Lively One: ’62 Ford Galaxie 500XL Club Victoria, 1 of 1

Before there were muscle cars, there were cars with muscle; big bruisers with lots of horsepower and lots of sheetmetal. Today’s featured car is one of those big bruisers. In 1960, Ford, trying to catch Chevy in the sales race, introduced an all-new car. The Galaxie versions were the top of the line, and for 1960, it was a model series instead of a sub-series of the Fairlane 500. Ford was responding to Chevy’s Super Sports and supported the big Galaxie with an ad campaign called “the lively ones”. Despite being an all-new car, Ford’s rival still outsold them by 215,000 cars. The 1961 Galaxie was reskinned from the glass house down and lost the distinct look of the 1960 cars. The 1961s had mini-fins and signature round Ford tail lights. The 1962 cars, like today’s featured car, looked cleaner yet, and all vestiges of fins were gone. 1962 also saw the return of a Thunderbird-style formal roof, two-door hardtop. We think the T-bird box roof works well on such a big car. This particular Club Victoria is said to be the only one powered by a 406ci Thunderbird engine with 3-2 barrels and an automatic transmission. Back in the day, you could by-pass the order book and pretty much spec a car the way you wanted. Impossible to do today because every variant has to be approved and tested to be certified for sale. So if the rules of collectibility work here and they should, this car has it: originality, rarity, provenance and condition. Originality for this XL is based on how faithful the restoration of the car was adhered to (the baby moons need to go). Only a close inspection will confirm that. Rarity seems to be a lock based on the Galaxie Registry, maintained by a 3rd party. Provenance is assured by the original build sheet specifying the HD Cruise-o-matic transmission plus documentation of the restoration. Again condition can only be assured by a personal inspection but it sure looks good in the photos. The seller is asking $40,000 and that is above the highest estimate of a car equipped with this engine. It is the transmission that separates it from the herd and makes it 1 of 1. So the premium price may be appropriate. We really like this one and would love to see it at long distance tour or rally. Click here for the eBay listing.