Mercury was a midmarket brand of Ford Motor Company. The brand was developed in the late 1930s as an upmarket companion to classic Ford cars. Starting in 1945, Mercury was merged with Ford's Lincoln to create the Lincoln-Mercury division. In 1958, the company added Edsel to this lineup to create the Mercury-Edsel-Lincoln division. This union lasted only until 1960, when the Edsel was (fortunately for Ford) discontinued.

Mercury's golden era was the 1950s. The '50s models featured Ford bodies that had been elongated and stretched to create a luxury feel. Mercury cars were less expensive than their Lincoln Continental counterparts, which, even in 1955, sold for $10,000. During the 1960s and 1970s, Mercury moved even farther away from its Ford base, and brands like the Mercury Cougar, Bobcat, and Lynx brought wide name recognition. The Mercury car brand launched a widely memorable 'cat' ad campaign which galvanized sales and spurred consumer interest in the entire Ford lineup.

However, starting in the late '70s, Mercury began to lose its distinction from Ford. As this distinction faded in people's minds, the brand began to lose steam. Recently, it has been revived somewhat, thanks in large part to the success of the Lincoln Navigator SUV and the exposure that vehicle's sales have generated for Mercury. The Grand Marquis and Mountaineer models have also received a good deal of attention.

That being said, in 1999, Ford renamed all Canadian and Mexican Mercury cars as Fords. The Mercury brand is named after the Roman messenger god. Its first logo featured the wings of this deity. In the 1980s, however, the brand adopted a different logo--three lines inside a circle.