I can't find anything about this on the Ford site, so wondered if anyone here knew. Where did the name Mustang come from?

The name Mustang sounds familiar to me from somewhere outside the Car circle but I can't quite pin point it. I know I heard how it was named before but it's completely gone out of my head now! Anyone know?

This is what I found on this. That the Mustang got it name from the P-51 Mustang fighter plane that was used in WW2.

I found nothing to confirm or deny the claim that it was named after a plane. The only thing I found on that was that it was mentioned in another forum. However, what I did find is that the prototype of the vehicle was already made before they named it. In fact, there was originally a wild cat logo on the front grill that looks to me to be a cougar, but it could be anything. It would be interesting to learn if there were any cat names already thought of. Anyway, two men by the names of John Najjar and Phil Clark drew sketches of the logo and Waino Kangos sculpted it. The people at Ford liked the logo and thought that it showed a great romantic perception of a cowboy in open terrain - running free. From there, they decided to keep the logo and call the car the Mustang.

i heard it was named mustang because at the time (1964) most all the cars were big and oxy, the little car was small and fast, just like the wild amarican mustang, the pinto is smaller and slower yet, just like it's name. seemed to make sence to me.

From my understanding, the mustang name came from the mustang scooters. They had the trademark on the mustang name and design in 1960 and that ford bought them out for the name in 1964.

http://www.hotcycleweb.com/60mustmc.htm

This link shows a nice example of a 60 mustang. I have only seen one other.