Text and photos by Steve Lenius.
When I was younger, I had an elementary school principal who owned two Model A Fords, one a car and one a Model AA pickup. My family also had friends in Pennsylvania who had a beautiful Model A with a rumble seat. I am lucky enough to have a picture of some members of our families riding in that Model A, but I’m not nearly as familiar with the once-ubiquitous Ford Model T, so it was a pleasure to have a nice-looking 1925 example cross my path recently while traveling — a chance encounter with a 100-year-old car.
With our friend’s Ford Model A roadster
My partner and I had just spent a week experiencing the area around Winona, Minnesota, and we were on our way back to our home in the Minneapolis/St. Paul area. We took U.S. Highway 61, which is one of my favorite roads because it offers scenic views of the bluffs along the Mississippi River.
We stopped for lunch in Kellogg at the Town & Country Café, which is famous for its home-style meals and homemade pie. As we approached the café, I was amazed to see a very old car parked in front of the restaurant. As we got closer, I thought to myself that it looked like a Model T Ford, and that is what it turned out to be.
I assumed that the Model T’s owner was inside the Town & Country Café having lunch. I didn’t know how long I would have to document this unexpected find, so I whipped out my phone and started taking pictures.
The license plate on the front of the car was from 1925. I believe that is the car’s year too — which means this little car turns 100 years old this year!
Note the transverse-leaf-spring front suspension. And, of course, the starting crank, although as I found out, some Model Ts had Bendix electric starters.
This car is a five-passenger Model T Touring Car, which was the most popular version of the Model T in 1925. It cost $290, plus an extra $65 for an electric starter. If you have seen earlier Ts, the wheels might look too small. Older Ts had 30-inch wheels, but balloon tires on 21-inch wood wheels became optional in 1925 for about $20 extra.
I noticed that the owner was carrying a red accessory gas can on the right rear running board inside its own little fence. The Model T did not have a fuel gauge, and the fuel system was by gravity feed (no fuel pump), so the owner’s manual warned not to let the gas tank run too low.
I noticed a “Keep Cool With Coolidge” sticker on the windshield. Nice touch.
The rear of the Model T had an orange-and-red “slow-moving vehicle” warning sign attached to the spare tire. The Model T is not very big, but it has only 20 horsepower, so it might do 45 mph on a good day. Of course, there were no freeways back when it was new.
I also noticed that the tires were whitewalls. I wondered, did Model Ts ever really have whitewall tires? Wouldn’t that have been awfully extravagant? (When I did an online search later, I found some vintage photos of Model T Fords wearing whitewall tires, but they were the exception rather than the rule.)
I noticed that the driver’s side had a rear passenger door, but no driver’s door, just a door-shaped stamping in the sheet metal where the door would have been. The closed bodies had real driver’s doors, but the Roadster and Touring Car did not. (The Touring Car got one in 1926.) Tool boxes for the running boards were common accessories for Model T Fords.
The top and the paint seemed to be in good condition. Of course, the paint was black. (Starting in 1926, it was possible to order a Model T in some other colors, but black was still the only choice in 1925.)
The radiator was crowned with a Boyce MotoMeter, which has a thermometer showing the radiator temperature. The Model T Ford did not have a temperature gauge on the dashboard, and it did not have a sealed cooling system, so the radiator could boil over easily. The MotoMeter also adds a touch of glamor to the plain black enamel radiator shell. Look at the detailing: the gold zigzag pattern inside the circle; the leaves around the edge of the circle; even the pair of wings spreading from the shiny gold platform rising from the radiator. Model T jewelry!
Time to move in closer for some interior shots, beginning with the back seat:
The Model T Touring Car had black imitation leather upholstery. Here is the front seat:
The upholstery looked too nice to be 100 years old. It was probably redone at some point, but it looked appropriately serviceable.
Clearly, the Model T did not have much on the dashboard: just the switch for the ignition and lights, plus an ammeter. I wondered if the ammeter was an aftermarket add-on, but I found out after that it was standard equipment on Model T Fords. (The wires aren’t supposed to be exposed like this, though.)
A Model T Ford does not have an accelerator pedal, just a throttle lever on the right side of the steering column. The left-most pedal on the floor operates the clutch for the two-speed planetary transmission. The middle pedal is for reverse, and the right pedal engages the transmission brake. Note the plaque on the bottom right side of the dashboard, which says “Ford Motor Company, Detroit, Mich., U.S.A” and lists all the patents under which the Model T was constructed.
After taking all these pictures of the car, I went inside the restaurant to order lunch. About halfway through lunch, a gentleman who had been dining by himself finished his lunch, got up, paid, and went out the door. I stood up and watched to see if he went to the Model T. He did. Yep, that was the owner.
I remember him walking all around the car, but I don’t remember seeing how he got in it. (Did he climb in on the right side and slide over to the driver’s side or climb over the stamped not-door on the driver’s side? I don’t know.) I was waiting to see if he would use the crank to start the car, but it turned out that was not necessary — instead, he just turned the key on the dashboard and the engine came to life. What a weird and distinctive noise the engine made! It sounded nothing like a car, nothing like a motorcycle, and nothing anything else I had ever heard. Unfortunately, I was not able to get any photos of his car’s engine, but here is the engine from a different Model T Ford:
The 176.6 cubic inch four in a different 1925 Ford Model T Touring Car / Bring a Trailer
The Model T owner backed the car up and drove away. Shortly after he left, another car pulled into the same parking spot: a new-looking white fifth-generation Toyota Prius. It struck me that this was the polar opposite of the Model T that had been there just a few minutes before, and almost as improbable to see in the sleepy little town of Kellogg, Minnesota. The person who originally bought this Model T a hundred years ago would probably feel the same way looking at the Prius as I felt looking at the little Ford — it would still be recognizable as a car, but radically different in technology, equipment, and design.
I sat down again and finished my serving of homemade Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup pie. It was the perfect ending to an unexpectedly memorable dining experience.
Photographed in Kellogg, Minnesota, May 10, 2025.
Related CC Reading
Curbside Classic: 1911 Ford Model T – Any Colour They Want (by Daniel Stern)
Driving Impressions: Ford Model T – These Are Not The Controls You Are Used To (by Dave Saunders)
Curbside Classic: 1926 Ford Model T Touring Car – Part I, Darlene’s ‘Silver Streak’ (by Ed Stembridge)
Curbside Classic: 1926 Ford Model T Touring Car – Part II, “A Jalopy Load of Feminity” (by Ed Stembridge)
Curbside Classic: 1926 Ford Model T Touring Car – Part III, “The Gypsy Coeds” Ride Again (by Ed Stembridge)
Curbside Classic: 1926 Ford Model T Coupe: T Stands For Tall (by Paul N)
We don’t see many (any!) Ts around, but Sam drives his A Tudor on a regular basis and it’s common to see it at the local dinner. My neighbor Bud has an A pickup and it’s common place to be working out side and see him puttering up the road. As and Ts built by the millions, meant to be driven, just not on the highway.
Wow! May must have been Model T month, as the one I saw and photographed in Santa Cruz, seen in the CC post after this one, was spotted on May 28. Thanks Steve for all the detail. I was walking my rather rambunctious dog when I saw it and the T was in a very busy gas station on Highway 1, a place likely to have fuel spills and not very dog-friendly so I had to photograph it from across the street. But as I mentioned in my post, I’ve seen a few Model A’s driving around recently, plus another one at our local high school (!) car show. I think my Ford sightings this spring have numbered more A’s and T’s than Pinto’s, Mavericks, Fairmonts and Granada’s combined.
I recently observed what appeared to be a Model A merging onto the freeway. Needless to say, that guy was taking his life into his own hands and asking for trouble as an eventual 45 mph top speed is most definitely not enough for travel on a modern freeway, even in the left lane.
At least it was during daylight hours and traffic wasn’t too bad at the time. But, still, why anyone would ever attempt that is beyond me.
A stock A can hit 65, although that’s not recommended for continual use. But many A’s have been fitted with overdrive, which makes continual 55-60 mph speeds perfectly doable. And many A’s have had their engines warmed up a bit; it doesn’t take much to have them be able to run 70+ mph. And they accelerate pretty briskly too. Not nearly as precarious as you make it out to be.
It sure seemed precarious at the time, as several vehicles had to quickly slow down and lined up behind it.
Not to mention the rest of the drivetrain (i.e., brakes) and tires of an original 4-cylinder Model A not being up to freeway speeds.
I suppose a flathead would be a bit better, though.
The Model A is a flathead, though. 😉
About 40 years ago I was considering getting a Model A as a summer car, but in the end I decided against it. There were several reasons, but engine performance was not one of them. I was more concerned about the braking performance. I ended up with a Citroen 2CV which is slightly faster, but it has excellent brakes (discs on front). I tend to stay away from busy highways. I now live in a small town in Ontario, so that is not a problem. The secondary 2 lane roads are great, with a speed limit of 80 kph, with most traffic adding 15 kph to get an average speed of 105 kph.
There are a couple of Model A in town and I do see them regularly, but not often.
When I was a teenager in Nova Scotia in the 1960s, a family with a cottage near ours had a Model T.
They would occasionally drive it down from Halifax, about 100km away, for the weekend. Even then it looked prehistoric, and it was only about 40 years old. There are probably several cars in my neighbourhood now that are that age, being driven relatively unnoticed on a daily basis.
The Model T family were definitely ‘cool car’ people – the husband drove a fintail Mercedes, and the wife had a Volvo Canadian (as Amazons/122’s assembled in Canada were badged). Early adopters for sure. Their less cool neighbours had a Meteor sedan and a Falcon wagon…
I like how the key was left dangling in the ignition. No need to worry about theft: While a manual transmission is enough to stymie many a modern car thief, the number of people in the world who can operate the vexing array of pedals, levers, and dials in a Model T is truly tiny.
I agree that the car is unlikely to be stolen, but I would worry about the key. It might be hard to replace.
A friend’s dad had a T that I got to ride around in quite a bit on quiet country roads. With five people aboard, progress up inclines was slow, but in low gear we chugged on up without stalling. There were no stop or taillights so he used hand signals to indicate stops and turns. I wondered if any of the people following us had any idea what they meant.
My own dad remembered that you would often have to back up steep hills; reverse gear had a lower ratio than first (though the location of the gravity feed gas tank might have been more favorable driving back-to-front as well).
A lovely old car .
-Nate
It’s nice to know that a super-survivor like this Model T still gets a bit of regular use exercise now and then. This one seems exceptionally clean, which makes me wonder how much of it is the “Car of Theseus” (i.e., enough replaced that it’s nearly all replacement parts).
Also, does anyone know why there was no driver’s door on these?
Early and late touring cars had driver’s doors. The general consensus seems to be that with the loveseat-style front seat on open cars and the obstruction of the hand lever, the driver’s side door was more or less useless even when it was present, so after a while, Ford decided to save the extra cost of punching it out and adding another set of hinges. Canadian-built open Ts had front doors on both sides, probably so the same bodies could be used for both LHD and RHD export cars.
The closed Model T sedans and coupe had driver’s doors, but they were a lot more expensive than the roadster and touring car, and the closed bodies generally had more conventional bench seats, so getting in and out through the driver’s door was not such an acrobatic feat. Here’s a 1923 coupe for illustration:
https://www.handh.co.uk/auction/lot/78-1923-ford-model-t-coupe/?lot=57290&sd=1
I happened across a T on the road near my neighborhood about a month ago. That one had a 1922 license plate on the front. I marveled at its 100+ year old status. I loved the sounds it made as it puttered along at about 35 mph.
These HAVE to be kept alive, for posterity and the legacy of transportation history!