Seen & Heard: Cars Crooks Drove in Hawaii Five-O 1979 Era

                                                                        By: Patrick H Smith

  For this segment of Seen & Heard, we're returning again to Honolulu where gangsters and hoodlums just can't keep away from a tropical paradise and those darn hula girls. Can you blame them? The thugs tend to use interesting cars too. This time out, the neat stuff is driven by a cop. In Who Says Cops Don't Cry? the third episode in the final Hawaii Five-O season, we see a bright red 1967 Mustang convertible being used prominently in a supermarket robbery takedown. The thugs used a 1968 dark blue Ford Econoline van. You can see the side marker lamps on this one, an immediate tip off of the year. The very next year was the all new Econoline with partial cab over engine design which revolutionized the van industry.

   The poor cop who gets iced was driving a 1967 Mustang convertible. His wife is a cop as well so they attempt to stop the robbery with tragic results when he dies from a bullet. She survives and spends the rest of the episode trying to find the killers. It's kind of intense. Kimo Carew is a new guy Steve McGarett is trying to add to the Five O team along with Ben Dawson, the unfortunate killed officer.  Kimo is played by veteran actor and body builder William Smith. You've seen him in lots of karate movies as well.

Basic Candyapple Red 1967 Mustang rag top with white stripe is used for shoot out scene.

   As for the Mustang, a couple of interesting things jump out at me. Those headrests were optional that year. Not many cars got those. It's finished in Candyapple Red with white roof and black interior. It has tinted glass, Mustang spinner hubcaps, radio,  automatic shifter and front bumper guards. I suspect it's a standard convertible model of which 38, 751 were made that year. It appears to be a straight six engine as no V8 ensignias are on the fenders. No stunt work was done with this car.
       

Blue 1968 Ford Econoline van with white roof does minor work in the shoot out scene.

   The thugs dump their 1968 Econoline and score a 1975 Mercury Montego MX Villager wagon as a replacement. It's done in white with woody trim and tan custom vinyl interior. The Villager was an attempt by Mercury to offer an upscale Montego MX as a station wagon along with four door sedans and coupes. It was somewhat ill advised as they were cutting into Ford Torino sales. The engine could be anything from a 302 2V, 351 2V, 400 2V or the mighty 460 4V. I seriously doubt it was anything larger than the 302. No stunt work of any kind was done with the car.
 

A 1975 Merc Montego Villager wagon is used for another supermarket robbery.

  Next on our list is a cool looking 1965 Cutlass hardtop. This belonged to one of the Honolulu cops. In that State it's common for police officers to use plain wrapper cars once they become detectives. In fact, many cops used their own personal rides.  Even Danno Williams is seen exiting a sharp Chevelle hardtop in one show. In another episode. Dealer's Choice...Blackmail,  A Honolulu cop is run over by a craps game dealer fleeing from his illegal operation. The homicide was witnessed by a loser gambling bum who blackmails the hit and run owner of the car for $20,000. Naturally this doesn't sit well with the thug, played well by Nehemia Persoff.
 

Steve McGarrett leans on the hood of a Grand Prix SJ to mourn the loss of veteran police
officer to a hit and run criminal.

    This episode shows a few interesting cars in it such as the pair of black Buick Regal and Pontiac Grand Prix SJ at the murder scene. Both cops personal cars used on duty. Notice the turbine mags and raised white letter tires? The SJ was Grand Prix's top trim level back then. It's triple black. Hope it had air conditioning!The Regal is an older model with round headlamps. It's sporting alloy slotted mag wheels. No stunt work was done on this show with either car. In fact, the TV series dialed back many of their stunt scenes in the last 2 seasons of the show.
 

Some crazy driving and leaning out of window frames opens up the episode, "Use a Gun, Go to Hell."

   We do have a beauty to show you however. This one's also from the last season in an episode called, "Use a Gun, Go to Hell," my guess is this script wasn't NRA approved! A lot of neat cars in this one due to the era. Some of our classics are just at the age where they're "used beaters" so they're doing stunt work and getting beat on. Check out the 1968 Ford in the opening scene where two guys and a gal are getting silly with cornering and leaning out the door. It's a red Galaxie 500 convertible, not too many of those around now.  They only made 6,066 of them.

Early Galaxie 500 convertible with plain grille stalks a bakery to do a robbery.

  This one had a white top, red split bench interior with column shift, passenger visor vanity mirror, tinted glass, door edge guards but it's roll up windows. Not loaded by any means. The car's covered in copious quantities of primer but it doesn't appear to have bondo. It looks like it was just sprayed on to make it look beat up. The interior's nice inside and the car wasn't really used in stunt work either. Notice the car has the Galaxie 500 interior with woodie door panels and exterior letters but no hideaway grille. Kind of interesting.
 

The killer shows up in a Mark V to make the ransom payment on the gun.

  At the other end of the scale, we have a ritzy Lincoln Mark V in white used by the killer who meets our foolish blackmailer for the ransom payoff. This machine was one of the hottest selling personal luxury cars that year with 75,939 made that year alone! Since it was the last year of the full size Marks before it was downsized. buyers went for it in droves, believing it would be a "collector's item." Well they're showing movement now but for many years after, they were slugs on the market place. Equipped with a 400 V8, Selectshift automatic and super highway gearing, these cars were cruise missiles on wheels. Designed to set it on auto pilot and fall asleep until you get there. On a major highway you could do that. Many an accident happened that way.

   We know it's a 1979 due to the grille and horizontal banded tail lamps. It has the  cool alloy wheels, but not much else in the way of options. It's not a Collectors Series, not a Cartier or Designer series either. We'll come back next week with some more cool cars from the silver screen; Mahalo.
*Article (C) 2020 by Patrick H Smith. images from CBS Digital & phs media archives.