Beautiful cars come and go through the showroom of Benchmark Classics, America's Hot Rod, Custom, Specialty and Muscle Car Playground in Madison, Wisconsin. The amazing cars on the floor often force you stop, stare and imagine what they'd be like to own and drive. But even in the rarified atmosphere of this cathedral of automotive love and lust, a car will occasionally come through the doors that will make almost everyone who sees it go, "WHOA!" This is about one of those cars...
Sitting on the floor at Benchmark Classics is a very unusual automobile from the most common of manufacturers. Even the truly car crazy with years of experience look long and hard the first time they see this one:
A 1939 Ford Deluxe Convertible Sedan.
This four-door drop-top is appealing in so many ways. The lines are elegant, perfectly highlighted by the palest cream lacquer imaginable. It isn't white; no, it really is cream. The pontoon front fenders and their embedded headlights look so right together. The fender skirts could put on a class about how skirts are supposed to look...and do great justice to the British term for them: Spats. And wait until you see the dashboard! Oh, this is just a beautiful car.
Designers and savvy collectors will tell you that the graceful lines and understated elegance of the 1939 Ford models led these cars to become classic examples of automotive design in the era leading up to WWII. While most American automakers of the time began to focus on closed coachwork, Ford introduced a new open car that combined the best features of a closed body, a cabriolet and a four-door sedan. Built from 1935 to 1939, the distinctive (and, even in its day, unusual) Convertible Sedan was a low-volume prestige car, designed to build traffic in Ford showrooms.
During the 1939 production run Ford divided their models into two series: Standard and Deluxe. The Deluxe models had a more modern appearance expressed through smoother bodylines, gorgeous teardrop headlights and simple chrome trim.
The 1939 Ford Convertible Sedan was only offered in the Deluxe model and came with an 85 hp, 221 cu. in. Flat-head V8 with a two-barrel carburetor, three-speed manual transmission, solid front axle with transverse leaf spring, and semi-floating rear axle with transverse leaf spring. It was equipped with four-wheel Lockheed hydraulic drum brakes, introduced that year for the first time on a Ford.
This Convertible Sedan includes dual tail lamps, dual windshield wipers, walnut wood grain window moldings and dash panels, rear armrests, twin electric air horns, a "banjo" steering wheel, a locking glove box door, and the coolest dash-mounted clock you'll have seen in years. It originally listed for $920, but the difficult economy held sales of the Convertible Sedan to just 3,561 examples in 1939; the model was quietly retired from the Ford product catalog.
This rare beauty is not only in outstanding condition, it is absolutely meant to be driven and equally ready to be driven. The saddle brown interior and tan canvas top, that beautiful dash and the wonderfully curved gear-shift lever will bring you back to the days before WWII in a car you can enjoy today and for years and years to come.
This was an unusual beauty in 1939. Today, it is a lovingly restored and protected example of great American design from the pre-war era. This is a car that honors so much of American automotive history, and in the same manner will honor the taste and instincts of its next owner. It sits waiting to meet that lucky person, on the showroom floor at Benchmark Classics, in Madison, Wisconsin. Be ready for the applause when you make this 1939 Ford Deluxe Convertible Sedan yours.
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