I thought a number of years ago, Ford was going to dump the Mercury line and
expand the Lincoln line. At the same time GM was talking about dumping
either Olds or Buick (I don't remember which), and Chrysler was dumping
Plymouth. I guess D-C was the only one to follow through with all those
plans. Bummer! The others might not be so strapped if they had followed
through also.

SC Tom

I don't quite follow you on the MN12 T-Bird/Cougar/Mark 8.

Now, yes, especially since all GM can do anymore is cookie cutter,
"badge engineered" cars from different now-non-existant "divisions"
that were once semi-autonomous "real" divisions.

Merc came along in '39 to compete against Chrysler and GM's upper line
cars, Buick and Olds, and to a lesser degree, Pontiac, which back then
wasn't much more than a gussied-up Chevy with Oakland-designed
straight 8s.  It set up Ford to be a "full line" manufacturer, like GM
and Chrysler already were.  Sloan's GM was able to offer cars covering
the entire price range, from the lowly Chevrolets, to the regal
Cadillac, and just about everything in between.  The trick was, that
while they shared Fisher bodies and very basic "corporate" styling,
each division had their own free rein to build power plants,
suspensions, interiors, exteriors...everything else, relying on GM
corporate on Woodward Ave. only for financing through committees. Ford
and Chrysler's cars were somewhat more alike and were built in some of
the same plants, although they did not share engines all that much
until the late '60s.

It worked, especially after the "whiz kids" at Ford, hired by "King
Herny II" after the war, came up with their hot looking slab sided
Fords and Mercs in '49, essentially putting a lot of lipstick (and a
new independent front suspension) on obsolete flathead drive trains
that had formerly lived in really obsolete looking cars.  Not long
after the highly successful '49-'50 models dominated the market, Ford
ran around Chrysler as the #2 of the "Big 3" and has stayed there ever
since.

Why dump Mercury now?  All Merc is now is a trim option, nothing more.
Back in the '60s, Merc still had their own version of the FE, the 410,
but everything else was getting very much the same, especially with
the 390s.  GM still had all bases covered, with similar looking but
very different cars in terms of mechanicals and prices.  Once GM
started dissolving the Sloan model of semi-autonomous divisions,
various GM divisions actually started begining to have a problem with
duplication of product, with GM's goal being to have all V8 cars
powered by the cheap-to-build Chevy small block and all V6 cars
powered by Buick.  A few lawsuits held that back for awhile, but it
eventually came to pass.  By then, the whole raison d'être for
competitors having competing lines started to fade.  Chrysler actually
knew this far earlier and dumped their moribund De Soto line, which
was supposed to compete with Oldsmobile in the '50s, in 1961.  I think
that the guys in Highland Park saw what happened to King Henry II over
in Dearborn with the Edsel fiasco, and decided to cede that market
slot to GM completely.  Besides, they already had Buick cornered with
their Chrysler line, and "sporty" versions of Chrysler models could
easily compete with Olds, and they did.

Now, Fords and Mercs are the same vechiles, just with what is optional
on the Ford version being standard of the Merc.  The only changes that
start happening at all are when you get to the Lincoln level, and even
that's again mostly window dressing (to attract ghettoids) and more
standard stuff, much of which isn't available on the baseline Ford.
Would stopping making those extra badges, grilles, taillights and
other "distinctive" parts help Ford's bottom line?  I don't really
think so, but, a look at Merc's sales figures for years now tells me
that no one buys "Mercury" anymore, unless they can grind out a better
deal on a Merc that has stuff on it as standard that would cost more
by buying the Ford version with options.  Despite attempts to burnish
the Mercury name with the failed Merkur and Cougar projects in the
last couple of decades, the name generally means the same to younger
people now that Oldsmobile meant to them...vanilla sedans with lots of
phony wood, fluffy seats and not much else.  GM's mismanagement also
made Olds go that way, especially after they screwed up marketing the
really fine Aurora by following it up with basically "badge
engineered" Intrigues and Aleros.  You could get the same car next
door at the Pontiac dealer for less as a Grand....Am or Prix.

MN12 is the platform (also used on Cougar/MkVIII) reference to
distinguish it from the previous Fox plat