(first posted 5/12/2015) Four old timers in 1975. Why are they posing near the rusty 1941 Plymouth? The 18 inch wheels offer the only clue. Thirty years earlier in Detroit they had their picture snapped standing by the same car—about to start one of the automotive world’s great adventures-the Richardson Motor Expedition from Detroit to the tip of South America.
You’re probably aware that –if you had more time and money—you could drive your own car from home to Mexico City and then to Panama and then all the way to the southern tip of South America. The so-called “Pan American Highway” spans both continents. I found out that I was wrong about driving “all the way,” but more on that at the very end of this piece.
So what car and what driver(s) made the first trip? As you suspected, the same nearly stock 1941 Plymouth in the photos was driven by Sullivan C Richardson, Arnold Whitaker and Kenneth C. Van Hee. And they made it before there was a road.
Back in 1941 the road was paved to Mexico City and after that—lots of dirt and mud roads, footpaths, and when they ended, swamps, jungle, and mountains, so they had to make their own road.
This entry, and the images, is excerpted from the Plymouth Bulletin, which itself excerpted Richardson’s book about the trip called “Adventure South.” Lots of good car detail in the web version.
The three also had a film camera and you can see the Plymouth in action (and in inaction after daily mishaps) in an hour-long period travelogue posted by Richardons’s grandson. Warning it’s an hour long and there may be too much about the trip and not enough about the car for you, so you may want to fast forward through the video.
Although the “expedition” was almost universally ridiculed as a fool-hardy publicity stunt, somehow the three made it to Argentina (where they got a warmer reception than Jeremy Clarkson and his Top Gear buddies) and then motored on and reached Cape Horn and pushed WWII off the headlines in Detroit. The car was shipped back to Detroit and the car and all three drivers eventually ended up in south California. The car may or may not exist in a SoCal junkyard—just look for a rusty ’41 Plymouth with 18 inch wheels.
Ps: Although you can now drive this route on paved roads, there is still one gap—the famous “Darien Gap” in Panama—that has to be traversed by ship. Although local politicians want the “missing link” paved, environmentalist, drug dealers ,gun runners are all against it, so the gap remains—for now.
Fangio learned his craft on these sort of roads in a 38 Ford and 40 Chev. Nice story.
Chev coup’e with GMC power.
Who needs a 4X4?
Surely a 4×4 with winch would have would have been preferred to local mules.
A wonderful testament to the ruggedness of the prewar Plymouth. This was what the Chrysler Corporation was known for in Walter Chrysler’s day, cars that were exceptionally well engineered and durable, if not always the most attractive. It is sad to me how that legacy started leaking away under mismanagement in the 1950s.
I wonder if you can get those 18 inch wheels on a 72 Dart or a 69 Satellite? Maybe one of those cars could have made it too.
I really like the looks of those wheels and the little tiny hubcaps. Prehistoric donks! 🙂
The video is worth watching if you have the time; or with a bit of fast-forwarding. Pretty grueling conditions they encountered, as well as remarkable scenery.
Agree 100%. The video (two actually) drips with the gestalt of that era – when adventurers did things for the sure challenge of it, and showed the joy and wonder they felt along the way. The narration has the unmistakable but hard-to-define quality that immedialely establishes the time period. Like you, I grew up in the 50’s and 60’s, and this sort of video helped shaped my expectations of the world for when I grew up. I wish today’s children had the same benefit.
To this day, I don’t think this is a trek to be taken lightly or for the faint of heart, falling somewhere between driving the Trans-Alaskan Highway, hiking the Appalachian Trail, and climbing Mount Everest. There are tales of those who have tried it, never to be heard from, again. In fact, I believe someone here made the comment about a friend once losing a Powerwagon to some Mexican banditos, simply because they wanted it, and they didn’t bring sufficient firepower to keep them at bay. I believe the upshot of the story was they were happy just to get back with their lives. Frankly, the best vehicle for an excursion of this type in today’s world might be an armored HMMWV with a .50 mounted in a turret.
Cringe-inducing stories stories aside, it’s just another reminder of the sad ending of a once great automotive marque.
The “losing a Powerwagon” story has to do with a different expedition on another continent. You may be referring to an American archeological expedition into Yemen in the 1950s that used a fleet of 12 or more Powerwagons. As is often the case in these things, the power of the person granting permission to travel freely in this territory diminishes the further away you travel from them. The local power near the archeological site had their own ideas about infidels within their land and proceeded to lay siege to the scholars. They were able to escape finally but had to leave a few Powerwagons behind. They are probably still there to this day.
I have forgotten my source, it might have been Hemming’s or possibly AllPar or a book or some other damn thing.
Had a friend who “lost” a Suburban in northern Mexico about 25 years ago. It was a support vehicle for a Mexican road race, one of the reconstitutions of the ‘50’s races. The local constabulary found some irregularities in the appearance of the vehicle, had it towed away and impounded, and that was the last of it. Nobody knew anything about anything, as if the entire incident had never happened.
Wonder what KT would think? His dull option meant to serve farmers and rural mail carriers has now become the Latest Thing among hot-rodders, and a major target for thieves.
Too many cars today could not do it at all. The upswept exhaust pipe is a clue…the Plymouth’s engine took its air from an air cleaner high up in the engine compartment. Modern cars have low-mounted air intakes that suck up deep water, with the paper air filter as protection against the engine’s actually ingesting that water and destroying itself through water lock in the cylinders. Instead, starved for air, the engine simply dies…too often with the car still mired in deep water. You’d need a snorkel (such as on military vehicles including the HumVee).
I love these stories of folks who don’t complain about a rough ride.
Here is my Great Uncle Will in the 20s.
For more of his exploits, check out my full story: https://www.curbsideclassic.com/blog/cars-of-our-ancestors-our-family-legacy-in-car-pictures/
It can be done in a small car, like realy small with small engine 375 cc=22.88 cu…
In 1953, Jacques Cornet and Henri Lochon departed from Quebec, Canada to the southernmost point of South America in Tierra del Fuego. The trip lasted 367 days and measured 52.000 km. It also involved the coast-to-coast trip in the USA. On Tierra del Fuego, a land very sparsely populated, they reached over 800 miles further south than any other vehicle ever before. On that trip, they broke another record: they drove their 2CV straight to the top of Mount Chacaltaya in Bolivian Andes. They reached the altitude of 17.780 ft and this was the highest point that was ever accessed in a car. Of course, there was no road to the mountain top. The car made it up there across the extremely rough terrain. All this was done with a tiny 375 cc 2CV
http://citcity.citroen1.info/2CV/expeditions.htm
Road & Track had a good article about the trip, and the car. In the 1980’s, IIRC.
Love these old Plymouths… was it a solid front axle model? I’ve daydreamed more than once of a 4×4 (bio)diesel conversion of a solid front axle Plymouth… (even better with that 18″ wheels) to make a long trip across South America.
No ;
This car had independent coil spring front suspension and at that time Chevys still had the near worthless “Knee Action” shocks whilst Dodge & Plymouth used tube shocks .
Dual leading shoe front brakes mean they actually stopped well too .
The two piece slightly canted windshield was very popular, ChryCo called it “Airplane Vision” .
This article makes me wish I’d kept my 1939 Dodge 4 door sedan .
-Nate
Yes, an article about this historic trip appeared in the 1977 Peterson Publication called
“the Complete Book of Plymouth Dodge Chrysler No. 2”, and the article was titled; THE CAPE HORN CAPER, “enter one 1941 Plymouth, two continents, and three men”, by Spence Murray, and shows pics of both before the trip and after the trip, with the same rocker panel dent. The article ends questioning wherther the car made it or not, and wasnt aware of its current whereabouts in ’77. amazing they made it w/o 4wd!! I guess weight and ground clearance and a couple of mules was all they needed. Nice to see some coverage of this again!
I remember reading that. Thanks for this update. Good to hear they made it, and fancy competing for the front page with news of WW2!
A recent Hemmings article on the subject, noting that the BBC was looking for a ’41 Dodge to film a tribute to the original Expedition. Also, the entire Special Interest Autos article from 1983 is here in very clear scans, conveniently thumb nailed:
http://blog.hemmings.com/index.php/tag/richardson-pan-american-highway-expedition-of-1940-1941/
Who says you need to portage around the Darien Gap? You just need a Corvair or two:
I was just thinking about that. Perhaps the Richardson Motor Expedition was the impetus for the Chevrolet pr guys in1961. Having read about that some months ago I wondered , what were they thinking. However the hokey film states they had 3 Chevrolet 4×4 support trucks with them. No doubt to run down smaller trees and drag 3 Corvairs across the Darien. Off camera of course. But that’s a whole nother story.
I don’t think these guys really made it through the Darien Gap, because in the early 60s, a Chicago area Chevy dealer and sometimes racer attempted to make the trip with five other guys, a fleet of Corvairs (!) and a 4×4 Chevy Panel Van for support. The whole thing made it into Vol 1, No. 3 of Automobile Quarterly:
I watched the whole video, the non-Plymouth parts were just as good. Amazing stuff…
They mention putting the car on a barge prior to hitting the Panama Canal, and since it skips over pretty quickly from Panama to Colombia, I’m sure they put it back on the boat once passing their photo-op. That shouldn’t take anything away from it at all, though. As the Corvair video shows, driving any car through that jungle without a support crew and 4x4s is basically impossible – and there is even some debate over whether or not the Corvairs made it through as well (I’ve also watched that “Daring the Darien” video like 20 times, one of the greatest things on YouTube!)
Unless you were actually around back then, it’s real easy to forget that the lack of paved roads throughout the U.S. was still a major influence on automobile design right up until WWII. Even stock, the ’41 Plymouth is pretty close to modern SUV ground clearance, and it’s got even lower gearing. I wish we had an American equivalent of the British “hillclimb” events where we could go watch Model Ts and Franklins bouncing down muddy trails as they were meant to.
One thing that makes me a little sad while watching these videos is hearing the possibility of a completed Pan-American Highway spoken of excitedly, as if it’s right around the corner. If that ever does happen, it probably won’t be in any of our lifetimes.
I understood the Darien Gap had been traversed by a Range-Rover around 1972 , in a British Army expedition. The car has been preserved.
Or is this a different definition or part of the Darien Gap?
Sad about the car’s unknown fate. It would have been a worthy addition to any museum. I wonder why Sullie didn’t look into that option, being in SoCal in 1977 when he sent it to the boneyard…
Yes, this car should have been preserved!!
Wonder if it still can be retrieved and saved?
According to the family, the car was sent to the junk yard and is gone to time.
People of that generation had a straightforward view of life and didn’t overthink things. They just did them. Unfortunately, this is why so much of those times, is gone to time. Think of all the WWII planes, tanks and other vehicles that went to the scrapyard, without a thought that maybe they should be kept for historical reasons, and for the education of future generations. Given their attitudes, it probably didn’t cross their minds. A journey like this today would consist of way too much preparation and probably not a few objections over the political, social or environmental ramifications, while missing entirely the pure spirit of adventure that led these three men on. Such a different world in eighty years.
Wow, what an epic story. Just finished the film and prior to that, read the whole story at the Plymouth site.
A shame the original car was apparently scrapped after somebody took one of the rear doors!
Well!!!! I did the same trip from Alaska to Punt Arenas in 1969-71 in a British Ford Thames van (3 gears!) with my erstwhile partner, Richard Webster. I wish we had known about these guys at the time. It brings back all sorts of memories for me and, having seen the documentary on British TV about the recent trip through Central America, it makes me realise just how difficult a trip it was for us. On the Californian Baja peninsular in Mexico, we were lucky to travel 10 miles a day!! I am in the process of writing up my diaries and letters home, so I am totally re-living my adventures.. If anyone knows how I can get hold of this book, please let me know through this forum – it seems to be completely out of print.
Many thanks!
We’re leaving in September headed all the way down to Cape Horn Argentina from St Petersburg Florida. You can follow our journey here. Cheers!
https://www.facebook.com/CentralAmericaOverlandExpeditions/
I can send a picture of the door that was removed from the vehicle via email if requested. I purchased the door during an international auction many years ago.
I was a good friend of “Sully” Richardson and have a first edition copy of Adventure South, personally autographed. When I knew him (1983) at that time he kept this car under a shade tree in his front yard in the Hollywood Hills, California and loved to regale people with the story. He died a few years later – I’m not sure where the car ended up. At 83 years old, I would consider selling my copy, as I don’t have anyone to pass it on to – who would really understand the history involved.
R. Frey
here is my number 928 is the area 812 is the first three numbers and 0811 is the last four digits. I still communicate with the kids of Sully. You have a great story. Call me and we’ll share
here is my number 928 is the area 812 is the first three numbers and 0811 is the last four digits. I still communicate with the kids of Sully. You have a great story. Call me and we’ll share
This man is actually my first cousin twice removed, great article man. Amazing journey, I have a signed copy of the book at home 🙂
Thanks for the history. Now I will have to spend time researching more.
https://archive.org/details/rough_road_to_panama
Here’s the first part of a two-part 1947 documentary about the trip. I’ve never found the second part.
You’re in luck. See the full video on YouTube (both parts) in the main body of the article.
I don’t know how I missed it. I even blew up the photo underneath it to read what it said. I’m not sure my browser loaded it the first time I looked at the article.
…environmentalists, drug dealers ,gun runners…
Strange bedfellows!
They came.
They conquered.
They pulled their pants up very high.
What an adventurous trip of a lifetime….and on a 2wd vehicle going where modern-day 4wd would fear to tread!
One of my father’s friends did something like this circa 1965 or 1966. He ordered a Dodge W-200 3/4-ton 4×4 pickup, flew to Michigan, picked it up at the factory and drove it down to Panama where he lived.
Much of that route can be viewed from the comfort of your home on Google Streetview.j
I just got a history of the Pan-American Highway, The Longest Line On the Map by Eric Rutkow, ISBN 978-1-5011-0390-2. I haven’t started it yet.