A Blast from the Past (Part 2)

…continuing with the second of several recaps or overviews of the amazing and seemingly endless collection of items accumulated by Harold Warp and now on display at the Pioneer Village in Mendon Nebraska.  We spent several hours perusing…and just getting a general overview of this museum and its artifacts.

This 1903 Ford is reputed to be the world’s oldest surviving Ford production model.  This 2-cylinder car developed 8 HP and cost $850.  Interestingly, except for the engine, the design is very similar to the Cadillacs produced at the same time…the major difference being the Cadillac only had a 1-cylinder engine.

Cadillac Motors was actually formed from the remnants of the Henry Ford Company after a dispute with Ford’s investors.  He left the company with a few of his key partners in 1902 to start again.  In the first year of production, this Ford model sold 1,708 cars.

This is the second oldest Ford ‘station wagon’ known to exist.  It was built in 1915.  Beginning as early as 1910, independent manufacturers built custom bodies for installation on Model T auto frames.  They were mostly for commercial use.  This one was acquired for Pioneer Village in 1959.

This is a 2-passenger 1906 Model 19 Rambler ‘Tourabout’.  It was built in Kenosha Wisconsin by the Thomas B. Jeffery Company.  This company was in business from 1897 until 1915.  In 1916, the company was purchased by the Nash Motors Company and years later, the Nash Rambler was born.

The price of the Model 19 was $1,250 plus another $150 for the tonneau cover.  In today’s dollars, the ‘Tourabout’ would cost $48,966, not an inexpensive 2-seater automobile!  The Pioneer Village acquired it in 1967.   

This is a 1911 “Little”, which evolved into the Chevrolet brand.  Bill Durant had created General Motors when he founded Buick in 1905.  However, bankers had taken GM from Durant in 1910.  Durant paid a visit to a former employee of his, William “Wild Bill” Little.  Little was in the process of building a car for well-known race car driver, Louis Chevrolet.  This car had a ‘huge’ 6-cylinder engine.  Durant envisioned a way to get back in the auto business and perhaps regain control of GM, and he bought out Little on the spot.

Durant revisited the design of the “Little” as well as the name.  The reengineered car had a 4-cylinder engine and it was renamed after Louis Chevrolet.  Although the 6-cylinder version was a commercial flop at $3,000 per vehicle, the new “Little” Chevrolet was priced at $690 and the company sold 1,500 of them in 1912.  Durant did regain control of General Motors…and then he lost control again…but that is another story.

This is a 1935 Pierce-Arrow sedan.  Pierce-Arrow was located in Buffalo New York and it existed from 1901 until 1938.  By 1915, George N. Pierce had the reputation of building a prestige automobile.  By that time, he’d built about 12,000 autos.  They were not inexpensive!  In 1915 models ranged from $5,850 up to $7,300.  In today’s dollars, they would range from $178,247 up to $222,461…

One change that made Pierce-Arrows distinctive was the placement of the headlights.  Up until that point, headlights had been traditionally mounted next to automobile radiators.  Pierce Arrow mounted them into flared housings built into the fenders…a revolutionary change in its time.  The Great Depression was the primary cause of the company’s closing.

Note: Harold Warp and Pioneer Village doesn't recondition, refurbish and polish many of the exhibits.  They preserve them as they were when recovered and saved.

This is a 1917 Mercedes Benz Limousine.  It was acquired by Pioneer Village in 1958 from a farm in Illinois.  The auto had been stored in a shed for so long that they had to cut down some fairly mature trees to be able to transport it to Nebraska. 

Gottfried Daimler began making cars in 1886.  Karl Benz is credited as being the first man to build a successful ‘horseless carriage’ in 1885.  These 2 competitors merged in 1926, forming the Mercedes Benz Corporation. 

So neither Daimler nor Benz was married to or had a child named Mercedes… How did the brand name originate?  It turns out that Daimler’s sole distributor for his autos in France, Belgium, Austria-Hungary and the United States had a daughter named Mercedes.  In 1901, Daimler built a new 28 HP 4-cylinder model and he named it “Mercedes”.  Sales were positive and another model received the same name…and the rest as they say, is history.

This unusual looking big black car was built by The Meteor Motor Car Company in 1924.  The company was located in Piqua Ohio and from my research I’m not sure when they finally went out of business as this was a ‘specialty’ automobile builder that went through many iterations. 

The Meteor Motor Car Company was founded in 1915 but stopped making passenger autos in 1917.  Instead, the company focused on hearses and ambulances.  This one on display at Pioneer Village is a hearse.  It cost $3,150 in 1917.  

This 3 car ‘line-up’ consists of 3 automobiles that tested the limits of technology and practicality more than a century ago. 

Both Baker and Detroit Electric built autos.  The last Detroit Electric car was shipped to a customer in February of 1939…although in its final years only very small numbers of these cars were built.  Early on, Detroit Electric autos were mainly sold to women and physicians who desired the dependable and immediate start without having to hand crank the engine to start internal combustion motors. 

White Motors built 500 steam powered cars in 1903 and by 1906, they sold 1,902.  A White steamer was featured in Teddy Roosevelt’s inaugural parade and he, as the President, drove one the following year.  William Howard Taft included a White in his Presidential ‘fleet’ of cars.  While White steamers outsold Stanley Steamers, Stanley sold 200 of their cars before 1900.  A Stanley Steamer held the record speed for a mile from 1906 until 1911…covering the distance in 28.6 seconds or at 127 mph.

The Duryea Motor Wagon Company (1885 – 1917) was located in Springfield Massachusetts.  It was the first American firm to build gasoline powered automobiles.  The Franklin Automobile Company (1902 – 1934) was located in Syracuse New York.  It is important to note that before the invention of antifreeze, air-cooled engines had a huge advantage during cold weather.  They were popular with doctors who needed an all-weather auto.

OK…enough autos for now.  Back to wagons and other collectibles!

Horse-drawn United States Postal Delivery wagons were the norm, especially in rural areas for many years.  But, in 1899, an electric automobile serviced 40 mailboxes in Buffalo New York in an hour and a half.  That was half the time it would have taken a horse-drawn wagon.  The use of electric and gas-powered vehicles quickly increased when postal carriers began delivering packages as well as letters.  By 1933, only 2% of urban postal vehicles were horse-drawn.

I was unable to determine when the last horse-drawn mail route was operational.  There is a mail route that is via mule train down into the Grand Canyon.  It serves the isolated village of Supai, home of the Havasupai Native American tribe.  The Havasupai peoples have lived in the canyon for over 800 years.

In the 1800s and into the early 1900s, rural America was entertained by traveling shows.  They might include a circus, vaudeville show or similar entertainment.  Early shows moved from town to town via horse and wagon.

This is one of those ‘show wagons’.  The Bowman Show Wagon was built by J. Bowman in Wakefield Nebraska.  He built it for the express purpose of his family taking part in the opening of the Oklahoma Territory to settlers, aka the Oklahoma Land Rush.  Illness prevented the family’s participation and Bowman redirected his goals.

He decided to start a vaudeville tent show in the summer of 1900.  At times, the equivalent of a one-ring circus, he and the family continued with this endeavor until 1910.  They would be on the road from late spring until early fall and the family ‘wintered’ in Blair Nebraska.  The last show of the season was always staged in Blair.

J. Bowman was known by Native Americans as “Bowman – the showman”.  He wore long hair and he dressed, looked a lot like and acted like Buffalo Bill Cody.  His most famous performer was a boy wearing knickers who danced for him.  His name was Fred Astaire.  

This photo demonstrates both the variety and sometimes crowded juxtaposition of the items collected and displayed by Harold Warp at the Pioneer Village.  In the foreground, there is a showcase full of various old phones and that display is adjacent to an old time telephone switchboard.  The phone/switchboard display reminded me of a time when we lived in the country in southern Michigan…I was in the 5^th grade…and we had a ‘party line’.  You never knew who was listening to your calls.

The Rawleigh ‘medicine’ Wagon was not an uncommon sight on rural roads across the USA between 1890 and 1920.  Another popular ‘medicine’ wagon purveyor at that time was the Watkins Man.  In 1900, has been estimated that there were as many as 30,000 horse drawn medicine wagons crisscrossing the countryside.  These company ‘agents’ are not to be confused with the more familiar ‘medicine men’ who provided entertainment and frequently sold questionable products to farm and small town families. 

These more reputable ‘door to door’ salesmen specialized in cooking flavorings/spices, home remedies, salves and livestock medicines.  As a youth, Harold Warp recalled that the family would always provide a meal for the agent and they’d also feed and water the agent’s horse. 

Guess what?!  The W.T. Rawleigh Company has been in business since 1889 and they still sell their products from their corporate offices in Florida.  Check them out at WT Rawleigh: quality vitamins and supplements, since 1889.  The Watkins Company is also still a viable functioning company, operating from Winona Minnesota since 1868.  By 1888, Watkins had 150 horse-drawn agents plying their wares in the Midwest.  Website: Watkins - Crafted In The USA Since 1868...Naturally (watkins1868.com).

As I’ve mentioned several times, the collection of artifacts at Pioneer Village is wide reaching and very diverse.  This wall mounted showcase displays various versions of old handcuffs and leg restraints.

Back in the late 1800s, guests arriving at an upscale resort via a trip on the railroad, were often greeted at the depot with a driver and a nice horse-drawn hotel transfer coach.   They and their luggage were then driven to the hotel or resort. 

I can think of one place in the United States where horse-drawn hotel transportation is still provided.  The Grand Hotel on Mackinac Island in Michigan, built in 1887, transfers their guests and their luggage from the ferry landing to the hotel using horses and upscale carriages.  There is a $12 charge round trip for each guest.  Check out this magnificent old hotel at Welcome to Grand Hotel | Mackinac Island, Michigan.

I’ll end this chapter of our visit to Nebraska’s Pioneer Village with this “Horse Car” from the Omaha Horse Railway Company.  In 1867 this was the first of many horse drawn cars or trolleys purchased for the OHRC.  The original cost was $700. 

Omaha’s first track extended 2 miles from the old Union Pacific Depot, ending at the stable that first housed 26 horses and 4 cars.  There were rail turntables at both ends of the route with turn outs along the way so the cars could pass each other as they plied their way up and down the line.  A car left each end of the route every 14 minutes and it took 28 minutes to complete the 2 mile trip.  The fare initially was 10 cents but it was later reduced to 5 cents.  The horses wore bells to warn pedestrians of their approach. 

By the time that the first steam drawn car traversed the route, there were 75 horse cars in service with 600 horses.  The line employed 255 people.  The car was used in parades from time to time and somehow it managed to dodge the junk dealers.  Harold Warp bought this first horse car for $750 in 1956, when it was 99 years old. 

Just click on any of the photos to enlarge them…

Thanks for stopping by to continue exploring this endangered historical collection of Americana!

Take Care, Big Daddy Dave