I was just barely 16 at the beginning of the school year. I was a Junior for Christ sakes, and had no car, no “personal” mode of transportation! How bad can it be that I was forced to ride the BUS to school! Yea we lived on a farm and walking to school – even up hill both ways in the snow was not possible. Desperation had set in, but with all teenagers, if there is a will there is a way. In a strange turn of events I got my first “RIDE” that fall. It was not a glorious ride but it served me well for 2 years and was a valued piece of junk on the farm.
One day I was down by a neighbors place and spotted an old pickup parked out behind a barn along with a lot of farm implements. I was open for anything at that point so I went to check it out. It was a blue, 1951 3/4 ton Chevrolet pickup. It was not in the greatest visible shape. It had been left out in the weather for some time and it was now parked along side all the old implements waiting to ROT down. So you can tell what one looks like, I found this as I don’t have pictures available for my first ride:
The owners son was a year older than I and already had a car so didn’t need this relic. As I checked the vehicle out it appeared to be solid enough, had tires on it that were still filled with air, but I had no idea if it would run. The next day at school I immediately asked my friend (we were all friends back then) if it would run. He said sure but it was an old piece of junk. Well a running piece of junk was a lot better than 1951-feet or nothing. I asked him to check with his Dad about a price and I would ask my Dad what he thought. The trick here was, I had to present it to my Dad in a way that it would be a good deal for me to have a vehicle and especially one that could be used on the farm. I was going to cover all the bases before he could say no. I also asked what might go with it? My friend said that they would include the side-boards for it cause they didn’t fit anything else they had. It had some old very heavy solid wood side-boards for hauling grain or what ever. It also had, from all appearance, a rotted out wood bed and they just covered it with a 1/4 inch sheet of plate steel. Man that made it a heavy truck. I didn’t care, it was a chance for me to have some wheels of my own and get off that damn bus with all the “little” kids.
When it came down to it my friend and his Dad had determined it was Junk, I knew better. They priced it at $50. I presented all this with all my reasons that we really need another pickup on the farm to my Dad and strange he said “lets go look”. We went down to look at it, he kicked the tires, looked inside, checked out the side boards that were on it, and said it might be a good thing to have around. I was walking about 3 feet off the ground at that point. The agreement was made on the condition that it would start. Sure enough they had to charge the battery in it but damn if it didn’t start right up. As far as we could tell it didn’t burn oil and ran pretty good. It didn’t have a radio but, it did have air (2 windows down and 45mph). I didn’t care, it was going to be mine and I would have a ride like the rest of the guys, well not like the rest as it was at the bottom of the class heap but at that point I didn’t care.
Dad paid for it, I drove it home and started cleaning it out. That thing had rats nests, chicken poop, and all manner of crap in it. The seat had a spring popped through so I got an old heavy horse blanket and used baling wire to tie it on to the seat. I was also doing all manner of mechanic duty to it to show I knew how to care for a vehicle. I got the oil and filter for it changed and made sure it had a full service done, by me. Spent several hours laying under to make sure I knew where all the grease zerks were and got them all greased. This was my first vehicle and it was going to make me proud. Well not proud, but happy I didn’t have to ride with the kids anymore.
Now it was not a pretty site to see, as it had a lot of rust spots on and in it. In fact my cousin got in to ride with me one day and stuck his foot through the floor board. Damn good thing we were in Vo-AG shop together as that turned into one of our projects. Weld in some new floor board patches. We would have not worried about that hole as it was plenty visible and no one was stupid enough to stick there foot out that hole, but on dirt roads it was a dust collector and we had to seal up that hole or choke to death. Anyway we cut back the rust to some decent metal then patched in some sheet metal and welded that in place. We covered it with some old floor mats and it was great. But that didn’t fix all the other stuff. I wasn’t going to let it just be a “rust-bucket” so during our shop class the next spring I got permission and took to sanding and buffing out the rust from the hood and grill. patching other spots that needed patching and trying to make it a little more presentable but when I didn’t have the money for real paint we had to settle for what we had. Being in FFA we had a lot of Blue paint. Actually that blue was not too far off the blue of the pickup, at least in my mind. We also had black and yellow paint in the shop stores that the teacher said we could use – actually we could use up all the old paint in the cabinet as it was getting to the end of the year and it would all be waste by next year anyway. Me and one of my best friends at the time determined we didn’t have enough blue to do any more than the hood and a few spots we had polished out on the sides. The grill work would have to be something else? We only had black and yellow left so in a fine moment of thought we just came to the conclusion that the grill would be alternating black and yellow stripes. From the above link I pulled these pictures cause it sure looked a lot like mine:
Imagine this with alternating Black and Yellow grill bars?
My interior was not blue but mostly a faded out black/brown. And it was a floor shift 4 speed. “Granny” low was very low. So low that it had the power to pull the farm tractor to get it started, now that is low. There is another story about how low it was that I will put in later.
Mine did have a lot of rust spots just like these:
Even thought is was a real rust bucket we were able to fix the major places and it didn’t look too bad.
I sure was happy and drove the crap out of that old vehicle for over a year. There are a ton of other stories to tell about my adventures in the 51 truck and I will add them later. Strange, today’s kids (including mine) would not be the least bit interested in anything that old and junky, but to me, it was a level of freedom that could not be matched. Me and My truck were well known, and Dad didn’t have to worry much about me out hot-Roding. It would barely run 60mph and that was down a long hill with a good tail wind. Besides it was so well known that anything I did wrong was reported home before I got there.
It would carry one heck of a load and we used it on the farm a lot. It died an admirable death when I was gone (in my third car) he cut it up and sold the engine and Cab for more than the $50 bucks we paid and used the bed and back part of frame for a really heavy duty trailer to haul fuel tanks and supplies to the field. That probably was the best investment in a vehicle anyone ever made. – WD0AJG