The fascinating history of American cars . . .one story at a time.
Author: Deb Tracy
I am a reformed attorney who has returned to my first loves, American history and classic cars. Raised in a family of automobile fanatics, my Dad is one of those guys who can look at a set of tail lights and tell you what car they belong to and follow that with a story about one he owned. Forget the “new car” smell, I love the smell of old cars and old garages. My husband (retired law enforcement and former U.S. Marine) and I turned our hobby into a business a few years ago and now happily deal in classic cars and their various parts. We live in rural Nebraska with our amazing teenage daughter and a houseful of border collies.
This captioned photo of ace pilot Eddie Rickenbacker appeared in the November 16, 1918, issue of the Honolulu Star Bulletin. Note that the caption describes him as, “First automobile racer to enlist.” Captain Rickenbacker was one of the best-known racers in America when he joined the army a month after the United States entered World War I in April of 1917. He became an aircraft fighter ace and, by the end of the war, had shot down 26 enemy planes. That record made him the number one American ace of the war, but just one of the many “car guys” that made immeasurable contributions to the war effort.
“Captain Eddie Rickenbacker, American Ace, in aeroplane. France. Spad XIII.” 1918. III-SC-50127. National Archives Identifier: 86706270.
The Regal Motor Car Company built automobiles from 1907 to 1918, and the Regal is probably best known for its record setting trip from New York to San Francisco in 1909. The trip was made by the first 1910 Regal “30” built, and this dependable mid-sized automobile was christened the “Plugger.” The Plugger left New York City at noon on July 5, 1909, and rolled into San Francisco exactly 30 days and 4031.8 miles later.
Once that run was finished, the Plugger racked up tens of thousands of miles more touring the country. These road trips are fairly well documented, but I did find one terrifying incident that occurred along the trip that isn’t much talked about. In June of 1910, the Plugger reached Missouri just as the area was experiencing torrential rains and flooding. Swollen streams had wreaked havoc on already questionable bridges, carrying some away and leaving others in a shaky condition. As the Plugger, piloted by R. W. Dean and Lee Cuson, approached the bridge at St. Charles, they discovered it to be in a dilapidated state. Some horse-drawn carriages had just made it across safely, however, so the men decided to attempt the crossing. This proved to be a terrible mistake as the planking gave way and the Plugger and its occupants were plunged into the Missouri River.
The car was completely submerged, but Cuson and Dean managed to swim to shore. A derrick was working on a nearby bridge, and the manager was convinced to bring his operation to where the Plugger went down. After two hours, the Plugger was finally resurrected from its watery grave, and the boys were able to dry it out and continue on.
When it rolled into the 1911 St. Louis auto show, it had been on the road continuously since first leaving the factory. Among the 150 or so shiny and show-ready automobiles, the Plugger pulled into its berth at the show covered in dried mud, road dust and stickers from “every crossroad and hamlet” it had visited, and it was the car that the crowds flocked around.
The 1909 trip was quite a feat considering the lack of easily navigable roads. Years later, in 1929, Cuson visited Nebraska and reminisced about the 1909 trip and the state of the roads at that time:
“If there was a square inch of paving in the whole west in those days, we failed to find it. Iowa was a sea of mud . . . Soon after that the route across Nebraska became a winding cow trail and the Regal plunged along like a prairie schooner.”
Some headlines are just eye-catching, like this one from a 1920 newspaper:
The first paragraph of the story is just as good:
Somewhere in south Minneapolis there is a “ghost car,” which nightly leaves its last resting place in the vicinity of Lake Street and Seventeenth Avenue South to wander about with rattling bolts and shrieking gears to haunt its former owner.
At least, this was the theory advanced in district court when the owner of the car, one Mr. Winter, was explaining why he should not be held in contempt for failing to disclose the location of a car that he had not yet finished paying for. Winter explained that it was “a ghost of a car” when he purchased it, and after spending many days flat on his back with his eyes glued to the oily dripping insides of the automobile, he gave up and abandoned it near the aforementioned location. In response, attorneys for the plaintiff offered witnesses to testify that the car had been seen at night, “wraithlike and wandering as a spirit condemned.” Stranger yet, the witnesses also claimed that it was Mr. Winter the ghostly automobile was carrying from place to place.
The case was dismissed with no prejudice until the car could actually be found.
See the circular image on the left side of this photo of an old block building? It is the ghostly remains of a painting of an early automobile tire. Taking the entire wall into account, it looks like it once read, “Goodrich Tires,” followed by the slogan, “Best in the Long Run.”
Goodrich used this slogan for many years. The earliest appearance I could find in newspapers was 1910, and it was used at least as late as the 1950s. This neat old building with the faded slogan is located in Scandia, Kansas. A quick search of newspapers from that era suggests it may have been Preble’s Garage. This ad is from 1920:
It looks like Preble’s Garage also sold White Eagle Gas at one time. Just imagine this building with the White Eagle pump out front!
We attended the annual Old Trusty Antique & Collectors Show a couple of weekends ago and were surprised to see this rare Empire sitting among the classics. Unfortunately, there was no one hovering around it that I could question, so I have no idea where it originated from or how it came to be in Clay Center; I only know it was there and it was amazing.
The Empire Automobile Company was founded in 1909 by a small group of Indianapolis businessmen. Three of these men, Arthur Newby of the National Car Company, Carl Fisher of Prest-O-Lite, and James Allison who later became known for Allison Aircraft, were also involved in the building of a certain famous brick racetrack in that city. On a cold day in December of 1909, the last brick, a gold-plated one, was laid into place, and it was time to prove the new track was a fast one. Many records were broken that day by bigger and more powerful automobiles, but the 4-cylinder Empire did participate in the record setting:
With the founders wanting to focus on the racetrack endeavor, Empire was sold in 1911, went through a reorganization that moved some operations to Pennsylvania, added a 6-cylinder 25-hp Continental engine as an option, and was gone by the time the 1920s rolled around. The Empire at the Old Trusty show looks similar to the drawing featured in this advertisement which provides some detail about the “The Little Aristocrat.”
The upholstery looks original, doesn’t it? Where on earth has this car been?
This was the 41st year for Old Trusty, and it really is a gem of a show with so much to see in terms of antique cars, trucks, tractors, and equipment. Here are photos of a few more things that were part of the show, including a 1966 Plymouth Satellite, a couple of Ford trucks , a canary yellow Model A, a 1912 Excelsior motorcycle, and all manner of military vehicles and engines.
Just when you start to worry that all the good car parts have already found their way into the hands of collectors, you have a great morning at the flea market. This is what we walked away with Saturday:
The instrument cluster is from a 1948-1950 Ford truck, and the clock, in beautiful condition, is from a 1937 Lafayette.
The colorful items at the top of the photo are vintage bug deflectors, and the oval underneath them is an early beveled glass window with frame like the one being used as a rear window on this 1907 Regal:
1907 Regal “30” Touring
The Oldsmobile “ringed globe” emblem is also in fantastic condition, and the fog light is a high-quality “Lumidor,” mentioned in this 1949 advertisement:
My husband has banned me from dragging home any more hubcaps, but I still manage to sneak some past him. The set of four Chevy truck caps are full of dents and rust, but hey, some people like them that way, and I also found a decent Mopar red-line cap. The find I was most excited about was the Buick cap, found only on the 1934-1935 Series 40.
You don’t see caps for this stunningly beautiful automobile very often, so I was thrilled to spot it in a pile of parts. The junking season is in full swing in my neighborhood, and we will be hitting the road for the next three weekends to see what else we can find. These are the places and dates in case you want to try your luck:
This advertisement for the 1958 Chevrolet, made in conjunction with the Kansas City Auto Show, describes the 17 models available in ’58:
Note that the lineup includes Impala models as part of the Bel Air series:
This marked the first opportunity for a member of the car-buying public to purchase a Chevrolet Impala, but it was not the first time General Motors utilized that particular name. A “dream car” presented at GM’s 1956 Motorama car show was a futuristic five passenger sport sedan that was, believe it or not, called a Corvette Impala.
Like the production Corvette, the Corvette Impala had a fiberglass body. It was almost the same width as a Chevrolet sedan, but four and a half inches longer and six inches lower. The power plant was a 225-hp Super Turbo-Fire V8 with 9.25-to-1 compression ratio, high-lift cam shaft and a four-barrel carb. Being a GM product, it naturally had a Powerglide transmission.
In a departure from the typical more-is-more styling of the 1950s, little chrome was used. It did have a toothy, Corvette-like grille, however.
So, would you have been in the market for this Impala concept car, described as having “fleet, buoyant lines that accent motoring adventure with safety and luxury?” Or do your preferences in motoring adventure run more along these lines?
Long before online ordering, one catalog that was indispensable to every car guy was the one that came from J.C. Whitney. The roots of the company go all the way back to a Chicago scrap metal yard started in 1915 by Lithuanian immigrant Israel Warshawsky, so this company has been enabling automotive junkies for over one hundred years. This advertisement is from 1927:
By the 1940s the business was using the name J.C. Whitney, and Warshawsky’s son, Roy, took over and expanded the company. I found a newspaper story from the 1970s that said Roy Warshawsky just “made up” the name J.C. Whitney and didn’t even recall why he chose it. The story went on to say that when people would call and ask to speak to the “boss,” meaning J.C. Whitney, the phone operators were known to maintain the illusion by replying, “Mr. Whitney is in Europe.”
I recently got my hands on a 1956 J.C. Whitney catalog, and it was a blast to look through:
As I thumbed through the fragile pages, I saw things that I did not even know were an option such as plaid convertible tops . . . .
. . . and hat racks.
You frequently see vintage bug deflectors for sale online and at swap meets, and there were many variations of these listed in the catalog:
There was also a variety of ways to achieve the look of white wall tires without actually shelling out the dough, including the rings seen below and a paint kit called White Wall Wonder.
It looks like vintage J.C. Whitney catalogs are currently going for $10-30 apiece online, so it might be time to drag yours out the attic!
We just picked up two fabulous 1930s Chevrolet dashes:
These would be correct for a 1933 Chevrolet Master or a 1934-1935 Chevrolet Standard, and this was an interesting time for General Motors as 1934 was the year the company introduced a new feature marketed under the colorful name of “Knee Action.” This revolutionary new design feature was a much-needed independent front suspension. The ride quality in early automobiles suffered because stiff front springs transmitted road shocks to the frame causing the front end to rise and fall. The consequent rise and fall at the rear of the car made backseat riding uncomfortable as passengers were jostled with each bump in the road. General Motor’s new Knee Action design allowed the front wheels to move up and down with the irregularities of the road without imparting the shock to the frame and passengers.
This diagram and accompanying explanation were part of a 1934 advertisement:
It appears an entire advertising campaign was built around this new feature. Here are a few more:
If you’ve been watching the automobile news, you know that there are now only six passenger car manufacturers in the U.S. – the “big three” and the “little three.”
So, can you name the six surviving car companies of 1954?
The Big Three are easy to identify:
Ford
General Motors
1954 Chevy Corvette
1954 Chevy Bel Air
Chrysler
Recalling the Little Three is more problematic as there was a lot going on in the way of mergers and acquisitions. In no particular order, they are:
Studebaker-Packard – Detroit’s Packard Motor Car Company bought Indiana-based Studebaker in 1954 and became Studebaker-Packard.
1954 Studebaker Station Wagon
1954 Packard Clipper Super Touring Sedan
Kaiser-Willys – Kaiser-Frazer had started up after WWII, riding high on the post-war boom. The company struggled in the early 1950s after a series of missteps, and the Frazer name was dropped. In 1953, Kaiser purchased Willys-Overland and, in 1954, the companies merged into Willys Motors, Inc.
1954 Kaiser Darrin
1954 Kaiser
1954 Willys M38A1
American Motors – AMC was formed in 1954 when the Nash-Kelvinator Corporation merged with Hudson.
