I had just taken the photo of the Star Chief and was slowing for a red light when I saw this nice heavy-duty ’50s Ford stake truck off to the right. I’m not sure of the year but I’m sure one of our CC Commentators can positively identify it.
It appears to be used as a sign, but looked nice enough to be totally functional and driveable, and it has current antique vehicle plates on it. If this was in Oregon, I know a certain truck fancier (two, actually) who would be most interested.
I passed one almost identical to this Saturday, doing about 45-50 (top reasonable speed). Definitely wasn’t a worker any more – someone had done a nice job restoring it.
Unfortunately, these really don’t bring enough restored to make it worthwhile unless you just have a particular thing for vintage trucks.
The nice thing about these old beasties is there are lots of them with low mileage sitting out on farms, at least here in Alberta. They can usually be picked up for less than $2K, and all they need to be parade/display worthy is a paintjob and maybe a recovering of the seat. In that context it’d be pretty easy to make a very nice one like this for under $4K assuming you do the paint prep yourself…
Assuming original grille, it’s a 1954, probably F500
I liked cars only until my early twenties. No way was I going to own a truck — trucks were for hauling pulpwood or something. My junkyard excursions began in a ’78 Firebird. I graduated to a ’73 Bonneville…and then came a ’77 El Camino SS — hey it was still a c….
Twenty years later there’s multiple ’70s-mid 80’s model C10-C20s, an S10, G-van, a Suburban, a C30 and even a freakin’ P30. Now I’m getting interested in the medium duty trucks which is not good.
There are some very very original & nice ones out there. Many of them have less than 50K miles on them. — I’ve seen them roll into the scrapyard in VGC — ugh! Finding nice survivors like the one you pictured is going to be tougher as time goes by though because the cost of scrap is so high.
Medium duty trucks easily bring over $1000 across the scales right now, depending upon what type of bed that’s installed on them. It’s such a shame because there’s few plastic rarities to break & many trucks share the same cabs, doors, etc as their little brothers..all that stuff’s available aftermarket.
Far more than 2 Ford truck fanciers here in Orygone….
Spotted an old truck today on the roadside 11 year old daughter said Bedford as we passed yep K model Bedford 1 tonner 1948 (gotta put the camera back in the car) now Ive fixed the door handle and can lock it again
To me, this generation of Ford trucks always looked best in the heavier duty versions like this one. With the great big wheels, the front overhang does not look so excessive as in the F-100s. I love these. I don’t know what I would do with it if I had it, but I want it anyway. Maybe I could use it for an exercise machine. It would probably make for a great 30 minute upper body workout everyday.
My Dad and I had an adventure in a vintage Ford F series 35 years ago, I think early 1977, heading to Everett in a borrowed 54, I think it was, it might’ve been a 56 light blue F100 stepside that belonged to good friends at the time.
We drove it from Tacoma to Everett, an hour and a half north for something, may have been to my oldest sister’s rehearsal dinner, I forget now but we broke down on the way there and the truck would not start, so we walked, I think to the nearest neighborhood, I forget now what/how we did it, but managed to get a ride to our destination and I think the following day, we came back with our friend to retrieve the truck and he did a jury rigging and got it going again.
My oldest sister said for years that if she got a truck, it’d be a restored ’56 Ford,why, it was the year she was born. I tend to like these myself as vintage trucks go.
Interesting.