Collector Car Corner/Cars We Remember; What’s in a name? Interesting facts from noted car show organizer

By Greg Zyla —

Q: Hi Greg and I hope all is well. We love our automobiles. Some even refer to cars as our pals, by giving them a friendly name. However, where did their rightful names come from? The answer is our major brands.

Let me explain. Ford is named after Henry Ford, Dodge after the Dodge Bros., Chrysler after Walter P. Chrysler, Buick after David Dunbar Buick, Oldsmobile after Ransom E. Olds, Chevrolet after Louis Chevrolet.

But how and where did some of the “sub brand” names come from?

Let’s start with the Mustang. Several names were suggested for Ford’s new vehicle. Included were Allegra, Adventurer, X T Bird, T Bird II, Torino, and the Mustang almost became the Cougar. A few mockup cars wore Cougar emblems for photos prior to mass advertising. One of the design engineers brought in to review the final stages of this new car said the long hood and short trunk reminded him of the P51 Mustang fighter plane. 

Another team member said, “Mustang, like the Wild Pony of the Old West.” From there, the Cougar also became the Mustang. Mercury used the Cougar name for its fellow Pony car introduced in 1967.

In 1959 a few young friends, all with engineering talents, started working for Chrysler and wanted to build a car for drag racing. With no support from Chrysler, as management frowned upon drag racing, the young men stripped down a 1949 Plymouth, reworked the suspension, and stuffed in the biggest available Chrysler motor between the frame rails. The group called themselves The Ramchargers. 

After much success at the drag strips, Chrysler management agreed to help support their racing efforts. The Ramchargers raced Plymouth brand cars. In 1966 The Dodge ‘Charger’ was introduced. Many years later, the Dodge ‘Ram’ truck, now just ‘Ram’, became popular. In 1967 the Plymouth GTX was a new Muscle car and joined the GTO, the GTA, and the GTS, to name a few.

So, what does the X in GTX stand for? Would you believe it doesn’t stand for anything? To end the long and bickering meeting between different marketing folks, the manager in charge finally said, “Put an X behind the GT, get the emblems made, the brochures printed, get the cars on the lots, and get them sold!” End of meeting.

Over at Chevrolet, their new Pony car, the Panther, was being developed. The Panther would soon be called the Camaro and become a legend for the Bowtie crowd. 

Another Chevrolet nameplate is the SS. This came about in 1957 when Zora Arkus Duntov took his “one off” purpose-built Corvette, the XP-64, and entered an SCCA event. The Corvettes had the newly developed fuel injection system installed on a race version 283. The car performed terrifically. A competitor wanted to compliment Zora by saying, “Your Corvette is a great sports car.” Zora commented, “Not just sports cars but Super Sports cars.” The SS was now part of the language at GM.

The 1961 Impala was the first GM car to wear the SS emblem. Many years later, it was adorned on a few Corvettes and many other Chevrolet performance cars.

We can’t forget the Pontiac Tempest/Lemans of 1964 with the 389 V8 stuffed in the engine bay. Big blocks were not allowed in the small and intermediate cars built in the early to mid 60’s. However, for every rule, there is usually an exception.

John De Lorean and Jim Wangers convinced Pontiac management to allow them to build a couple of prototypes using the off the shelf 389 engines as an equipment option. The prototypes borrowed the name from a Ferrari 250 GTO used for Grand Touring Competition. 

The Grand Turismo Omologato became the GTO. A few of these cars were taken to Florida during the winter months for testing. Wangers made certain several automotive magazine editors were available for test drives. 

The GTO was by far the fastest ‘factory’ built car in the 1/4 mile. The editors fell in love with the GTO, and every car magazine praised the GTO for its newfound muscle and good looks. 

Side note, Jim Wangers had the warmed-up Pontiac 421 super duty V8’s installed in the test cars, not the 389. He wanted to make sure the magazine editors were super impressed, and their story would convince the everyday hot rodders to flood the Pontiac dealerships with requests to buy the new GTO.

I always felt, as does Greg, that 1964 is the birth of the muscle car craze. In 1968 the muscle car wars were in full swing. Plymouth built an all new, bare bones, no-frills, muscle car to be called ‘The LaMancha’.

Never heard of it?

In 1965 a theatrical play on Broadway was produced from a book called “The Man From LaMancha”. A story of a daring, handsome, and bold young man to save the day and be loved by all the ladies. Prior to launching this new Plymouth muscle car, one of the marketing guys was watching some Warner Bros. cartoons with his young son. Yep, they were the famous Road Runner and Wile E. Coyote cartoons. 

The name Road Runner sparked interest. This same marketing guy had been given a test car to drive around. A friend rode along and made a simple comment, “Man, this car runs down the road quickly, it is a neat Road Runner.”

Once back at the meetings getting ready to launch ‘The LaMancha,’ it became the Road Runner. That is why the first few Road Runners built have a black and white ‘Bird’ on the fender. There was no time to get them in color. There are a few more related stories I would like to share. I don’t want to overload the system, so I will send it in the future.

Stay well and enjoy every day. Regards, Randy Lawton, Berwick, Pa.

A: Randy, thanks so much for your letter and excellent info on “what’s in a name.” I always try to give my readers something they didn’t know concerning our outstanding collector car hobby. 

Your letter is loaded with info that many readers don’t know. Further, Randy Lawton is best known for organizing the original Bloomsburg Nationals Car Shows and fielding winning late model stock cars. Both Randy and his son, Shaun, have won races, including many at Selinsgrove Speedway in Pennsylvania.

Notable is that in 1968, Plymouth paid Warner Bros. $50,000 for the rights to use the Road Runner and Wile E. Coyote names and likenesses for their cars. This licensing deal also included the iconic “beep beep” horn sound, which became a signature feature of the Plymouth Road Runner. I’d say they got a great deal, but still feel the Super Bee Dodge should have been the Dodge Coyote.

Additionally, some of the info I dug up says Plymouth paid an additional $10,000 for the horn usage rights, but I’m sticking with the $50K overall as the further I dug, it turns out that Plymouth spent $10,000 of its own on developing the sound in house. (That makes sense.)

I was a friend of Jim Wangers, who sadly passed away April 27, of 2023. Wangers, as you know, was the legendary Pontiac drag racer and marketing manager who raced for Royal Pontiac in the 1960s. He was 96 years old when he passed and left behind a remarkable legacy in the automotive world, particularly for his contributions to the Pontiac GTO and the muscle car era. I highly recommend his book, “Glory Days: When horsepower and passion ruled Detroit.” It’s the bible of Pontiac high performance.

Thanks again for your informative letter.  

(Greg Zyla is a syndicated auto columnist who welcomes reader input on collector cars, auto nostalgia and motorsports. Contact him at extramile_2000@yahoo.com or at greg@gregzyla.com.)