In September of 2020, we somewhat unexpectedly lost my grandpa, Harold, known to almost everyone in the family simply as Papa. He was larger than life: a motorcycle-riding, airplane-flying, world-traveling, wood-chopping, could-fix-anything kind of hero. He spent 44 years working at the Tillamook Cheese Factory, serving as President and CEO for the last nine years of his career, and around Tillamook, that meant something. The Creamery is woven into the identity of the whole community, and Papa had helped shape it. He had also served on the school board for decades and spent more than 30 years as treasurer of our church, the Tillamook Church of the Nazarene.
But to us, he was Papa. He was the guy who would help anyone with anything, fix whatever was broken, explain whatever needed explaining, and somehow make you feel like everything was going to be okay. He was strong, capable, generous, and steady in a way that made him feel permanent. He was the kind of person you just assumed would live forever. Of course, no one does.
Because he passed during those strange COVID days, his funeral could not be held in the normal way. Instead, it took place at the Tillamook High School football field, with people spread out for social distancing. It was an odd setting for a funeral, but somehow it also felt fitting. Papa had lived a big life, touched a lot of people, and belonged to the whole community in a way few people ever do. We called his funeral “Celebrating a Life Well Lived,” and it really was.
Even with all the restrictions and distance and weirdness of that time, the turnout was massive. Family, friends, former coworkers, church members, community members, and people whose lives he had helped shape in ways I probably never fully understood all came to say goodbye. Sitting there in the football stadium, looking around at all those people, it was impossible not to feel the size of the life he had lived.
After the dust settled, it was time to help my grandma simplify her life by paring down their vehicles. She would keep her 2013 Ford Fusion Titanium. The rest of the fleet would go.
And it was quite a fleet.
There was Papa’s 1963 Buick Electra sedan, his 1950s Ford dump truck that he used for hauling wood, his 1999 F-250 tow vehicle, and his motorcycle. In addition to all of those was the 1988 Chevrolet S10, the little black pickup with black, white, and gray stripe decals that had technically been my first car before I was surprised with my Honda Accord.
My dad ended up taking the S10 and moving it to my grandparents’ property in Woodland, Washington, where it served as a little utility truck. He kept it there for a couple of years, but eventually realized he wasn’t using it much. Worse, it was sitting outside in the weather and slowly deteriorating.
That would have made Papa sad. Not because it was some rare or valuable collector truck. It absolutely was not. It was a very basic little S10: 2.5-liter Iron Duke four-cylinder, two-wheel drive, manual transmission, AM radio, manual windows, manual locks, and not even a cigarette lighter outlet. It had been Papa’s commuter vehicle on days when it was too wet to ride his motorcycle, and it was the truck he used for wood splitting and other chores around the house.
But Papa was Swiss, frugal, and took care of things. The S10 had been kept in good shape because that was simply how he treated what he owned. Watching it sit outside and slowly decline felt wrong.
My dad asked if I would sell it for him. I countered with a different offer: I would adopt it and give it a good home. He agreed, with one very fair condition. If I ever decided to sell it, the money would go to my grandma.
That was more than fair.
I had not seen the S10 in a couple of years, so I was genuinely excited when my dad dropped it off. Then I was a little dismayed.
It was quite a bit rougher than I remembered. The black paint was covered in a thick coat of green fuzz, the black, white, and gray stripe decals were faded and cracked, the interior was slightly moldy, the bumper had been bent, and the headliner was drooping. Even worse, it vibrated pretty badly when driving. At first glance, I thought the paint might be trashed.
Then I scrubbed a small section of it.
Underneath the grime, the black paint cleaned up surprisingly well.
I decided I was going to bring it back to its former 1980s glory.
First, I had to figure out what I was actually working with. I gave the truck a quick bath, and to my surprise, the paint looked like it might be salvageable. It was not good, exactly, but it was not hopeless either. I also took it down to Les Schwab and replaced the ten-year-old tires, which immediately fixed the vibration problem and made the little truck drive smoothly again. The engine ran about as well as it ever had, and with only around 120,000 miles on it, the Iron Duke still had plenty of life left.
Then I went after the paint. I scrubbed it, buffed it, and applied a black tinted wax, and the transformation was honestly pretty impressive. It did not look new by any means, but it looked dramatically better. Suddenly, instead of looking like an abandoned old pickup, it started looking like Papa’s S10 again.
At that point, I had to decide what level of restoration I was really aiming for. Was I going to spend a fortune chasing perfection, or was I going to aim for more of a clean survivor look? I decided pretty quickly that survivor was the right answer. If I took it to a body shop and had every little flaw fixed, I would be too afraid to actually use it for truck things. And that would have completely missed the point.
I bought a new bumper online and went outside my comfort zone by installing it myself. I am not going to pretend it was a major mechanical accomplishment, but for me, it felt like one. When it was done and actually lined up reasonably well, I was pretty proud of myself.
The interior needed some attention too. The original headliner was drooping badly, so I found a one-piece fiberglass replacement online and installed that. The seat also needed help. I briefly considered having a local upholstery shop redo it properly, but the quote was around $900, and eventually my sensible budget side prevailed. Instead, I ordered a custom-fit seat cover from Amazon, installed it, and called that good enough for a clean survivor truck.
The next big question was what to do about the decals. Now that the paint looked decent again, the faded and cracked black, white, and gray stripe decals were really letting the truck down. I took it to PSI, a local print shop, and they said they could reproduce and install new stripes. The catch was that the old ones had to come off first. They could remove them, but it was going to cost a lot of money.
Naturally, I went home and started researching.
Eventually I came across a 3M Stripe Off Wheel, which is basically an adhesive-removing wheel that attaches to a drill and lets you grind old decals off without destroying the paint underneath. At least, that was the theory. I bought one, charged up my drill batteries, and started the process.
It was miserable.
I could only work on it in chunks, usually about as long as my drill battery lasted, which was around twenty minutes. That also happened to be about as long as my wrists could take. Over the course of a couple of months, I slowly worked my way around the truck, section by section, grinding off decades-old decals a little at a time.
All told, it probably took fifteen to twenty hours to get them completely removed.
Once the old stripes were finally gone, I briefly considered leaving the truck plain black. Honestly, it looked really good. Clean, simple, and much more modern. But it did not look like Papa’s S10.
So I had PSI print and install new stripes, which ended up being the biggest expense of the whole restoration by far. When I went to pick it up, I was floored. The new decals completely transformed the truck. It looked right again.
One other small modification made the truck feel even more personal. I ordered a personalized Oregon plate: N73DE. That had been the tail number of Papa’s 1976 Beechcraft Bonanza, an airplane he owned for 38 years. Flying was a huge part of who he was, and he only retired the Bonanza about three months before his death, when he turned 83 and insurance would no longer allow him to keep flying it.
Putting that number on the S10 felt right. The truck had been his, the airplane had been his, and now this little pickup carried a small tribute to both sides of who Papa was: the practical man who split wood and drove an Iron Duke S10, and the adventurous man who flew his own airplane.
Papa’s truck was back in action.
The S10 quickly became a remarkably handy tool to have around the house. We hauled bark dust in it, took tree limbs to the burn pile, moved odds and ends around the property, and even drove it up to pick out the family Christmas tree. It was exactly the kind of work Papa had always used it for: small jobs, useful jobs, the kind of things a basic little pickup is perfect for.
Wesley absolutely loves going for rides in the S10. I have even let him sit on my lap and steer it a few times on private roads, which he thinks is about the greatest thing in the world. I will admit, though, that I feel slightly guilty every time I take him for a ride in it, because “safe” is not exactly the word anyone would use to describe a 1988 compact pickup. No airbags, no modern crash structure, no driver-assist technology, no anything. Just a little black truck, a bench seat, a manual transmission, and a whole lot of nostalgia.
And yet, it continues to be exactly what it has been since the late 1980s: reliable, simple, useful, and honest. It is not fancy, but it is cool in that basic 1980s truck way. The upright cab, the simple dashboard, the Iron Duke four-cylinder, the manual transmission, the stripe decals, the small size—it all feels like a different era of truck design, back before pickups became luxury family haulers the size of small houses.
I feel honored to be its current steward. That is really how I think of it. I do not feel like I “own” Papa’s truck so much as I am taking care of it for the next generation. My plan is to keep it forever. I truly cannot imagine letting it go. At some point, it will probably be joined by a larger truck, because it would be awfully handy to have one our family of four could actually fit in. But even if that happens, the S10 is not going anywhere.
This little truck was originally going to be the finale of my Cars of a Lifetime series. It felt right. After all the cars that came and went, ending with Papa’s old S10 seemed like the perfect full-circle moment.
But then, a few weeks ago, I was surprised with a new car that holds almost as much sentimental value for me as the S10.
So, next week, we wrap up our time together with one final chapter.
Extremely cool one here, Tyler! I would’ve done exactly as you have, what a great way to remember him by and have quite a useful vehicle.
I sure hope they keep making folks like him, too. Kinda afraid they don’t…
Why can people like this be president of more than a cheese company. Sorry, might be too political.
You did a great job of bring it back to what is was.
This has been a great series. These are the sort of pickup trucks they should still be making. Tillamook Cheese has started to have distribution in Ohio the last few years and it is a special treat to get it. Appreciate a little bit of the back story!
We din’t often see generational vehicles. You’re making your Papa proud, happy. My godfather’s grandfather was the founder of The Church of the Nazarene.
That’s pretty cool! Phineas F. Bresee? I went through the whole Caravans program at the church, which is kind of its version of Boy Scouts. I completed all of the requirements to get the top award, which is the Phineas F. Bresee award.
Lovely tribute to your “Papa”. Nice job on the S-10. My kind of truck: basic.
We eat a lot of Tillamook cheese; the 10-year cheddar is my favorite. And of course we did the factory tour some years back.
When trucks were trucks and not luxury vehicles.
What year did the S-10 first have the changed dashboard?
I believe 1986 was the first year of the new dashboard.
Good job, it’s a useful little truck, being useful and looked after. The same couldn’t be said of the 84 S10 shop truck I drove in the early 90s which was equally basic but already a beater with faded paint no tailgate and a lot of rattles. The 85 Ford Ranger S we had was a much better truck to drive.
We’ve been through Tillamook and visited both the cheese factory and the blimp hangar. I wonder how Papa felt about moving a lot of the operation to Boardman. We still buy Tillamook because it’s quality stuff.
A couple of the local churches have a car connection, the Bend Church of the Nazarene does a monthly Cars & Coffee and the Lutherans do a car show.
Papa had a rule that any car he had had to have a covered area to park it, which really helped the paint. I don’t have enough garage space for all of the fleet, so the Tesla gets parked in the driveway and the S10 gets its spot in the garage.
Papa was actually part of the decision makers that had them expand to Boardman. The added capacity has been important to expanding the brand I think.
My brother had a series of these, each with the 4.3 liter V6 and the 700R4 automatic. They were all mostly durable, save for the transmissions which were all near-death when he bought them. They got him through some very hard times.
I always felt like if any 80s Chevy was going to become a classic, it was the S10. Universally, I have heard praise for them when bought second-hand, and they are like the 1957 Chevy in that regard: good used cars.
It sounds like you’ve found a forever car. I made it a point to hold onto stuff my grandpa had made, and one of his carvings sits in my office as a reminder of him. You’ve done a good turn on this one.
I’ve taken it to the high school auto shop a couple of times to have them change the oil and fix this or that. That shop teacher tells me the students are quite enamored with it! So it might indeed be a classic at some point.
This is great .
The love for Papa comes through loud and clear, you’re a good wordsmith to boot .
Basic pickup trucks will always be a thing for some, I’m one of those . my 2001 Ford Ranger was the cheapest one made then, rubber mats and a radio so awful no one could stand listening to it .
That you’re teaching your young son to love trucks and tools is a very good thing, many life lessons to be learned from older simple tools and vehicles .
-Nate
I love how much Wesley loves the S10. The funny thing is, I don’t know that Papa was super in love with it. I think it served its purpose and wasn’t broken, so he just kept it.
This is a terrific story, and one I feel I can relate to because right now, I’m the steward of my late father-in-law’s 1997 F-150. We got it under similar circumstances, and though it’s a different make and decade, it’s the same general idea: a base truck with virtually no amenities. And it’s perfect for our family right now. One big improvement though, was getting a seat cover for the vinyl bench!
Your S-10 cleaned up great. Also, I forgot what the hockey-stick instrument panel on these trucks looks like. Great job with getting the new stripes, too – that really makes the truck.
Your grandfather sounds like he was quite a man. I looked up the tail number of his former plane, and when I checked it out, I saw it was flying through Texas at that very moment. Glad that it’s still in the air, just like his truck is still on the road!
He was indeed.
And we are excited that his plane is in the air. A few months after his death, my dad, who is not a pilot, brought the plane out of the hangar to start the engine up. When he was pushing it back into the hangar, the tail hit a shelf and damaged part of the tail gear. Because it was such an old plane, they didn’t make that part anymore, and the insurance company wouldn’t put a used part on a plane, I think for liability reasons. So, they totaled it out and it was taken away on a truck. We were very glad to hear that someone bought it and repaired it and that it seems to be getting frequent use. So many memories are tied into that plane. Another one of my prized possessions that I inherited was a model of the plane my grandma had made for my grandpa years back. It lives on my desk at work.
Here it is.
I’ve likely eaten lots as Harold’s cheese, as Tillimook has long been one of my go-to brands (of cheese and ice cream – is the latter related?) Imagined it as a larger company than it probably is – most of my fave cheeses are from small barely-known brands.
Great work on the S-10 too!
Yep, Tillamook cheese and Tillamook Ice Cream are both from the creamery, and both are world class.
That was an excellent post Tyler. A good tribute to you grandfather and a cool story about keeping the old truck alive. I hope that your son gets to drive the truck one day. I am in the midst of putting an old truck back on the road and I look forward to putting it to work one or two more times.
Wesley is convinced that he is going to get the S10 as his first car. I’m convinced he is going to get the safest car with the most airbags I can reasonably afford…. but I might still let him drive it occasionally.
I’m of a certain age where several of my friends had these as their first car. Parents who could afford it, and didn’t want their kids in an “unreliable” used car, would head to the Chevy (or Ford or Dodge) lot and pick the cheapest new car on the lot. Young men who’d already reached a state of independence could buy these with $300 down and a $150/month payment. If I recall, they were more or less the same price as a base model Cavalier. I was in Michigan at the time, and a lot of folks got friends and family GM discounts, making them even cheaper. In hindsight, an S-10 was a better first vehicle than a Cavalier.
Awesome story and well done!
Tyler: Really great reading your story, and I can relate somewhat, as I bought a ’93 S-10 that had been relegated to residing under a tree, and used for very brief trash runs due to a missing freeze plug (I discovered this after getting it). Like you, I spent time stripping/cleaning/repairing/etc. and it is now my daily driver. Since we can only post one picture at a time, the before pix attached, after/current pix in next post. 🙂
Nice! I miss my 1999 Nissan Frontier (2.4L 4-cylinder with 143hp and 5-speed manual). All of these truly small class trucks are missed. Not everyone needs a full sized truck but wants the utility of a bed for a variety of reasons, and being optioned with four or six cylinder engines back in those decades made sense as well for good fuel economy..especially with a manual.
Today the smallest trucks like GM’s Canyon/Colorado, Ford’s Ranger, and Toyota’s Tacoma are the same size as what full sized trucks were 20 years ago!
Final thought on owning a truck of any size: your friends and neighbors who don’t have one will ask to borrow it or have you help them pick something up they bought!
After/current picture. 🙂
That’s awesome! I’ve noticed there still are quite a few of these around. Good job on the restore.
Tyler: I am really enjoying your posts! You have a great flair for writing. Thanks for sharing them with all of us!
Thank you! I’ve really enjoyed writing this series.
Great writeup! You really captured the magnitude of who Papa was and his impact on his family and community.
It’s remarkable – I have a very similar story. My wife’s grandfather was also a great man who came from an outsized family and served as a partiarch for the family and community. He was a doctor, and he delivered many of the children in his town. An old Italian with Brooklyn roots, he also handmade his own fresh mozzerella that he delivered every morning to the family store, well into his 90s. His daily driver was a plain jane, strippo Ford Ranger that he bought new from a local dealer. Its only options were an automatic transmission (he wanted manual, but I guess it wasn’t available at the time), and AC. Crank windows, manual door locks, etc. Very bare bones. But it served him quite well.
Grandpa passed a couple of years prior to the pandemic, and the truck bounced around the family as a dump-runner. Every aunt and uncle had a key to it, and they took turns beating it up. About two years ago, my father-in-law was tasked with selling it, and I asked about buying it. When we got the truck, it stank of old, rank cheese, and it was pretty beat up in spite of the relatively low mileage it had of about 90k.
After we took posession, I, too, replaced and repainted the front bumper, put on new emblems, found a camper top and racks, and we made the truck our own. My wife daily drives it now, and it’s a direct reminder of Grandpa, who I’m sure would be thrilled that the truck is still in the family and didn’t get sold into work-truck duty and used up. We have a 2 year old, and if we keep the truck for another 13 or 14 years, perhaps it will be his first vehicle. I hope it can hang on that long, but being a solid, bare bones Ford, there’s a good chance of it.
That’s great to hear about another truck that has been rescued.
Great that you have your grandfather’s truck. That kind of vehicle has special meaning that only a few understand. My father had second hand cars between 1947-1953 before he got company cars for most of his life. He only bought, new for himself. two cars as he was one looking for a new job and then two long retired. The first is the 1968 Cougar which became my car after 17 months and his 2004 Le Sabre. In his later years he always teased me about getting to drive his Cougar again which I call my car. The Le Sabre I call Dad’s car and it is treated with kid gloves although my 17 year old, unlicensed son, took it out, without my permission to go to a job interview. Uncovered and then covered back up but at least he told me. Didn’t blow a fuse, like his Mom would have, but reinforced that you drove grandpa’s car with no license so imagine an accident. He did get the job.
Great story, Tyler.
I occasionally wish that I had kept my dad’s 1996 (+ or -) Ford Ranger pickup, which he bought new and daily drove up until he passed away in 2012. Dad’s Ranger was equipped somewhat uniquely — it had a standard cab, long bed, 2-wheel drive, 2.3 liter 4 cylinder engine, 5 speed manual transmission, factory aluminum wheels, and factory A/C. He later added a cap that was painted to match the body color. Dad loved that little truck and drove it everywhere.
At the time of Dad’s passing, I had to weigh the Ranger’s pros and cons. On the plus side, it had low mileage for the year, it ran great, and had zero rust. The Ranger started easily and ran smoothly, and although it always seemed underpowered, it scooted reasonably well if you pushed it hard,
The negatives included a couple of minor electrical issues (the gas gauge and the interior lights hadn’t worked in years), chalky paint (it had never been garaged), and an interior that reeked of cigarette smoke and had multiple burns in the seat cushions. But the ultimate deal-breaker for me was that it was 2-wheel drive — in my area of the mid-west, that would be a major issue six months out of the year.
So we made the decision to sell it. If I remember correctly, the buyer was a nice young guy who needed a small truck for his struggling home-based business. We wound up selling it to him at somewhat below book value. I recall seeing the Ranger a couple of times before my mom moved out of the area — the new owner had cleaned it up and it looked pretty respectable.
Love these old bare bones pickups. Adc these to the list of vehicles I should have kept. Had an 89 S10 given to me by my dad. He bought it new and turned it over to me in 2006. Drove it for years.
Keep yours and teach your children to drive a stick someday. They’ll have memories forever of a great time e with dad.
Great story and you did a fantastic job reviving it. The stripes were well worth while and make the truck.
A little late here, but agree this was a wonderful read. Your Papa was quite the legend.
I have the Nissan equivalent of the Chevy S-10, though a decade newer: a first-year (1998) Frontier. It’s quite basic — regular cab, 6-foot bed, 2WD, 4-cylinder, 5-speed manual with crank windows and manual locks. It does have a/c, frontal airbags, and an AM/FM cassette radio.
I plan to keep it as long as possible.
I had one of these “keys and heater” S-10s. Red vinyl seats. I think it cost a little over $6,0000. Same gradient stripes. No radio. No AC. Used it to pull an old 16 foot runabout boat for Lake Erie walleye and perch fishing. I’d never buy something like that now. But I do enjoy the memories.. .