The 1955 Mystere show car was originally intended to showcase Ford’s infant gas turbine technology, but it soon earned a more direct role in the company’s product plans.
Like so many vehicles of the Motor City’s classic dream car era, the Ford Mystere was never a real automobile as such. It was a pushmobile, i.e. a glider as they are known in the Detroit styling studios. As finely finished as the Mystere was on the outside, there was nothing inside or underneath: no engine, drivetrain, or suspension. It was only a pretty face, sigh.
On paper at least, the Mystere was to be hypothetically powered by a gas turbine engine, but the Dearborn automaker’s turbine technology wasn’t yet ready for a real running prototype. (For example, see our feature on Ford’s experimental Boeing-powered ’55 Thunderbird here.) Working from an original rendering by the prolific Bill Boyer of the Ford Advanced Styling Studio, the company’s stylists worked up full-sized interior and exterior package on a 121-inch wheelbase. However, the Mystere’s actual construction was subcontracted to Creative Industries, a Detroit company that specialized in building show cars and prototypes for all the automakers, and had special expertise with fiberglass and molded Plexiglass structures
The Myster’s futuristic cockpit featured a number of forward-looking features, including a television in the rear seat and four shell-style bucket seats. Note also the distinctive throw-over steering yoke, an idea apparently borrowed from the Beechcraft Bonanza, a glamorous personal aircraft of the period. Since the vehicle was not a driver, we wouldn’t know how functional the Mystere’s dual-driving setup was, but our guess is not very.
In the original plan, the Mystere was to make its debut at the 1955 Detroit Auto Show, but that launch was scrubbed when Ford decided that two of the show car’s most visible features, the deep-vee side trim and diagonal tail fins, were headed for production on the 1957 passenger cars. (The Mystere’s contribution to Ford’s ’57 production car design is described in the Ford styling film we’ve featured here.) The Mystere did eventually make a public appearance at the Chicago Auto Show in January of 1956, below, where it received extensive press coverage.
