dan_6776 wrote:

This is the first OEM part I have purchased so I have been really thinking about this lately. How did so many OEM parts from years ago get here? Were they lost then found? Kicking around in some person's garage? Were they in storage after some dealers closed their doors? Are there people out there searching and buying parts dealers are getting rid of and hanging on to them for years only to release them back into the market? Collectors, hoarders, estate sales? Who knows?

I have been meaning to reply to this post since you first posted it but am only now getting around to it.  NOS parts will some day be a thing of the past, no pun intended.  There are multiple answers to your question.  In the 60s when these cars were built the Economy was in excellent shape and Ford was making good money.  The communication infrastructure we utilize today was not in place and things like cars were not so complicated and the average person could make there own repairs.  This all worked together to make a huge supply of NOS parts.  

If the average Joe can replace a broken part, him or herself, than the parts needs to be readily available.  With out computers and effective communication there is no way to really know how much of a part is bing used.  Basically Ford gave it there best guess as to how many of a part were needed and then made more as it seamed like inventory was getting low.  Then those parts were shipped out to parts houses and dealerships.  The guess was usually based on the last years numbers and they had no way of knowing weather the parts shipped out last year were actually sold or sitting on a shelf somewhere.  Ford was making good money so the $$ tied up in inventory wasn't an issue.  That is what created the initial surplus.  Your other guesses are correct parts piled up on shelves somewhere and people now buy out old dealership and parts house inventories and that is why you now have places that cary nothing but NOS parts.

In todays market with the internet and people getting there parts overnighted from centralized warehouses to your local parts house there is not the surplus of parts in the system that were there 50+ years ago.  This means in the future NOS parts wont even be an option.