Review of Michael W. R. Davis, "Mustang and the Pony Car Revolution"

Michael W. R. Davis, Mustang and the Pony Car Revolution. Charleston, S.C. :Arcadia Publishing, 2014.

The Mustang is one of my favorite cars. I owned two of them, a 1966 and a 1990 convertible, albeit the under-powered versions. And they were among the best of my cars in terms of reliability and cost to operate. So when offered a copy of Mustang and the Pony Car Revolution, I was eager to take a look at one of the many books that are coming out during the model's 50th anniversary year.
Author Davis, a 25 year Ford PR veteran, was working on the Cardinal Project when he learned that the Mustang was in the works as a response to Chevrolet's Monza. He was close to the scene as the Mustang moved from concept car forward to production, and most recently collected an impressive number of images which are reproduced for this book.

So what we have here after a two page introduction is about 120 pages of photographs with captions. Most of these photographs are of cars, but a few have individuals of note and relevant to the Mustang story. the photos tell their own story, and their selection casts a sort of historical interpretation of how the car came to be. Frankly, the authors choice of precursor vehicles spins a tale that at times is a stretch. For example, is the 1927 Chevrolet some sort of DNA linked to the Mustang? Well, I suppose so, but only in the most tangential way.How about the 1948 Mg-TC and the 1950 Jaguar XK-120? Even more remote to the lineage than the prostitute Rehab to Jesus.

In sum, the photos included are fun to look at and the book is entertaining. Is it history? I suppose so, but I would hope that my students would do better.