DCON, I had never heard the term Special used with a 440 engine before, however Ford had used the term "Police Special" for some of their engines.

So, I did some checking. You are partly correct, and I'm sure in popular usage, the term might be used as if it only applies to 440 equipped police cars. However, in Mopar vin decoding there are two areas of useage of the term "Special". Generally the second digit being an S indicates a special order vehicle, cop cars are a K.

Under engine codes (the letters changed from year to year) the term special refers to special order engines, which in fact, as you point out, the police version of the 440 could be. But they also have "special" engines in each engine line, including the six cylinder. So the term "special" is not unique to the 440, nor does it necessarily mean a police engine.

Also found it interesting that not only did they have a code for Taxi (not surprisingly T ), but that they had a unique code for New York taxis ( N ).