The Plymouth Barracuda, introduced in 1964 as a warmed-over Valiant—a failed counter to the wildly popular Ford Mustang—yet became, in six years, the prototypical American performance car. Some would argue that at the very pinnacle of the muscle-car pyramid stands the Plymouth ‘Cuda. Most were equipped with a 340 ci small-block or de-stroked 305 ci V8 for the AAR (Trans-AM) series. The big guns had a 440 ci V8 engine, while a mere handful were powered by Chrysler’s legendary 426 ci Hemi V8 engine. The “Cuda’s shape and proportions are perfect 55 years on, and its near-perfect design, combined with the mystique of the rare Hemi engine, has catapulted the coupes, with about 652 made, into the collector stratosphere. Meanwhile, the 14 convertibles —only five examples of which were equipped with a 4-speed manual transmission—are the stuff of legend. A matching-numbers example was sold by Mecum Auctions in 2023 for $3.5 million.
From the article by Robert Ross, Bryan Hood, Erik Shilling
