The 1970 Scout 800A SR-2 is a well known Scout promotional special. It was marketed as a hardtop with lurid Flame Red paint, special striping and chrome Rallye wheels with Goodyear H70-15 Polyglas white-letter tires. Images of an SR-2 with a soft top have been seen occasionally over the years. It inspired questions but the back story was unknown. Until now. The original SR-2  was a V8 Roadster with a white Whitco soft-top, red-hot paint and special appliqués was give an OK for prototype development in concept November of 1969.  The completed prototype was viewed by the Scout Product Committee in December, 1969, and you see it here. It was well received but two parts of the package were not approved, the bumper guards and some SR-2 graphics on the tailgate, not visible here. As a Roadster package, it highlighted the new Whitco soft tops for Scout, which International was selling through its dealer network and had pushed hard in '69. The original plan was for 1,000 units. Cool! By January of 1970, the plans were well advanced and working towards April production when Marketing threw a monkey wrench into the gears. Based on past sales, they thought 1,000 roadsters might be very tough to sell.  The Scout Product Committee agreed and decided the SR-2 package would be a  Traveltop Scout. The Whitco top would remain an dealer-installed accessory. By February they had also decided to open the powertrain choices to both the new 6-232 six and the V8 and offer any transmission or gear ratio combination. It was also decided to consider a second color option. It took another month to decide, but Burnished Gold became that second color.  The SR-2 was introduced to dealers on March 25, 1970, and production started April 20 and ended in July, with 1,975 listed as being built.

This post is one of a series of bits that were discovered during the research for International Scout Encyclopedia by Jim Allen and John Glancy. Author and historian Jim Allen is sharing his extra writing along with images from John Glancy as well as the McCormick Archives housed by the University of Wisconsin--stay tuned, we have some great information for y'all!