This short Ford film charts the changes in America’s favorite V8 automobiles for 1935.  The footage Includes some priceless scenes, have a look. 

The Ford passenger car lineup received significant improvements for 1935. The famed 221 CID flathead V8, rated at 65 hp for its 1932 introduction and bumped to 75 hp for 1933-34, was upgraded to 85 hp, which would remain  its power rating for years to come. Bodies were rounder, roomier, and more modern in appearance for ’35, and the front transverse spring was moved out in front of the beam axle, lengthening the spring base and making the venerable Ford buggy suspension a little less sensitive to pitch. New body styles included the Touring Sedan, which included a built-in, weatherproof trunk compartment—soon to be forever known as the humpback sedan. Ford was America’s most popular brand in ’35, comfortably outselling Chevrolet by several hundred thousand units.

But the major appeal in this fine old newsreel is in seeing the Ford men, father Henry and son Edsel, as they inspect the new 1935 Ford cars. (We’re guessing the filming took place sometime around December of 1934 with the annual model rollout.) As we often remark here at Mac’s Motor City Garage, footage like this allows our favorite figures to step off the flat pages of the history books and become multi-dimensional.

It’s also a fun seeing the year’s new Ford models hustled around a dirt course at an impressive pace. We’d like to say that none of the now-precious Fords were harmed in the production of this film, but we don’t know that. There may well have been a few unfortunate incidents on the bumpy circuit around the River Rouge plant. At about a minute forty in of the three-minute clip, watch for some serious fooling around.