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The Mercury brand is a portion of the Ford Motor Company. Most divisions within large car companies were created by the company or are an offshoot of another brand. Mercury, however, was started from the ground up in 1939. Ford already had the Lincoln Motor Company, a high-end brand and the owner at the time, Edsel Ford, thought there was a good market somewhere between the Lincoln and the Ford.

The Mercury brand has a unique style and an overall better performance than most of the Ford vehicles. The brand was named after a Roman god to establish its heightened sense of style and performance.

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The first Mercury vehicle was the Mercury Eight. The car became a hit and sold over 155,000 models before production ceased during World War II. The Eight had ten more horsepower than the regular V8 engine in the other Ford vehicles. After the war ended, Ford began marketing Mercury vehicles closer to Lincoln and farther from Ford models. Mercury established itself in the upper realm during the 1960s with the Meteor and the Comet models. These cars were high in performance, reasonable in price and had an overall stylish appearance. The end of the decade saw the Mercury Cougar, the muscle car that is famous today. This vehicle was an early version of the Mustang and it was built on the very same platform.

Mercury sales rose quite a bit in the 1970s and even the 1980s. The vehicles became an even more profitable division when the fuel crisis hit in the 70s. When consumer tastes moved on to smaller, more efficient vehicles, Mercury came out with the Bobcat and the Capri in the 70s and the Lynx model in the 80s.

In 2011, Mercury sold vehicles like the Grand Marquis, the Mariner and the Milan. The Grand Marquis is a 4-door vehicle that can seat six passengers. The Mariner is more of a sport utility vehicle that seats only five and the Milan is a family sedan with 4 doors and five seats.

Mercury cars have gone through a lot over the years, including celebrities. One of the most famous people to drive a Mercury Mariner Hybrid is Al Gore. Gore won the Nobel Peace Prize for helping to raise awareness on environmental issues and today, he drives the hybrid vehicle from Mercury. The vehicle gets 34 miles per gallon and the engine shuts down when it is not in use like when idling at stoplights or sitting in slow traffic.