For kings and presidents
It served as a wedding car for the royal couple when they married in 1968 and for the crown prince couple in 2001. In the time between the two generations, the car had been sold, but was hired by the Royal Household for the wedding in 2001 and bought back the following year. It bears registration number A-5. A historic car like this has a natural place in the Royal Palace's car collection. The fourth generation of the Lincoln Continental is 562 cm long, 203 cm wide and registered for 6 people.
The model was also with the fateful day in November 1963 when President John F. Kennedy was shot in Houston. The car he was in was a custom-built Lincoln Continental Convertible, called the SS-100-X. It was extended by a meter, had steps on the rear bumper for the Secret Service people and reinforced bodywork. The car was available with various transparent roof structures to protect against weather, wind and assassination. Unfortunately, none of these were in use on the day when the tragedy occurred. What happened to the SS-100-X? It served for several years for the Secret Service, but today stands at the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Michigan.
Model history
The Lincoln Continental was produced between 1961 and 1969. During this period, 3 different variants were made: 4-door Sedan, 4-door Convertible and - from 1966 - 2-door Hardtop. The model was produced in 3 series, 1961-63, 1964-65 and 1966-69. All with the biggest V8 from the contemporary "Ford stable".
Kongehuset's A-5
About the pictures
The convertible in Frognerparken is from the car exhibition that was held on the occasion of the Independence Day celebrations in 2019. The pictured car is owned by a private person, but is identical to the car that the Royal Palace used, among other things, as a wedding car in the wedding between Crown Prince Haakon Magnus and Crown Princess Mette Marit. They are both 1966 models and have exactly the same "spec" in relation to the chassis number. In 1966, 54755 Lincoln Continentals were produced. The privately owned car is number 13509, while the Royal Palace's car is number 40075. Several of the photos are from the exhibition "The King's Cars" in 2022. One of the photos of the Royal Palace's A-5 was taken during an exhibition outside the palace's garage. In the photo gallery there is also a picture of a 1964 4-door Continental. It is a Series II car before the facelift in 1966. The picture was taken at Hoftreffet 2019 in Vestfold. The white Convertible was photographed at Ekeberg in 2018 in connection with an Amcar meeting.
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