When Ford Motor all but eliminated passenger cars from its North American lineup earlier this month to concentrate on trucks and S.U.V.s, it turned the page on a long and storied history of now-defunct but once red-hot nameplates: the Model T, the Model A, the Galaxie, the Fairlane, the Thunderbird and the Falcon, to name several.

There was one conspicuous survivor: the Mustang.

"Get rid of the Mustang?" asked James D. Farley Jr., Ford's president of global markets, when I asked him this week how the Mustang had survived. "The Mustang is like Rocky: It survived the 1970s fuel crisis, the glam 1980s, the move to S.U.V.s. It's made it through every round of cuts."

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For me, the Mustang's reprieve came as welcome news: I took my driver's test in my mother's 1967 turquoise Mustang notchback. On the rare occasions I was allowed to drive it, it conferred instant status and triggered unabashed envy among my high school classmates.

Wall Street probably would have been just as happy to see the Mustang go the way of the Fusion, Taurus and Fiesta, current models that Ford said it would phase out and which Mr. Farley dismissed as "commodity silhouettes." (Ford says it will continue to make passenger vehicles, but they just won't be in the shape of today's sedan. The Focus, for example, will survive, but as a crossover S.U.V.)

That's because in its last earnings report, Ford revealed for the first time that a relatively small number of products, including the hugely popular F-150 pickup truck series, accounted for 150 percent of its earnings before interest and taxes, with profit margins in the midteens. Another group was barely profitable. By contrast, Ford said its "low performing" products lost money, with negative margins of more than 10 percent.

Using Ford's disclosures, Morgan Stanley automotive analyst Adam Jonas extrapolated that the low performing businesses accounted for 40 percent of Ford's revenue yet sharply reduced the company's earnings. Ford didn't say which models fall into the category, but Mr. Jonas included North American passenger cars and Lincoln models. (So far, at least, Ford hasn't altered its Lincoln lineup, which includes several passenger sedans.)

Mr. Jonas applauded Ford's decision to drop most of its passenger cars, assuming the company actually follows through on it. "If a disproportionate effort is going into products that don't make money and consumers don't want, then what are they doing?" he asked.

Ford doesn't break out financial results by model, but Mr. Jonas believes the Mustang is modestly profitable. The base hardtop starts at $25,845, but popular options can quickly drive up the cost. The convertible starts at $31,345. The most popular model, the Mustang GT fastback, can easily top $40,000, and the 526-horsepower Shelby GT350 starts at more than $57,000. A racing version of the Mustang Cobra can hit six figures.

"I can't think of another car where some models sell for four times the base price, " Mr. Farley said. "We sell a lot of Mustangs that are $70,000."

The Mustang has continued to sell well. Ford said it sold nearly 126,000 last year in 146 countries and that it was the world's best-selling sports car. (By contrast, the Toyota Corolla, the world's best-selling passenger sedan, sold nearly a million cars.)

But the Mustang's survival isn't really about numbers. "Five years from now, whether Ford decided to keep the Mustang or not isn't going to be a material factor," Mr. Jonas said. "It's more of an emotional thing. They're trying to preserve the sexuality of motoring the way it used to be known."

From the day it was introduced 54 years ago, Mustang was positioned as a stylish, affordable and practical alternative to expensive European sports cars. In various tests, the Mustang GT still compares favorably to the Porsche 911, which starts at over $90,000.

So iconic is the Mustang that it has been commemorated with a Postal Service stamp — twice. The latest one, in 2013, depicts a blue 1967 model bisected by two white stripes.

Mustangs have appeared in countless movies and television shows, becoming an indelible image of American culture. In "Goldfinger," James Bond ran a white 1965 Mustang convertible with red interior off the road.

Steve McQueen drove a dark green 1968 fastback in "Bullitt," in which Mustang emerged as a classic "muscle" car. This year Ford is selling a 475-horsepower Bullitt anniversary edition, complete with, in a nod to the original, a cue ball on the stick shift. The Bullitt limited edition sells for $47,495. (The first one off the assembly line sold at a charity auction earlier this year for $300,000.)

A souped-up 1967 Mustang fastback stars in "The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift." But Mustangs aren't all about high testosterone. A 1966 convertible is featured in "The Princess Diaries," and Ford said 27 percent of Mustang buyers are women.

William Clay Ford Jr., Ford's executive chairman and the great-grandson of founder Henry Ford, is a Mustang fanatic, with 20 versions in his personal collection. Mr. Ford showed up at the company's annual Mustang birthday party last month in a navy blue 1968 Mustang Shelby 500 convertible with a white top.

"I put it in the same category as the Corvette," said Eric Minoff, an automotive specialist at Bonhams auction house in New York. The Mustang "is a cultural icon. Even people who don't know anything about cars recognize a Mustang."

Next week, Bonhams is auctioning several vintage Mustangs previously owned by Carroll Shelby, the racecar driver and automotive entrepreneur who developed high-performance Shelby Mustangs in collaboration with Ford starting in the 1960s. A 1968 Mustang GT 350 and a 1969 GT 500 are each estimated to fetch $80,000 to $100,000 at the June 3 auction.

I found a turquoise 1967 Mustang notchback that looked identical to my mother's car listed on the Hemmings vintage car site for $37,900.

Those are surprisingly high prices considering how many Mustangs were made. "After the car first came out, there was a saying that hot cakes are selling like Mustangs," Mr. Minoff said. "They're not exactly rare. But no matter how common they are, they're very attractive cars, and with the V-8 engine and rear-wheel drive, they're very sporty and fun to drive. The fastback editions, especially with all the options, command quite a premium."

Mr. Farley described the Mustang as a "mind-set" vehicle. "When we ask people around the world what they think of Ford, they say Mustang," he said. "Mustang means freedom. It means taking a road trip in a convertible down the West Coast. That's what people all over the world imagine America to be. Why would we ever give that up?"