In early 2020, the 26-year production run of the original Range Rover was counted as the twenty-seventh most long-lived single generation car in history by Autocar magazine.

However, the high price of adding such car-like features as seven seats, floor carpets, a heater, a one-piece windscreen resulted in fewer than 700 being sold before the model was dropped in 1951.

In 1954 Land Rover launched a second iteration estate car, this time aimed at the commercial user who needed an off-road vehicle for carrying passengers without car-like comforts.

While available with features such as an interior light, heater, door and floor trims and upgraded seats, the estate car retained the base vehicle's tough and capable suspension – as well as its mediocre road performance.

By the late 1950s Rover had become convinced a market for a more comfortable 4x4 existed in areas such as Africa and Australia, where ordinary motorists faced long journeys on unmade roads that called for four-wheel drive and tough suspension.

Proto SUVs such as the International Scout (1961) and the Ford Bronco (1966) began the skew of 4x4s towards speed and comfort while retaining more than adequate off-road ability for most private users.

Rover acknowledged the emerging recreational off-road market in 1967 under Charles Spencer King, and began the "100-inch Station Wagon" programme to develop a radical competitor.

[5] He was also convinced that a permanent four-wheel drive transmission was needed both to provide adequate handling and reliably absorb the power required for the vehicle to be competitive.

Powerful, light and sturdy, the Buick alloy V8 earned off-road modifications such as carburettors that maintained fuel supply at extreme angles and provision for cranking the engine with a starting handle in emergencies.

Introduced to the public in June 1970, the new "Range Rover" was launched as "A Car For All Reasons", boasting a top speed of around 100 mph (160 km/h), a towing capacity of 3.5 tons, spacious accommodation for five occupants, hydraulic disc brakes on all wheels, and a groundbreaking four-speed, dual-range, permanent four-wheel drive system.

To much critical acclaim, it appeared that Rover had succeeded in their goal of making a car equally capable both on and off-road – arguably better in both environments than any other four-wheel-drive vehicle of its era.

Notable off-road feats were winning the four-wheel drive class in the first Paris-Dakar Rally in 1979 and 1981,[7] and being two of the first vehicles (along with a Land Rover Series IIA) to traverse both American continents north-to-south through the Darién Gap from 1971 to 1972.

[8] Even though the concept was initially aimed at customers like construction foremen and military officers who needed 4WD for professional reasons as well as occasional recreational users like skiers, it soon became a car of choice for aristocratic English country house owners.

This allowed the bodywork of the Range Rover to carry much greater structural strength with the steel frame while retaining the corrosion-resistant and easily repaired aluminium outer panels.

For the prototypes the engineers designed their own functional body panels simply to protect the occupants and to allow the vehicles to be driven legally on the road.

Two years earlier, British Leyland had restructured and promoted Land Rover into its own BL subsidiary and the now more independent company used the Monteverdi as a basis for producing its own four-door model in July 1981.

The seat base was lowered and door handles were redesigned, making it more difficult for rear passengers but greatly improving the comfort for taller people in the front.

The car gained a 'soft feel' safety dashboard (derived from that used in the facelifted Series 1 Discovery) with new switches (these were lifted from the Rover 800) and instruments.

[19] Both naturally aspirated and turbocharged versions were built, but the all-alloy engine blocks failed under the much greater pressures involved in diesel operation.

The effort to strengthen the Rover V8 for diesel operation was not, however, completely wasted; the 4.2-litre petrol variant of the engine used crankshaft castings developed in the Iceberg project.

Although the Range Rover was designed with the US market in mind, and was planned to be launched in the US in the middle of 1971, with a base price of $5,300, that didn't actually happen, due to new US safety and environmental regulations, coupled with British Leyland's precarious finances.

Range Rover of North America was established in Lanham, Maryland in late 1985, to import through the ports of Baltimore and Long Beach, California.

In 1989, to establish its reputation, eight special edition Range Rovers were prepared for the "Great Divide Expedition", a 12-day, 1128 mile trek in the Rocky Mountains in the state of Colorado, from 21 August to 2 September 1989.

[23] Partway through the event, one of these special edition Range Rovers was rolled multiple times at high speed by automotive journalist Jay Lamm.

[27] However, with various cost-reductions – notably a cheaper interior; a smaller, less powerful, base diesel engine; and only two side doors during its first year – the greatly similar vehicle was marketed at a distinctly lower price point, filling the gap in Land Rover's model range, starting in 1989.

On top of that, the spare wheel was mounted on the outside of the vehicle — all three measures greatly increased the Discovery's luggage compartment space compared to the Range Rover.

[29] Coachbuilders and fabricators such as Carmichael, Gloster Saro, and HBC Angus modified numerous Range Rover vehicles for first response use.

The Range Rover was a favoured platform for ambulances across the British Isles, with builders Carmichael, Herbert Lomas, Pilcher Greene, Wadham Stringer, Spencer Abbot, and Heinel Specialbilar supplying modifications.