Roy Brown was the lead designer of the Edsel, a much-hyped car of the 1950s that turned into a byword for failure.
Mr. Brown, who died Feb. 24 at age 96, was a longtime Ford Motor Co. employee who also led the design team for the 1955 Lincoln Futura concept car, which became a model for the Batmobile used on TV's "Batman."
But it is the Edsel that became Mr. Brown's most famous legacy, despite—or because of—its epic downfall. The car was unveiled amid an advertising blitz in 1957 in which Ford trumpeted its innovative design and mechanical elements, and projected sales of 200,000 a year or more.
Consumers failed to get the message. Critics compared the model's most distinctive styling element, a vertical grille with a large oval in the center, to a horse collar or a car sucking a lemon. Early models had reliability issues. Perhaps more important, a recession damped demand for midsize cars.
Just over 100,000 Edsels sold over three model years. Mr. Brown's design became one of the scapegoats in a decadeslong debate over what killed the Edsel.
Mr. Brown was transferred to Ford's British operations, where he had success with the Cortina model, and then returned to a senior design position at Ford.
Born in Hamilton, Ontario, and educated in Detroit, Mr. Brown went to work as a stylist for Cadillac in 1937. He joined Ford after World War II, during which he was stationed at Fort Knox in Kentucky.
In the 1950s, Ford worked on what it called internally the "E Car"—E for experimental—to be priced between its low-cost Ford and more upscale Mercury badges. More than 6,000 names were considered for the car before it was named after Henry Ford's son, Edsel.
When Mr. Brown exhibited his first clay model of the car to top management, he was greeted with a standing ovation. But the adulation was short-lived. "The Edsel was oversold by Ford as the revolutionary car of the future," said Matt Anderson, a curator at the Henry Ford, a museum in Dearborn, Mich.
Ford announced it was suspending production in 1959 amid losses estimated at $250 million. Time magazine said "Edsel was the wrong car for the wrong market at the wrong time." Mr. Brown, who proudly drove an Edsel Pacer for decades, liked to call it "Ford's most successful failure."
Legions of Edsel collectors stayed loyal, and starting in the late 1960s formed clubs that now have members in 48 states, Canada and elsewhere. Restored Edsels can go for upward of $100,000.
"The Edsel got a bad rap. It's a beautiful car," said Robert Meyer, proprietor of Edsel World in Fort Myers, Fla., which deals in Edsels and Edsel parts. "Young people today love the outlandish design elements."