In 1986 when my oldest daughter was born, my wife and I went to look at a '77 Pinto wagon. The woman who was selling it, it was her late Fathers and all he basically used it for was to go fishing. It only had 28K miles on it. It was awesome, it looked like a brand new car. We bought it for $750.
We drove it until 2003 and had 188K miles. We had Zero problems. It did have a minor rear main leak and it was a 4-speed and the clutch started slipping a bit. But that Pinto was one of the most dependable cars I ever owned.
A buddy of mine bought it and made a tubbed drag car out of it