Back in the 1980s and early 1990s my brother had an enormous collection of 'field cars' down on the farm - decrepit free cars he had fixed up so we could drive them round the farm in lieu of Jeeps. Well, as you can imagine we were very hard on these cars, and the one that stood up best to all we had to throw at it, was, you guessed it - a 1970 AMC Hornet.

Runner up was a '73 Olds Vista Cruiser, but the Hornet was the toughest. Modern cars would have been destroyed the first day under our abuse, but the old Hornet lasted well over a year!

I was pretty hard on my 73 Gremlin X with the factory 304 V8. It was bulletproof tough car, and withstood my college years and 2 years afterwards.

I drive Corvettes today, many years later, also with the bulletproof LS engines and drive trains.

Actually wouldn't mind having my V8 Gremlin X in my collection. I special ordered it, and there were few made vs the 2 sixes made then. My mom had a 66 Ambassador wagon with a 327 V8; yes that's correct. In college a kid had a SC Hornet 360 4 speed, a pretty rare offering, and there was the Machine rare AMC as well. I remember a James Bond movie with nothing but AMCs in it, and even a Matador airplane! A Hornet did a special jump in a spiral over a river. In the early 70s, AMC models were very popular. My most desired pick would be a Mark Donahue Javelin, even over a AMX with the GoPack. These were well built in the day.

On the other hand if it were in good shape, it would be worth a few thousand dollars. Eventually anything rare becomes worth something.

It's also worth noting that the 'twenty-first century' cars of which you speak cost many, many times what this Hornet cost new or used.