Start with what the Lincoln Premiere is: a 2-door hardtop / 2-door convertible / 4-door sedan / 4-door hardtop with 368 cuin Lincoln Y-block V8, built from 1955 to 1960, at the height of the post-war boom. What it meant takes a little longer. The shape is credited to Bill Schmidt.
The background
The Lincoln Premiere is a luxury car model that was sold by Lincoln in the 1956 to 1960 model years. Positioned below the company's Continental Mark II coupe during 1956–1957 and above the Capri which it shared from 1956 to 1959, it was produced in 2 and 4 door versions which could both accommodate up to six people.
The Premiere was for a short time the largest, top level 4-door sedan Lincoln offered against rivals from Cadillac, Imperial and Packard during the mid-1950s while not being available as an extended length limousine. For 1958, the Premiere shared its chassis and mechanicals with the Continental Mark III–V sedans, until it was replaced with the 1961 Continental sedan. The Premiere name has been currently revived as a trim level on Lincoln models.
The engineering
The engine is 368 cuin Lincoln Y-block V8. On the scales it comes to 4500 -. Drive goes through a 3-speed Turbo-Drive automatic. The layout matters: a front engine drives the rear wheels, the classic proportion — long bonnet, cabin set back — that most people picture when they picture a sports saloon or a grand tourer. The wheelbase is 126.0 in. These are manufacturer figures carried by Wikipedia and Wikidata, not road-test measurements.
Where it sits
In the Lincoln line-up the Lincoln Premiere has a clear place: it replaced the Lincoln Cosmopolitan; it handed the line to the Lincoln Continental (1961); the factory was Wayne Assembly, Wayne, Michigan. The cars a buyer would have weighed it against include the Mercedes-Benz 300 SL, the Mercedes-Benz S-Class, the Fiat 500. Its Lincoln stablemates include the Lincoln First Call and the Lincoln Funeral Car.
Owning one today
There is no federal ownership record for the Lincoln Premiere — it predates the complaint database or was never sold in the United States — so MotorJury publishes no running-cost figure for it. For a car of this age the price is set by the collector market and the condition of the individual example, not by a formula.