More Than a Sketch
| 01 April 2006
Obviously, the pony pictured above isn’t a car at all. It doesn’t wear 4-tires; it wears 4-hooves. It’s clearly a sketch, and it looks familiar, doesn’t it? Some of you probably know its origin or parts of its story. Nevertheless, here are some more details about the sketch and about the man behind the sketch.
Forty-two years ago this month, on April 17th, the 1964½ Mustang made its first public appearance at the New York World’s Fair. But, as we know, there were Mustang concept cars before that. The passionate and dedicated individual who put his indelible mark on Mustang I, the first Mustang concept, is the subject of this story. It’s the story of a man who drew cars beginning in his teens and, early on, he began calling them . . . MUSTANG. After graduating from high school, he was accepted into a major of Biochemical Engineering at Nashville’s Vanderbilt University but illness intervened. Bedridden for a year, the 17 year old teenager, unable to do little else, sketched the things he loved—cars. That year served as a forerunner to a significant change in career goals.
I find his story absolutely spellbinding. And as interesting as I find the story itself, equally fascinating is the way it came to light. There’s a lady in Texas who has spent the last 20 years developing the details. She was gracious enough to give me permission to share with you some of her copyrighted material and some of her images. Her name is Holly Clark and the story she tells is riveting. Thank you Ms. Clark, for your assistance and for allowing me to share this story with our club members. Your father must have been a very special person.
Yes, the story is about Holly Clark’s father, Phil Clark (Phillip Thomas Clark) born October 27, 1935 in Centerville, IA. He died when Ms. Clark was very young but since 1986 when she discovered much of the information about him, she’s been determined to gain him the recognition he deserves. She’s written articles, given interviews, shared details with Ford Motor Company at the request of J. Mays speaking for Bill Ford, and started a series of books to immortalize Phil Clark. The first book will be released soon under the title The Man Behind the Pony.
Part of Phil Clark’s story is posted on the Internet, it’s been the subject of several newspaper articles, and part of it appeared in the August 2005 issue of Mustang Monthly. I wrote a little about it in the editorial column of the August 2005 issue of Pony Express but there’s so much more to tell.
Phil Clark was a car buff who was fascinated by the cars of the 1950s and early 1960s, particularly the “muscle cars” of the period, forerunners to the high powered machines of the mid 60s. He tried to send early drawings of his dream car (later called Mustang) to Chrysler. Although impressed, Chrysler suggested he take an art course. He took a home-study course and worked for a while in the layout departments of the Cain-Sloan Co. and Sears. Then he was accepted into the prestigious Art School of Design in California. Following graduation, he went to work for General Motors where he designed “the Car of the Future” for the 1964 General Motors World’s Fair display called Futurama, an imaginative city of the future.
In Gary L. Witxenburg’s 1979 book entitled Mustang: The Complete History of America’s Pioneer Ponycar, it’s suggested by the author that Clark’s fixation on Mustang also surfaced at General Motors where, in addition to his Futurama responsibility, he was part of a design team that sent sketches of a concept car to Bill Mitchell, Head Designer. Seemingly in the vein of Ripley’s “Believe it or Not,” the concept was called Mustang. In typical GM sloth-like fashion, though, no immediate action was taken on the concept car; When the Fururama project was finished, Clark and several other designers were let go.
This was just about the time that Ford wanted to begin work on a project with a code name of T-5; they hoped to develop a marque to replace the failed Edsel. The prototype that evolved was eventually called Mustang I. Clark was hired for the project and he was full of enthusiasm. He saw the job as a stepping stone to his goal of one day having his name on a car similar to the scuff plate message on General Motors’ cars that said “Body by Fisher.” He believed that eventually “his” cars would carry the message: “Body by Clark.”
For a period of time at Ford, the T-5 project was stalled behind an AMA roadblock. Ford and the other AMA (Automobile Manufacturer’s Association) members had agreed to a ban on factory supported racing. Mustang I was planned as a 2-passenger sports car capable of racing on Saturday and then driving to church on Sunday, a common practice among club racers of the day. Intolerant of the race-car component of Mustang I, the AMA ban nearly derailed the project. But thanks to Ford’s tradition of marching to its own drummer, a decision was made to boycott the ban. Ford green flagged the Mustang I project in early May 1962 and consciously made the decision to support racing. The slogan “Powered by Ford” was created.
Work began immediately on Mustang I and 100 days later, dubbed the 100-day wonder, it debuted at Watkins Glen on Saturday October 6, 1962. On Sunday as part of the pre-race ceremonies leading up to the Formula 1 race scheduled that day, Dan Gurney and Sterling Moss each drove the car at speed for several laps around the race course. I was at the Glen on October 7th, I saw the car, I remember taking pictures of it (that I can’t locate), but I had little appreciation of its significance. Or maybe it was only an interesting exercise at the time and the “significance” evolved out of 20/20 hindsight over the past 44 years.
Where was Phil Clark during the development of Mustang I? Right in the thick of things, that’s where. One sketch was used for the design of the car and it came from this talented 27-year old designer. Apparently, it was the first time in Ford’s history where one sketch carried the day. Typically, bits and pieces from several designers would be combined to produce the final sketch. But J.J. Telnack, former Vice President of Corporate Design for Ford Motor Company said, “Phil was one of our most talented designers and was part of the original Mustang design team throughout its development in 1962 until its launch. He had considerable influence on the total design and the early prototype Mustang concept that he [Clark] directed.” The Clark-sketched body was mounted on a space frame chassis designed by his friend Roy Lunn, a former Aston-Martin engineer and a soon to be famous part of the Ford GT-40 racing program. True to original intent, Mustang I met FIA and SCCA specs and it could have raced under those sanctioning bodies.
But what about the galloping pony sketch pictured as Pony of the Month? How did it fit in? Well, it seems that Clark liked to sketch animals too. And, as if day and night devotion to the 100-day wonder wasn’t enough to occupy the time and mind of the young designer, he continued to sketch animals during the intense 100-day period. Ford needed an emblem for Mustang I and, as related in Ms. Clark’s Mustang Monthly article, Clark sent 10 pages of Mustang emblem sketches to Ford executives for consideration. Others sent sketches too but one of Clark’s emblems became the emblem of choice for the prototype. Originally, it was a sketch of a galloping pony in front of a so-called tie-bar, as the cover picture and the picture at left above both show. But as Ford management zeroed in on his sketch and it gained traction, someone asked how you could tell that the horse was American. Clark, who was in the room at the time, immediately changed the tie-bar to a red, white, and blue tri-bar. That sealed the deal; his sketch was approved. The pony was tightened-up a little bit and rotated out of 3-D for casting purposes but with the tri-bar replacing the tie-bar, it otherwise remained as-sketched. Surely, it stands as a tribute to the man so involved in, and so important to, the genesis of Mustang I. To this day, Mustang uses the same emblem.
The emblem has found its way onto more than 8.4 million Mustangs since it appeared 44-years ago. And somewhere in Clark’s possessions Holly Clark hopes and expects to find a cardboard cutout of the emblem that Clark painstakingly made and then
covered with aluminum foil to make it shiny. The family made some of their Christmas ornaments that way and Clark used the same process for his cardboard rendition of the emblem.
When I first saw the sketch, it literally gave me chills; it still does. And I would certainly like to see the aluminum-foil-covered cardboard cutout.
Was the 27-year old designer, pleased with the Mustang I project? Without a doubt he was because he had lived and breathed the 2-seat creation. It was the culmination of ideas that he had carried in his head and translated into sketches for at least 10 years. Although the message wasn’t anywhere on the car, it truly had a “Body by Clark.”
Was he equally pleased with the production car when it was announced 18-months later? With so much of himself invested in Mustang I, you would expect that he was very proud when the production version come to life. But you would be wrong! He found it hard to contain his disappointment and the disappointment only deepened as the Mustang evolved from the 1964½/1965/1966 to the 1967/1968, and on toward the 1969.
Ford decided that a 2-seat car would lack broad appeal; they saw a 2-seater as a niche car with market demographics pretty much confined to hard core sports car enthusiasts. It was clear that Mustang I would not be produced. But a production version with a back seat, basically a re-skinned version of the Ford Falcon, would hit the streets at a base price below $2,500. Saying that the public wholeheartedly accepted the production version is a gross understatement. Ford had hit a home run. But Clark’s disappointment was based on what he saw as the lack of purity in the production car. Mustang I, the small agile sports car, had disappeared and in its place was this “other” car called Mustang. It had few, if any, of the prototype’s characteristics. Beyond sharing the name, the two had little in common except for the emblem. It was of little consolation to Clark that his emblem was retained and that it was being used on every unit leaving the assembly line, frequently in several places on each car.
Clark’s career at Ford continued. For example, in 1966 he was managing a design studio for Ford of England. And because of his credentials, he was also being wooed by Chrysler. But the young designer was very ill. He suffered from an unknown kidney disease during most of his adult life and underwent routine dialysis. He needed a kidney transplant but the procedure was rare 40-years ago.
What would he have thought of Mustangs as they evolved beyond the 1969 model year? His disappointment probably would have continued but we’ll never know for sure because he died from his kidney ailment on February 28, 1968, at age 32. At the time, he was undergoing dialysis at Vanderbilt University Hospital in Nashville; the very university where he had been accepted into college in 1953; the same university he had been unable to attend because of illness. He’s buried in Nashville and it seems only fitting that Mustang I was on display at the Mustang 40th anniversary celebration held there in 2004. Perhaps Clark’s spirit was with the car keeping a watchful eye on the “Body by Clark.”
An important and integral part of Mustang genesis and gestation was gone. Were it not for Holly Clark we might never have known it existed, let alone its importance. The Mustang marque has survived for 44-years from Mustang I to the current S197. In my opinion, it’s success is very much related to the collective passion of the Mustang faithful. The car was and is an icon. The early passion of people like Phil Clark and, since then, the passion of many others in the Mustang community have made it so. It has seen some glory times and some tenuous times but it’s still with us and currently a star in the Ford lineup. For many, Mustang is much more than a transportation appliance. It’s an experience that influences lifestyle. It can get inside your head just as it got inside Phil Clark’s head so many years ago.
Today we can look at Clark’s emblem and be grateful that it’s still essentially true to his sketch. It was the right emblem at the time and it remains so today. It’s purity is a testament to his design genius.