The car cruise I attended in Iowa City back in May had quite a few interesting motors beyond the ’55 New Yorker. Funny how going to the same cruise-in year after year can blind you to things. I had seen this 1940s IH pickup many times before, but my uncle brought a pretty interesting feature of it to my attention. I have no idea if it was a new addition or had been on it for years. A classic symptom of car show overload…
I knew this pearlescent “Kermit” green truck was an IH, but had to do a little research to figure out the year. I’m sure our Cornbinder scholars will correct me if I’m wrong, but I believe it is an early postwar KB-1, as seen in this classic vintage advertisement. Let’s say a ’47, for the sake of argument.
At first glance, you might think it was a prewar version due to that narrow grille, but if you look closely you can see the holes in the fenders for the side grilles, which for some reason are missing. But the front is not the best part of this truck.
The best part is this custom wooden bed cover, which had a Thunderbird-type motif on it (click for a larger picture). Perhaps the owner has a T-Bird too? Either way, it was very cool, and the wood just glowed, despite the rainy, overcast day. Nice truck!
Looks tastefully done…wonder what he did for motorvation?
Now thats a nice pickup and not a model we saw much of in NZ I saw a KB6 recently but havent seen a baby one since OZ
In this era IH didn’t really recognize the traditional model year designations and used the change of the letter prefix or suffix to denote the new model. When the new model was introduced was also different from the others often coming in time for the start or end of farming season so you could buy the new IH instead of the “old” truck from the other guys. This went on until the govt started with the regulations and IH even noted in the advertising that they switched due to gov’t regulations being tied to model year. That didn’t stop them entirely though as you could get a 71 800b or a 71 810 the model designation on the data plate of the first rigs to wear the Scout II badge.
Hope my nephew is working on the 1940 model I gave him. This one is a real looker. I think the same thing in IH red would be better.
The cover reminds me of a 1946 Ford pickup I saw in Gig Harbor last summer. It was bone stock in every respect, and there wasn’t a mark on it anywhere, even in places like the tailgate and taillight hardware. It carried ordinary California truck plates, and it had the best-carpentered hardwood topper I’ve ever seen on a pickup. No way to tell how old the topper was – it could have been as old as the pickup, I suppose. It looked like it was finished in varnish, not anything modern like urethane. The camera was at home of course….