Ford engines - I'm lost!?!?!

I am going to go researching, but just for drill, I'm also going to toss this out here, to pick the brains of the real experts.

My Son has a '69 Torino with a 351 in it. I don't know the difference between a Cleveland, and a Windsor. Isn't one a little block, and the other a big block?

He just drove from Minnesota to Las Vegas, and the car started to overheat, the last three hundred or so miles. As he describes it, it may have popped a head gasket between a water passage, and a cylinder: a little "pop" in the left exhaust, from time to time, and a slight miss, as well as running hot almost constantly, but not blowing steam, or overflowing the radiator (no expansion tank on it). I'll get it checked out in the next few days, if I can find all of my gauges, and the right tools - I still am unpacking after two major moves in just over two years.

So! Anything unusual, as compared to Chevys and other GM engines, about the Fords? Anything I should watch out for? I know that "engines is engines", but some are different than others, and, in all honesty, the only Ford I ever had anything to do with was my '51 Flatty.

Thanks for any help you can offer.