Images: americarclassics.com

As with Chevy and Ford muscle cars, there are just some models of obscurity that have simply fallen from the American performance “canon,” not being thrown-around at the discussion table when it comes to Mopar muscle. Oh sure there is plenty of talk, plenty of lore that revolves around the Road Runners and GTXs; those are the baddest of the bad when we’re talking about Chrysler’s B-Bodied cars. But as we already know about ordering cars during the ’60s, it was a decade in which pretty much anything went, or at least in terms of factory options.

One of Chrysler’s rarest muscle cars is this HEMI/4-speed-optioned, ’66 Plymouth Satellite. This particular car is especially rare, as it is an original HEMI car with 25,200 original miles accumulated.

Of all the Satellites that Plymouth ever built, only 62 of them are known to have been ordered with a HEMI and a 4-speed for the 1966 model year; of these 62 cars, only 10 are currently known to still exist.

The 1966 production year marked Chrysler’s introduction of the second-generation, 426 HEMI V8, and this motor was offered in extremely limited numbers.

Along with the famed performance package, Plymouth’s Satellite was also offered with a variety of deluxe, interior options for 1966. These included a console-mounted tachometer, a radio and premium embossed bucket seats.

Though Plymouth might have tried with their B-body fleet to establish the balance between performance and luxury, this HEMI-optioned Satellite is “living” proof that outright performance, in spite of all the extra options that were being dumped onto muscle cars by that part of the ’60s, was still the biggest part of the Mopar equation, though it has always been the Road Runner and GTX in particular that have been exalted as the “track runners” of Chrysler’s B-Body family.