Potential Gone to Waste

When it first came out in the middle of 1963, the Mercury Marauder and it's sister car, the re-vamped Ford Galaxy, sported a unique roof line, a forward slanting fastback which was just the opposite of all the other tops on Mercury's full sized models. There was a reason for this roof style, though. It was done for the cars to race the NASCAR circuit. And race it did. The Marauder and the Galaxy were two of the top winning cars in 1963 and 1964.

It wasn't just the roof line that gave the Marauder an edge in NASCAR. Beneath the hood it was powered by some very muscular Ford engines. One of three different Thunderbird V 8 engines, a 390 cubic inch, a 406 cubic inch and a 427 cubic inch model could be chosen. But they weren't called Thunderbirds when dwelling under the hood of a Mercury, they were branded the Marauder and the Super Marauder.

By 1965 the Marauder badge had been retired, at least from cars. The name lived on as a designation of Mercury's largest power plants. But the car just didn't want to go away. In 1969 Mercury brought it back, a stand-alone full sized car. And even though it had those meaty engines, it was designed to compete against other luxury cars. (The 1969 Marauder shown here sported the 390 cubic inch plant.)

Outside the new Marauder had its own look but underneath the skin it was sharing a lot of parts and components with another full sized Mercury, the Marquis.

The car didn't sell well. The demand for a full sized sporty car had diminished by 1969 as younger and even older buyers were moving more toward true muscle cars or family styles such as station wagons. Barely 15,000 Marauders were sold in 1969 and just over 5000 the following year. The badge was discontinued following the 1970 model year.

Mercury brought it out of moth balls in 2003 and 2004 as a high performance trim for the Grand Marquis but like much of the Marauder's life, this was short lived as, once again, sales fell well short of expectations. The audience looking to buy a full sized luxury car wasn't looking for something sporty. Or if they were they were looking toward Germany to find it.

The Marauder, born of NASCAR technology, always had a ton of potential but Mercury could never find a way to make sales live up to expectations. So much potential gone to waste.