$3 Million for 1975 Ford Escort GL

It has no hubcaps, no air conditioning, no radio. The engine built 30 years ago at a Ford plant in Cologne, Germany, won't even start. It appears to me he (privious owner) was a pretty bad driver," auction employee Rick Limpp said as he wiped fingerprints from a chrome bumper that shows obvious hammer marks from repairs.
The car also comes with possible papal possessions: carved wooden rosary beads, a box of wooden matches, a candy tin and a dashboard medallion bearing the likeness of St. Maria Goretti, the patron of youth, young women, purity and victims of rape. There are too many nicks and dents, and too few frills on the boxy four-door sedan due for auction Saturday in a Las Vegas casino showroom.If it hadn't once been owned by Pope John Paul II, this light blue 1975 Ford Escort GL wouldn't attract a second glance. the car might fetch as much as $3 million (?2.47 million) in the auction, which was purchased for $102,000 (?84,033) in 1996 by an American businessman.