In October 1965, with the Ford Mustang the hottest-selling car in America, the general manager of the Empire State Building had a great idea – to display a Ford Mustang on the 86th floor observation deck of the iconic Manhattan landmark.

Officials at Ford agreed and dispatched a crew to take was careful measurements of the skyscraper’s doors, hallways and elevators. They determined that a white convertible Mustang could be disassembled into four main sections and transported – along with many smaller pieces – up to the building’s 86th floor in elevators to be reassembled.

Three dry runs performed in Dearborn to make sure it would work. Then, at 10:30 p.m. on Oct. 20, a Ford crew in crisp white overalls began taking the car apart outside the building on 33rd Street.

It all ran smoothly until the crew discovered the steering column was one-quarter-inch too tall for the elevator. Some careful maneuvering was done and by 4:30 a.m., the reassembled car was on the outdoor observation deck and ready to be photographed from a helicopter.

But that wasn’t the end of the stunt. Later that morning, the car was taken apart again and moved inside the glass-enclosed observation area that is surrounded by the outdoor deck.

Many of the building’s visitors were surprised and delighted to find a Mustang there and assumed it had been lifted into place by a helicopter.Five months later, on March 16, 1966, the car was disassembled for the last time and removed from the building.