Cars Rarely Found in Their Namesakes
We have talked at length in this series about vehicle naming conventions, testing the limits of finding cars named after various creatures in the animal kingdom and ones titled after people. Actually, that one is an upcoming effort. Stay tuned.
One series that has always caused some brow-wrinkling is the concept of vehicles being named for places in which they are likely never to be found. Whether it’s a product of socioeconomics or a simple matter of the car never being sold in that market, numerous examples exist of machines sharing the name of a place it’ll probably never visit.
[Image: Milos Ruzicka/Shutterstock.com, GM, Dodge, Ford]
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Mercury Milan
For a spell in the mid-to-late 2000s, Mercury sold its own variant of the Ford Fusion. Called the Milan, it showed up in the States and Mexico - plus the Middle East - though this author can confirm that at least one copy made it over the border into Canada somehow. Perhaps someone drove in and flew home.
Mercury Milan
Anyway, alert readers will recall the flap raised last year by Italian lawmakers who lost their collective minds when Alfa Romeo dared to title their own new vehicle as ‘Milano’ despite it not being built in that city. Imagine what they thought about this Mercury, assuming they even bothered to care. Non va bene! As for the car itself, it did eventually earn a midcycle facelift and hybrid powertrain.
Dodge Monaco
This model was introduced way back in the ‘60s and is probably the iteration most gearheads think of when someone mentions the name. As was typical of the era, it was available in a slew of body styles - wagon, sedan, two- and four-door hardtop - and could be opted with an enormous V8 engine of the famed 440 cubic inches.
Dodge Monaco
Measuring every bit of 220 inches in some model years, the spectre of an ill-handling V8-powered beast whipping around Monaco brings deep joy to this author. We sincerely hope some crazed gearhead has imported one to the area at some point over the last fifty years. Oft-forgotten fact: Dodge revived the Monaco name in 1990 and briefly applied it to a badge engineered variant of the Eagle Premier, itself originally a collab between AMC and Renault.
Chevrolet Monte Carlo
Why not stay in the same part of the world - heck, exactly the same part of the world - for our next entrant? The mighty Monte Carlo, especially the rear-wheel drive variants, is better associated with lairy burnouts and NASCAR than the sun drenched coast of Monte Carlo. Fans of geography will note Monte Carlo is in the principality of Monaco.
Chevrolet Monte Carlo
Chevy decided to flip the script and make the Monte front-wheel drive in 1995, basically rebadging of the old Lumina coupe and causing apoplexy amongst good ol’ boys across the nation. Last-generation SS models nevertheless reintroduced V8 power, sending over 300 horses to the scampering front wheels.
