1400 miles in 35 hours with my dad to pick up a rare special order 1966 Ford Galaxie & goodies

My old man ran up on a Facebook Marketplace ad for this car early in the week. A 1966 Ford Galaxie 500 XL with the orginal 390 4bl engine and 4 speed in a odd color we had not seen.

The more we researched, the more it was clear he had to get this car. I did some digging on my end to figure more out on the color from an original 1966 Ford sales book. This color was a Tunderbird only color, so it was for sure special ordered. Sapphire blue. (We later learned it would have been a required fleet order. 1 of ~5000)

I talked to the owner around lunch Friday to hash out the plans. He broke the news that the front wheel had fell off going like 10mph when he took someone for a test drive a couple days ago. He was bummed, and sent us photos of the damage.

This kind of news would deter most, but we knew what he had was special and also knew its fairly easy to snag another one. It also is a nice price bargaining chip.

While we were talking he also said, "hey you are a Ford guy, any interest in another engine too?" He then shoots me a picture of a beautiful 390.

These pulled from a car, not running, and torn into pieces can go for around $1000. This one is dolled up, rebuilt, and lots of upgrades. Peaked our interest, but knew this was most likely a 2k to 3k build and not something we would snag.

We finally sorted all the details out with the seller and went to get a local auto hauler with about 10 minutes to spare before they closed.

We headed out from U-Haul around 6p CST Friday and planned to drive to Morgantown WV to get a few hours sleep from Bowling Green KY. After dinner and gas stops we made it to the hotel around 3a EST.

We both got around 3 hours sleep, then continued the trek to Laurel, MD

Due to needing a notary for out of state vehicles, and it being Saturday, we had a tight schedule.

We made it to the seller's house around 11:30a EST Saturday. Nearly his entire properly was fenced in by a patchwork fence.

After chatting with him, checking the car out, and getting on a similar page, we looked at the extra engine. He pulled out a 4 speed toploader, a rear end, and a bundle of parts. After it was all said and done, Dad bought it all for what the car price was. Seller needed to clean out due to retiring to Florida.

On the way home, I dropped in on my coworker who lived 30 min from the car. Had a chance to checkout his project truck too.

I made it home around 3:30a Sunday. 1400 miles, 35 hours later, and a walking zombie.

Now its prep time to get our cars ready for the Holley FordFest coming in a couple weeks! I told dad to throw a band aid sticker on the fender for now and call it good.