There are amazing survivor vehicles out there, and then there is this 1969 Plymouth Fury III with 21,000 original miles! This car is maybe the nicest original fifth-generation Fuselage Fury III left on the planet and it can be found on Craigslist in Duluth, Minnesota for $4,800. I just saw this car in person this morning and it is truly mind-blowing. When it gets sold, which it will, here is the archived listing. Unless I buy it and then you can ask me for photos or a ride anytime.
My dad had this exact same car but in yellow with a brown top, otherwise it’s 99% identical to the one that we had in the early-1970s. I remember my dad being blown away when premium gas went up to $0.60 a gallon; those were the ’69 Fury III years for us. The car could and would lay rubber like nobody’s business with the stock 318. I had to see this car in person and I also thought I might snap it up, it is ridiculously nice. If my 1966 Lincoln Continental Coupe would have been this nice I’d still have it.
The owner of this Fury III is a super nice guy and he just couldn’t pass up this car when he saw it on the side of the road with a for sale sign in the window a couple of years ago. He is only the second owner of this 48-year old jewel. The original owners bought it new and then the husband passed away shortly after. His wife drove it for one year and then it was parked in their car sales showroom for decades. It literally has just about 21,000 original miles on it and it looks like it has 2,100 miles on it. Being in northern Minnesota, and in a storage unit, there was a big solid ice mound in front of the door from the roof dripping and freezing so I didn’t drive it, but the owner started it and it literally sounded and ran like new. I wouldn’t have wanted to drive it on the salty roads anyway, but it was tempting.
Isn’t this thing beautiful?! I know that most people will say “Too many doors” (ugh), but this is what most people drove, especially if they had a family and kids to haul around. And by saying “most people”, I know that some of you have never owned a four-door car in your life and you wouldn’t be caught dead in one, other than the hearse that you’ll ride in eventually, unless you insist on a two-door hearse. This car is frost green and I couldn’t imagine a better color for a car of this era. There is one tiny rust spot on the very bottom of the LF fender but I looked underneath and I didn’t see any other rust other than surface rust like you would see on any car that hasn’t been detailed monthly for car show duty. It’s looking great so far, Scotty G, but how about that huge trunk? Yep, just as you thought it would be, like a time capsule. You can see one small ding on the center trim piece in the trunk photo, that could fairly easily be massaged out to be like new again. That’s literally it for dings on this car.
If a person needed proof of originality and uber-low miles, this front seat is another sign. It is literally like new, as is the back seat and 99% of the interior, other than a small crack in the top of the dash just where you’d expect to see one: on the side of the speaker holes. That’s just another one of every car maker’s planned design-obsolesce assurance that a person will never keep any particular vehicle more than a few years before trading up to the newest model. The seller got the car with the original tires but has since put new ones on, and also a new set of shocks and a new master cylinder, new U-Joints, and he flushed the cooling system and changed the hoses and has done a lot of other work on this gorgeous car to make sure that it’s a reliable driver after being stored on that showroom floor for so many decades. At $027 a day, or $100 per year ($4,800/48 years) this is one nice car.
There were no engine photos in the ad but I took this quick photo this morning. The 230-hp, 318 V8 engine, as you can see, is in the same amazing cosmetic and working condition as the rest of this car is. One quirky thing is that for some reason the AC compressor and hoses have been removed. I’m guessing that it quit working even a year or two after being sold new and the original owners took it off. Or, maybe they needed it for one of the cars that they were selling? Who knows. The next owner will have to get an original, giant Chrysler unit, or maybe upgrade to a nice, smaller modern unit, which shouldn’t be too expensive and will be nice for those hot summer days, which number in the low-dozens in northern Minnesota. All of our cars had AC when we were growing up in the 60s and 70s, but eventually they all quit working and we never bothered to get them fixed. I think that this car would be a great addition to anyone’s collection and it could be a daily driver after changing the transmission fluid and filter (it’s still original!) and taking a few small trips to make sure that everything is working perfectly. After all, cars like this low-mile jewel were daily drivers when they were new so why not drive a classic, get 20+ mpg, and turn more heads than your $50,000 silver/white/black SUV will?
Great find. Proof that there are still some nice original ones left!
Beautiful car, AND it’s a FOUR DOOR!!!
My grandparents had a ’69 two door Fury II, in a metallic bronze color. Stylewise, this car’s brother. I rode thousands of miles with them in that car, and eventually got old enough to drive it some. It had a 318, and got impressive gas mileage, for the size it was. This was also the car my cowboy grandpa drag raced that split window Corvette in, in downtown McAlester, Ok., when I was 11, or so. We had lots of good times in that car.
Non working Air Conditioning just made this otherwise very desirable (to me) car drop at least one thousand dollars in price.
Not a fan of the colour, but am a fan of the number of doors.
Big, comfy, quiet, and smooth riding. Just the car for a highway cruise.
Big difference between a car kept in a cold garage, and one kept for decades in a climate controlled car showroom. It might not be obvious in photos, but looking the car over in person, it’s night and day. Someone is going to get an incredible entry into the car hobby.
Beautiful survivor! Amazing condition (especially for MN)! Despite me (and most others) not liking 4 door cars, $4,800 seems like a steal to me! IF it was close to me, I’d offer $4,000 CASH. Too bad full size 4 door cars aren’t worth much! However, Hagerty says a #2 Excellent car is worth $9,000!
My Father bought a new convertible every two years, and kept it four years. Two convertibles at a time, in Northeastern Ohio. In 1968, aftter i had been drafted, I came home on leave, and found a 1969 Plymouth Fury lll four door in a nasty light yellow green with a green top. My Mother wanted a four door to transport her friends.
A 1964 Lemans convertible had been traded in and its stablemate was a 1966 Catalina convertible. There was no comparison. When I got back from Nam in 1970 the Plymouth was gone and there was a 1970 Olds convertible.
Somewhere in a box I have a small diecast toy version of this car, in blue, done up as a police car. Original Majorette or Matchbox, can’t remember.
How has this not sold yet? Only downside I see is they didn’t cap off the a/c evaporator when they pulled the compressor and lines. Otherwise this is pretty much as perfect of a find as there ever has been on Cragislist.
I agree, quite a find. Used to be, cars like this just melted into the background, kind of like all cars today. Nothing particularly outstanding about it then, just a 4 door family mover, could be any make, but today, this really looks unique. Again, nothing outstanding,( aside from condition) just a good ol’ ’69 people mover, and could do the same today.
A/C compressor not a huge deal as it needs to be converted to modern refrigerant anyway- a good time to install an efficient modern compressor. The sight of these still strikes a little fear into my heart. As a 13 year old I ran from 3 of these on a two rut trail next to a railroad track, piloted by Florida Highway Patrol officers intent on catching an unlicensed Kawasaki 100 trail bike. I laid the bike down in the brush for an hour until they finally gave up. These brutes were powered by 440’s and were hell on wheels. They looked something like this, but yellow instead of white.
I only wish I could have this car!I had one of these when I was in the army and it brings back so many good memories. I did a lot of traveling in mine and it was like a motel on wheels. The only negative about them is that they ate ballast resistors. Every payday I’d buy a few. It had over a hundred thousand miles on it when I sold it to my uncle and I know he put quite a few more on it before he sold it. I love the 318s they were next to bullet proof.
I owned a ’70 Fury Gran Coupe with a 383cid. I never replaced the ballast resistor in the 14 years I owned it. I suppose I was lucky.
Scott
Please contact me though my Email address you have on file concerning this car. Im very interested and would like to talk to you about what you saw.
Thanks Mike
Ten years from now I think we will look back and think $5000 was a steal. Sure its not that rare but condition matters
Back in the early 70’s, my dad suggested that I buy a second car to save the miles on my 64 1/2 Mustang! So I took his advice! ( I still have that 64 1/2 Mustang by the way! ) I started looking around for a second car! I found one just like this one! I bought it without asking him to look at it! It was brown! Anyways I was driving it with a friend of mine around coming down independent Blvd! This road is somewhat curvy! The right front wheel came flying off! It passed us up and we started laughing until we wound up in a ditch! I never got it fixed and parked it! I was scared to drive it! I would tell people that it was possessed! Young and dumb teaches lessons that you don’t understand until you get older! LOL, thanks for the memories!
My father and grandfather had more late 1960’s to late 1970’s MOPAR cars than I can count. Grandfather had one like this except it was brown with a brown vinyl top. He was so short that he would drive by looking over the dash through the upper part of the steering wheel!!! Drove my father crazy. Looking back, they were all true land yachts. But in those years, it was just what everybody drove.
Crap,
I was going to drive up from Minneapolis and buy this beauty.
GONE!!!!
Arrrgggghhhh !!!
I wish I had more garage space so I could go after this one. Wow, really nice find.
Who bought this? I will trade my nice one just like it + cash for this cream puff!
A really great car, with the great torsion bar ride,bulletproof eng and trans. Buy and drive!!!
The seller could have asked $6500 and probably got that price.
Beautiful but the dang thing is GREEN!
I can’t say I care for the colour, but the car is beautiful!
Very unusually optioned. I noticed no power windows, locks, ect., but it seems to have automatic climate control (!) and a rear defroster. The auto climate control on my ’73 New Yorker worked flawlessly.
The 318 was a great motor. My Dad had one in our ’71 Charger 500, and on the open road, it got around 25 mpg.
I did a piece of artwork nearly identical to the cross shot of the interior.
Nice car. I’d like it more if it was a hardtop, but still sweet.
@Blueprint: I had that one too. Majorette.
A very painful update on this fantastic car: it’s headed to someone’s garage other than mine, unfortunately. But, it was a Barn Finds reader so that’s great news! $5,000 was a good deal and quite a few of us will regret not jumping on this preserved beauty.
Beautiful looking car. For the year and condition, I would think that $4800 would be a fair price for a classic car. You still want to have enough money to replace the oil and gasoline that had settled at the bottom of the tank, and to bring everything up to today’s standards.
The only thing that bothers me about this Plymouth Fury 3 is my mother bought a brand new one in 69 when I was 10 and I can tell you now the 318 was blue not orange seems a little odd
That is quite a find. Although the title seemed like clickbait, after reading a little of the article, its became evident that the question was quite valid as this is quite amazing. The price is a giveaway, especially since a collector owned it. I thought the fuselage Fury improved each year and each facelift with the 1972 sort of “electric razor motif” front end. I liked the look of these beasts as police cars….very authoritarian and imposing! And from my perspective as well, its absurd that people would say “too many doors”, but that being said, it makes it less desireable, and those in the know with an appreciation for the traditional American sedan get a break on the final price. Two door sedans always came off as the economy model, and I don’t think they were much sportier in most cases. The one exception offhand is the 1977 to 1979 B-Body Chevrolet. That is where there was a huge visual distinction, and I like the looks of both equally. Back to the Plymouth, nothing better than a sleeper survivor!