Cars You Should Know: Mopar

Another month, another car brand in the spotlight for our year-long campaign of Cars You Should Know (CYSK). If you’re just joining us, we’re helping agents help their car-loving customers by highlighting a different collector vehicle makes and models throughout 2025. We’re deviating slightly this month by focusing on not just a single brand but rather a distinction/class of cars that most enthusiasts understand. This month, we’re talking about Mopar cars.

What is Mopar? At its simplest definition, it’s a combination of the words motor and parts. A term coined by Chrysler, it was used as a brand name for antifreeze they began selling in the 1930s. Today, Mopar refers to any make that fell under the original Chrysler Corporation umbrella, including the two makes we’ll be focusing on this month: Dodge and Plymouth.

Dodge Challenger

The Dodge Challenger was late to the pony car party in 1970, but for Mopar fans it was worth the wait. Dodge’s signature pony car only lasted until 1974, while rivals like the Pontiac Firebird soldiered on. Dodge did bring back the Challenger badge for 1978, but like the first-generation Challenger, it was discontinued after a short run from 1978-83. Dodge’s second revival of the Challenger badge has been far more successful. Introduced for 2008, this latest Challenger has played on muscle car nostalgia with retro styling and bright paint — just like rivals like the Camaro or Mustang. The 2023 model year was the last for the Challenger. For now, at least.

Plymouth Barracuda

The Ford Mustang gets all the credit for pioneering the pony car segment but, technically, the Plymouth Barracuda came first by a few weeks in 1964. By the second generation for 1967-69, the Barracuda had grown in size, speed and style, but the 1970 model year is considered to be the best. The Barracuda eventually disappeared after 1974. Despite its relatively short production span, the Barracuda (particularly the 1970-71 version) is one of the most well-known and popular muscle cars. Speaking of the 1970 version, check out this one-of-a-kind Mopar magic.

Plymouth Road Runner

The Road Runner debuted in 1968 and the first generation ran until 1970. Road Runner? You may be asking. Like the cartoon? Absolutely, yes. After licensing from Warner Bros., Plymouth also used the famous cartoon character on both decals and the horn. An updated Road Runner debuted for 1971, but performance began to decline as the muscle car era waned. With a couple stops and starts, 1980 was the final year for the Road Runner. And today, even though Plymouth itself is no longer a brand, the early Road Runners with the rarest equipment and colors are particularly collectible among the classic muscle crowd.

Dodge Charger

The Charger started its public life in 1966 (two decades after being teased as a concept car). The Charger was a Hollywood favorite, with lots of screen time. It appeared as the bad guy’s car in the 1968 movie Bullitt starring Steve McQueen, and as the frequently airborne General Lee in the television series The Dukes of Hazzard (where some 250 to 350 cars were destroyed over six years of filming). More recently, a 1970 Dodge Charger was used by the character Dom(played by Vin Diesel) in The Fast and the Furious movie series. It’s about family.

Dodge Viper

The Dodge Viper roadster was launched in 1992 as a back-to-basics sports car with a distinctive V-10 engine. Featuring an 8-liter engine (488 cubic inches), 400 horsepower, and no driver aids, the early cars developed a reputation of being hard to handle for novice drivers. Subsequent versions brought a coupe, more power, better performance, and a proliferation of variants. The last Viper was produced in 2017.

Forgotten Classic: Dodge Pickups

The forgotten classic is a whole category—the D/W series of pickups of 1957-93. They’re forgotten partly because of the popularity of the Ford and Chevrolet/GMC pickups of that era, and partly because of the popularity of the Dodge Ram pickup introduced in 1994. Hagerty insures almost as many of these D/W series pickups as the 1970-74 Dodge Challenger/Plymouth Cuda pair combined, which shows how popular the vintage truck scene has become.

Do a deeper dive

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