I went with the Bridgestone S03 Pole Position tires. I've only put a few thousand miles on them, but they are great! Excellent wet grip, sickening dry grip and very low road noise. I can really stick it with the Quaife. Drawback is the price, but I went to my local Firestone armed with a quote from TireRack and got a huge discount. Worth every penny IMO.
Before that I had Kumho ECSTA Supra 712s. Hated them from the moment they were mounted. Terrible dry traction, at any pressure, but decent wet traction. What can I say...they were cheap.
Before that I had BF Goodrich GForce KDWS tires. They seemed to be really good tires, but they were worn out by the time I really learned how to drive the car to its potential. Much better than the Kumhos for certain.
Definitely Blizzaks for the winter. A little expensive but again, worth every penny. I've never run them on the Contour, but I have on a few other cars. Amazing grip on the ice. Excellent in the rain too.
A good resource is
www.tirerack.com as they have reviews of many tires that supposedly
aren't biased.
No Beowulf, not bias ply tires
I know you were thinking it!
4 Speed MTX...synchro and shift fork replacement in progress 
