Solved! It’s a 1951 Monarch!
It’s been awhile since we’ve had this much debate over the identification of a car! Readers will recall the 1950s photo we have been carrying in our four most recent columns. It shows three cars with their owners and kids lined up and taken on Bell Island. It was initially submitted to this column by Joyce Hammond. The two letters below correctly identify the car and prove their point with pictures. Others, earlier, such as Jack Okeefe also made correct I.D.S but there was some lingering doubts on the part of some reraders.
Hi Paul, I think I have solved the mystery ... it is a 1951 Mercury Monarch. They were sold in St. John’s by Munn Motors as they were the Ford Mercury dealer. George R. Parsons also sold Fords but they were not a Mercury dealer. The Monarchs were known as the “Canadian Mercury Monarch” as they were not in the US. I have attached a picture which I have in one of my Ford books and you can see the “bulldog” hood ornament and also the “suicide doors” as in the picture you have. The Monarch was only in Canada (as was the Ford Meteor). The Monarch was inclined to be a little more luxurious than the Mercury.
Really enjoy your column! Regards,
William J.(bill)aitken, former Ford sales person. Mount Pearl.
PS - The Canadian Mercury Monarch (and the Meteor) were also sold in this province by the Botwood Stores, Botwood, NL.
A lot of searching
Paul, it took quite a bit of searching but I finally identified the car from last week’s (“Now what about that middle car?”) as a 1951 Monarch. A site on the Internet called “Monarch, Canada’s Mercury” had the following to say ...”the Meteor/monarch cars ... first appeared in April, 1946 because of Ford of Canada’s postwar marketing strategy. More lower priced cars were sold in Canada than in The United States because of the (then) slightly lower standard of living, not to mention the whopping sales and excise taxes that added almost 20 per cent to sticker prices (for Canada). To give Canadian dealers a sales advantage Lincoln-mercury dealers sold the Meteor, a Mercury-ized Ford while Ford dealers got the Monarch, a Mercury clone.
A photo of the ‘51 Monarch from the same web site is attached.