12. 1963 Mercury Monterey Breezeway
Although Mercury is now gone, for decades it was Ford’s affordable luxury division. They placed Mercury between their inexpensive Ford products and high-class Lincolns. During the 1960s, this brand offered class and style for reasonable prices, making it a formidable opponent to Oldsmobile, Buick, and Chrysler. Learning from the Continental, Mercury decided to offer something new to customers, hoping to raise the sales numbers.
So in 1963, they introduced the innovative, interesting Breezeway option as their top model. Mercury used a reverse C pillar design for the concave profile of the car and a retractable tilted rear glass window. It was an innovative solution resulting in more space in the interior and a cool design. However, it proved to be somewhat of an impractical feature since the passengers could smell the exhaust fumes at low speeds. Mercury kept the Breezeway option for selected models up to the 1968 model year when they retired it. Despite being not so popular or influential, the Breezeway still is one of the coolest U.S. sedans of the ’60s.