Ford Motor Company has sold well over
10 million Mustangs in the past 46 years and created 100 million more
memories of youthful indulgence, magical first dates and unforgettable
Friday night cruises. Now, as the fifth-generation 2011 Mustang rolls
off the assembly line and into Ford dealership showrooms across the
country, many who have experienced and reveled in the Mustang mystique
think back to how it all started.
The
first Ford Mustang rolled off the assembly line in Dearborn, Michigan,
on March 9th 1964. A month later, on April 17th 1964, Mustang made its
worldwide debut. But, the journey from drawing board, to assembly line
and to driveways all across the American landscape actually began many
years before, in the fertile imagination of a young man named Lee
Iacocca.
Iacocca
joined the Ford organization in 1946. Although trained as an engineer,
he soon realized his personal passion and future was in sales. Iacocca
spent years as a field manager helping dealers promote and sell some of
Ford's most undesirable products.
In
1956, his "56 for $56" campaign, advertising that buyers could purchase
a new 1956 Ford for only $56 per month, caught the attention of senior
management. Robert McNamara, then vice president of Ford Division,
summoned him to Detroit. Once there, Iacocca's sales savvy soon helped
him lap everyone else on the executive fast track. In 1960, Ford
chairman Henry Ford II promoted him to Vice President and General
Manager of the Ford Division.
