What an interesting string of stories, claims and rebuffs! Though
I must say many unique cars have been built by the manufacturers over the
years and they do get out to the public even though the auto manufacturer
may never have intended it.
When I worked at Ford Design, our VP, Gene Bordinat would regularly
have a custom car built to his specs for his daily driver in addition to
the various company cars he had. We would build cars with unique sheetmetal,
unique drivetrains, always unique colors (some not so good either!) and
it was policy that the cars would not be sold if any safety-related equipment
was altered even down to modifying or replacing a seat belt! Of course
those kinds of things were always changed during a custom build.
One MK IV even had the passenger compartment moved aft about a foot and
side exhaust pipes installed that exited through the front fenders!
Young Edsel Ford II (as a high schooler) would come to our studios and
order his "new" car - usually a specially built Mustang with Shelby equipment
etc. Lee Iacocca always had his Lincolns customized as did some of
the Ford family members. (Henry II preferred to drive a light blue
Pinto when he drove alone - he claimed it helped him keep a low profile...)
Now when these special cars were later sold (by whom I don't know) one
can imagine the stories that would accompany the car!! "Of course
it was 'factory-built', I bought it from the VP" and etc.
We all know that Exner had many special cars built and usually drove them
as his daily driver as did Harley Earl and Bill Mitchell at GM. Most
likely there are many of these "factory-built" special cars out there giving
rise to the many legends that we hear about.
I know if you were an insider in a car company you could get a lot of
special work done and/or equipment installed in a car which was factory-built
in every sense of the word, but not available to the general public. I
had a T Bird built to my specs that included a unique color combination
of interior material and exterior color along with some deleted options
and other added engine and suspension options for which parts were still
available - but no longer offered through dealers. This was in the
60s. (BTW my unique color combo on that car was a candy apple red ext with
a tan monochromatic interior).
So, I would think it likely that a "Hemi Commando" or Fury convertible
or any other unique vehicle could have in fact, been built at some point
in time at Chrysler and escaped the corporate "destroy and do not sell"
policy. As to using a decal, old or new as a point of authenticity - forget
it! We used to make custom decals all the time to make a car look
more "factory" and less like a "custom".
Brian
D500s in MI
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