Big Jag

Fresh from our "scoop" on Vanessa Edmunds` pink Edsel (Cedar Key News of March 1), my thoughts have turned very easily to various other glamour cars. Say you have one hundred grand to blow on a new set of wheels? What`s on the shopping list? - Consumer Reports` analysis places the Honda Fit as top value amongst the more than 200 vehicles they tested, but then it might be a bit teensy for dogs and shopping. What about a Prius as a Green Car? Or a sporty Mustang? A Bentley or a Lamborghini certainly couldn`t be squeezed out of the budget.

You might think that with my English antecedents the Jaguar would be an obvious choice, or that it should at least be considered as a credible candidate. Today`s luxurious and athletic 2011 XF and XJ models, for example, are drop dead gorgeous and worthy of all of the motoring journalists` cliches.

Jaguar X

But the Jaguar still has an image problem for many Englishman. The Mark X, especially, was too often driven by the type of "businessman" associated with such phrases as "kneecapped" and "very good to his old mum". The Mark X was the last really louche Jaguar; technically sophisticated and with chic coachwork, it never achieved its projected sales targets, and most were written off in British TV police dramas. (Reliability figures that were well below average may also have had something to do with this!)

So I might be tempted to go for one of the current Cadillacs or Mercedes - but then it`s too easy to select the obvious, and I figure that there cannot possibly be anything wrong with going retro and choosing one particular fabulously overstated piece of American automotive engineering. Take in the lowness that defines my ultimate example of Virgil Exner`s "Forward Look", the chrome eyebrows over dual headlights and the red Jet Trail tail lamps set in chrome -bezel shells, and I dare you not to fall in love with this confection in two-tone pewter gray and rose quartz (or indeed one of the 75 other color schemes available). When did God start designing cars?

Open the door and "the seats swing out to meet you, the seats swing in to seat you", slide behind the wheel, immerse yourself in the gold-beaded Jacquard fabric and vinyl upholstery, and take note of the array of buttons and switchgear. On the move, and you will be enchanted with the strong cast iron 383cu in V8 motor and the ease of the push button TorqueFlite auto transmission, cosseted by the Torsion-Aire ride, and comforted by the deluxe radio and air-conditioning. Surely the advertising agency got it right:
"Take some steel, forge it with skill, make an automobile. Go Dodge!"

1959 Dodge Custom Royal

Yes, I give you the 1959 Dodge Custom Royal Lancer, the biggest, baddest and best of the supercars, and 53 years on it`s still the standard by which all the others should be judged. Drive it just once and surely you will fall in love all over again. Who cares about the fuel economy when the rest is perfect?