Australian icon joins the centenary party

By ALASTAIR SLOANE motoring editor

A 30-strong convoy of unique Australian Ford Falcon coupes is joining the biggest-ever collection of Ford vehicles when Ford Motor Company celebrates its 100th birthday next month.

The Falcons, representing Australia's oldest motoring nameplate, will be among up to 10,000 Ford vehicles converging on the company's world headquarters in Dearborn, Michigan, on June 16 to mark 100 years of Ford operation globally.

Leading the eclectic collection of Falcons into the Henry Ford World Centre will be Ford Australia's latest models, the BA XR6 Turbo Falcon and BA Fairmont Ghia.

These youngsters will be closely followed by older siblings - Falcon XA, XB and XC hardtops - born in the 1970s.

Sure to turn heads will be the highly modified versions of the Falcon XB coupe, replicating the Interceptor version made famous by Mel Gibson in the cult 1970s film, Mad Max.

The Australian-made movie, released as The Road Warrior in America, turned the Ford coupe into a collector's item in the United States.

The BA Falcon escorts will be driven by former Ford Australia Falcon assembly plant managers Phil Spender and Gary Roe, now senior executives within Ford's North American manufacturing operations.

Melbourne-based Ford coupe enthusiast Howard Nessen will be among the crew driving the US-owned Australian-built Falcons, which will leave from Utah, Memphis and Pennsylvania before meeting in Toledo, Ohio, to make the final leg of the drive into Michigan as a group.

Nessen, himself an owner of a 1974 XB Falcon coupe show car, has been in contact with the American Falcon owners in the rally.

"We've been organising our convoy as the US-based Australian Ford Falcon Club since early last year and even had two of the key guys from America fly over here earlier this year," he said.

"They wanted to see where their cars were made and even managed to organise a meeting with Ford Australia president Geoff Polites, who gave our idea the thumbs up."

The hard work of Nessen and his American counterparts has resulted in the Falcons being selected by centennial organisers to be included in a special-interest area at the Detroit rally, parked alongside motoring icons, the GT40 and Shelby Cobra.

This comes on top of the selection this year of the 1960 Australian Falcon as one of Ford's 25 most significant vehicles of the century, out of a field of 1000 distinct models produced by Ford globally since it began operation.

If the US Falcon owners have anything to do with it, their American brethren are about to become even better acquainted with this long-time Australian icon.