Ford Thunderbird

The Ford Thunderbird is a personal luxury car manufactured and marketed by Ford Motor Company for model years 1955 to 2005, with a hiatus from 1998 to 2001.

Ultimately gaining a broadly used colloquial nickname, the T-Bird, the model was introduced as a two-seat convertible, subsequently offered variously in a host of body styles including as a four-seat hardtop coupe, four-seat convertible, five-seat convertible and hardtop, four-door pillared hardtop sedan, six-passenger hardtop coupe, and five-passenger pillared coupe, before returning in its final generation, again as a two-seat convertible.

At its inception, Ford targeted the two-seat Thunderbird as an upscale model. The 1958 model year design introduced a rear seat and arguably marked the expansion of a market segment that came to be known as personal luxury cars, positioned to emphasize comfort and convenience over handling and high-speed performance.

The Thunderbird entered production for model year 1955, marketed as an upscale, "sporty" two-seat convertible rather than as a sports car, per se — averting direct competition with the Chevrolet Corvette. With the 1958 introduction of second row seating, the Thunderbird led a new market segment, the so-called personal luxury car. Subsequent generations became successively larger until the line was downsized, first in 1977, again for 1980, and once again in 1983.

By the 1990s, the Thunderbird's core market, the large two-door coupe, had fallen almost completely out of favor. Production ended with model year 1997, resuming for model years 2002–2005 as a smaller two-passenger convertible.

From its introduction in 1955 to its termination in 2005, production reached over 4.4 million.

A smaller two-seater sports roadster, named the Vega, was developed in 1953 at the request of Henry Ford II. The completed one-off generated interest at the time, but had meager power, European looks, and a correspondingly high cost, so it never proceeded to production. The Thunderbird was similar in concept but was more American in style, more luxurious, and less sport-oriented.

Credit for the development of the original Thunderbird is given to Lewis Crusoe, a former GM executive lured out of retirement by Henry Ford II; George Walker, chief stylist and a Ford vice president; Frank Hershey, chief stylist for the Ford Division; Bill Boyer, designer for the Body Development Studio, who became the manager of the Thunderbird Studio in the spring of 1955; and Bill Burnett, chief engineer. Ford Designer William P. Boyer was the lead stylist on the original 1955 two-seater Thunderbird and also had input in the following series of Thunderbirds that included the 30th Anniversary Edition. Hershey's participation in the creation of the Thunderbird was more administrative than artistic.^{[citation needed]} Crusoe and Walker met in France in October 1951. Walking in the Grand Palais in Paris, Crusoe pointed at a sports car and asked Walker, "Why can't we have something like that?" Some versions of the story claim that Walker replied by telling Crusoe, "Oh, we're working on it..." Although if anything existed at the time beyond casual dream-car sketches by members of the design staff, records of it have never come to light.^{[citation needed]}