It is a picture-perfect day in Westport, Connecticut, and we're floating as if on a cloud, down sun-dappled lanes past one impressive white colonial manse after another. From the passenger's seat, local realtor Jonathan Deak points out the ones owned by boldface names while we pilot his 1974 Lincoln Continental Mark IV. Among the Mercedes-Benz and Audi SUVs, most of them either gray or black, that today ply these shady streets, our red moondust Lincoln seems a little out of place. That wasn't always the case.
This Lincoln Continental Mark IV was originally purchased in nearby Greenwich. As the story goes, Adele and Rolf Hasner bought a pair of new luxury coupes off the showroom floor—not unusual in this part of Connecticut—a red Mark IV for Adele and a green one for Rolf. However, Adele never liked the car's huge and heavy doors (she's got a point there), so she switched to a new four-door Cadillac Seville in 1976. Her Mark IV remained garaged, driven only occasionally, for the next twenty years until Deak, a family friend, acquired it from her son in 1996.
Lincoln might be running away from these cars now, but the Mark IV was a real success story at the time. The company had brought out its predecessor, the Mark III, in 1968, in response to the Cadillac Eldorado. The Mark's Rolls-Royce grille and fake-spare-tire hump stood in stark contrast to Bill Mitchell's creased and classy Caddy. By the early 1970s, however, the Eldorado had taken a turn, following Lincoln down the boulevard of baroque. Lincoln, meanwhile, turned up the wattage with the Mark IV for 1972, and sales jumped by nearly 80 percent over the previous year. The Mark IV sailed past the Eldorado and outsold it every year after.
The 1974 brochure humbly states: "The Continental Mark IV is one of the most desirable and most wanted personal American luxury cars of this decade." It is indeed very much a car of its decade. The 1970s Continental Marks are arguably the zenith of the personal-luxury era, in all its long-hood, short-deck, vinyl-top, opera-window glory, in the same way that a '59 Cadillac epitomizes the finned '50s. As Deak says, "It's the pinnacle of mid-'70s fabulousness."
And there is fabulousness. Ford threw everything it had at the Mark—some of it serious, some of it less so. On the serious side, one can't help but marvel at the smooth and silent operation of the massive, 460-cubic-inch V-8 engine. The Lincoln Continental Mark IV also offered rear antilock brakes and an electric windshield defroster, both of which are on this example. Less serious perhaps is the Cartier clock (with genuine Roman numerals!) that is as prominent as the speedometer and sits proudly near it in the instrument panel.
Elsewhere, the cabin boasts acres of tufted white leather (velour—in five different colors—was also available). The low roof and small windows make for a cozy interior, almost absurdly so, given the hugeness of the exterior.
