 1961 Lincoln Continental cadaver model to a four - door , executive engineer Harold Johnson got a call from someone in designer Elwood Engel ’s studio apartment , probably John Najjar , telling him the seat long horse had been completed and the caper had been done .
Johnson and his assistant , Bill Davis , headed back over to the Styling Center that good afternoon . Johnson immediately acknowledge that when the clay theoretical account had been rebuilt as a four - threshold , a hop - up had been put in the beltline just in front of the termination of the rearward door .
They next calculate at the four - door seating Pearl Sydenstricker Buck to see how much way there was for egress . The front fanny was fine , but when Johnson got into the back seat , he could n’t get his base back out without kicking the door . At that distributor point , both Johnson and Davis realize a Lincoln with a wheelbase short enough to please VP Robert McNamara would never mould with conventionally configure doors .
In his old assignment , Johnson had been chief locomotive engineer at Continental Division when a Mark III Berline proposal was make with back door that were hinged at the rear . He evoke that the back doors of the 1961 Lincoln be hinged the same agency so the thickness of the doors would no longer demonstrate an egression problem .
When he proposed the rearward " self-annihilation " doors , Johnson also suggested doing away with the B - pillar wholly , and interlock the doors to the level and to each other , as he had done on the Mark III Berline mockup .
He ultimately decided to retain Bel - pillars on the 1961 Lincoln , however , because he was upset that McNamara might still suggest cancellation of Lincoln if this model became too complicated or too costly . As another cost - keep measure , it was decided that only four - room access sedan and four - threshold transformable mannikin should be raise .
When it was finally revised , the full - sized clay model of the 1961 Continental was enthusiastically support by Bill Ford and McNamara , and unanimously approve by the Product Planning Committee .
Once the decision was made to produce Engel ’s alternate Thunderbird as the 1961 Lincoln , the the Great Compromiser model was moved up the stairs to Gene Bordinat ’s M - E - L studio to set it for output . There , Don DeLaRossa and his studio intriguer grow trimness and embellishment for the motorcar . The convertible - top mechanism was worked out , too , using existing applied science from the Ford Skyliner retractable hardtop .
Harry Strickler , head modeler in the incarnate advanced studio , think that even before the car went upstairs to the Lincoln Studio , an instrument - panel buck was started in competitor with the design being prepare in Dave Ash ’s Lincoln Interior Studio .
At one point , Ash add Engel his proposal for the instrument panel , but Engel thank him and said he already had his own ideas . Engel ’s architectural plan for the instrument gore was to group the air - conditioning and radio set controls between two box house the tool on one side and the baseball mitt - box on the other .
Although the basic plan of the instrument jury is attributed to Engel , Art Miller and Bob Zokas of the Lincoln Interior Studio refined Engel ’s loge - and - tube blueprint into the finished 1961 Continental instrument instrument panel .
Interior studio apartment designers Paul Wong and Ed Albright convinced Ash to let them design the fanny for the 1961 Continental based on designer Ludwig Mies van der Rohe ’s Barcelona chair ; their intent , although qualify , was used on the production car .
In this article ’s next section , recover out what technology decision were made for the 1961 Lincoln Continental .
1961 Lincoln Continental Engineering
In Lincoln vice prexy Robert McNamara ’s fortnightly meetings with the applied science squad for the 1961 Lincoln Continental , the subject of discourse was almost only how to figure out past problems , especially those that had resulted in repeated large losses .
The 1958 Lincoln had to begin with been plan for a 126 - inch wheelbase , but was subsequently increase to 131 column inch so the railway locomotive could be moved five inches forward to make the transmittance hump lower .
Because the 1961 Continental was to be shorter , the engine and transmitting had to be move as close to the firewall as potential . That signify that the transmission hump in the front - rider compartment became huge , threatening to limit rider content to four instead of six , something unacceptable for a Lincoln .
One of the problem Harold Johnson had to resolve as principal engineer at Continental Division was a tendency for the Mark II driveline to oscillate . He asked Dana Corporation to occur up with an inexpensive unremitting - velocity , duple - cardin universal joint . It never was used on the Mark II , but it was revived for the 1961 Lincoln , where it allowed the transmission and the propeller shaft to be fish downwards .
The end result was that the 1961 Continental was built on a 123 - inch wheelbase , yet stay on a six - passenger car .
At one of the semiweekly meetings , McNamara brought up the subject of Lincoln quality – or what he saw as a lack therefrom . With primary applied scientist Harold MacDonald and Johnson ’s enthusiastic support , vendor cooperation , and new testing method , a 24,000 - mile warranty and even universal oil standard were crusade through as stock features on the 1961 Continental .
At 25,164 units , the 1961 Continental sold slightly better than the 1960 Lincoln and Continental . But in a weak year for the manufacture , that modest increase amounted to a 60 - percent gain in food market share .
More importantly , the profits the new - style Continental made ( $ 20 million between 1961 and 1964 ) , the praise it received , the design award it won , and increasing sales over the next decade assured that Lincoln would pull through .
