Like I mentioned above....I think the paint on this car is original.
Based on the license plate and registration, the car was put in the barn in 1969, and the paint is pretty worn...so if this is a repaint, it would've had to have been done many years before 1969 and the car would've necessarily been worked hard after the repaint for it to look like this.
So there's no way to prove it, but I think what's left was applied by Ford in '24 and was worn like this when it was tucked away.
The nearly 50 year barn stint has left it filthy, so I washed it by hand with soap and water. Then I started the process of wiping it down with some stuff called Penetrol. My method is to rub in a very small amount of Penetrol and then immediately wipe it thoroughly dry. This brings out the black paint, stops the rust and leaves a nice dry, dull shine with no wetness or oily residue.
I DON'T want the shiny shellac look that you see on antiques in restaurants, but I do want to bring out the old paint a bit and stop whatever surface rust is present.
You can see the Before and After in these two photos. In the first one, it's the splash apron vs. the body and the second photo shows half of the cowl treated and the other half not.