The Musings of A Simple Country Man

By Hobie Morris

(Brookfield, NY) “It was a magic carpet, bumping over rough roads when the ruts were deep and -whizzing along when they were smooth, dry and dusty.” —Kansas City Star

Sometime early in the last century a small black automobile slowly backs up the steep dirt road that leads into this remote country village. By the time the driver reaches the valley’s summit his neck is pretty stiff from constantly craning it trying to keep his auto on the surface of the narrow road and out of the deep ditches on either side.

When at the top he turns his auto around and continues driving four miles east into
another scenic central New York valley along which runs the wider gravel Route 8 and
Bridgewater to the north and Leonardsville to the south.

Getting into Brookfield in the early days of motoring is often much easier than getting out especially if you travel up the steep eastern side of Beaver Creek Valley. It is the shortest route to easier traveled roads beyond.

But backing up? Among many of the earliest automobiles backing up steep inclines made the gasoline flow more efficiently through the carburetor to the sparkplugs. It is a “pain in the neck” but it got you up a steep hill albeit at a snail’s pace!

This black auto is not an especially good hill climber. While it can easily cruise along at 30 to 45 mph on level ground its 20 horsepower 4 cylinder 2.3 liter engine often struggles up steep inclines. Occasionally the “low” transmission bands will overheat and fail to work at all! When his happens a driver can turn the car around, press the reverse pedal and, once again, back up the hill!

Every fall for the pasts 39 years thousands of central New Yorkers have flocked into scenic and historical Brookfield to attend the very popular “Wheel Days.” The Fairground, where the event is held, is a bee hive of activity. There is plenty of excitement for everybody from early morning till long into the cool evening. The highlight of this three day event is Sunday’s appearance of a huge number of unique vehicles of every conceivable make, model, age and description. The spacious grounds can hardly hold them all and the thousands of spectators who mill around examining them. Many of these antiques are driven to “Wheel Days” under their “own steam.” Collectively they document America’s productive genius that was once the envy of the entire world.

On the most recent Wheel Days my wife Lois and I are like kids once again. As we sauntered around the Fairgrounds admiring the numerous exhibits a small black auto slowly “putt-putted” by us. We admired it and waved to the driver and his passenger.

Later we saw it parked with its hood raised and windows rolled down. We went over to it. Its engine was amazingly small as was its radiator; its interior strictly no frills and rather primitive in its simplicity. Quite a contrast to modern automobiles with their mind (and wallet) boggling complexity. We found out this black auto had been built in America 87 years ago. It was called a “Model T.” A vehicle that many claimed “changed the world.”

Unquestionably it was one of the most beloved, famous and important vehicles ever made; the first American auto to be effectively mass produced and cheap enough for the common American to purchase. It was the brain child of the auto pioneer and icon Henry Ford. (In 1914 using efficient mass production methods a Model T came off the assembly line every 24 seconds).

First some background information.

In June, 1903 Henry Ford founded the Ford Motor Company. The first production auto was a Model A (1903); a Model B (1905) followed by Models N (1906) and R and S and then the most famous to be Model T in 1908. The first T’s came in an assortment of colors and did so until 1913 when it came only in black for the next 13 years. Color options once again became available in 1927. In 1928 Ford introduced a new model, the equally famous A.

In 1921 the Model T commanded 61.6 percent of all cars sold in the US. The T was unique in many ways. Its left side steering wheel location soon became standard in the industry. Its metric auto engine was the first mass produced engine of its kind. Then there was the planetary gear system discussed later. Between 1908 and 1927 there were 15.5 million Model T’s built. Someone described the T this way: “nimble as a jack rabbit, rough as a hickory stump, simple as a butter churn, unadorned as a farmer’s boot.”

Henry Ford was a prime mover in an auto revolution unleashed in the early decades of the 20th Century. When the Model T was conceived in 1908 there were barely 300,000 autos, and 253 companies making cars, on America’s roads. By 1927 there were 20 million automobiles. Between 1913 to 1925 12.7 million sold were Model T’s.

Ford led the way in “democratizing” car ownership. The Model T was often the first auto ever owned by millions of Americans. Some have called the T the “farmer’s car.” In 1920 49 percent (42.5 million) Americans still lived on farms or “rural territory.” In countless ways Henry Ford’s invention freed the American farm family from the slavery of tedium and isolation.

The farmer’s uses of the Model T were legendary. As one farmer expressed it the T would do everything except “rock the body to sleep or make love to the hired girl.”

The Model T was very remarkable besides its affordability. The 1925 Model T touring car sold for $290.

It was for example an “all season” vehicle. It stood well off the ground with 15 inches of clearance. As author Hal Borland remembers, “It -would waddle through a foot of snow without a whimper or, if need be, a foot of mud…..I once drove 30 miles through snow 14 inches deep….It took three hours but I got through.”

There were no snow tires in those early days but there were tire chains. If caught without a pair you could wrap rope round and round the tires. Tires had wooden “artillery wheels” with spokes so one could wrap the rope that way.

Starting the Model T in the winter proved to be a never ending challenge. Radiators were usually drained every night. (Some people used kerosene for antifreeze but the smell lasted the year round). When you wanted to start it you poured boiling water into the radiator, covered the hood with a heavy blanket and waited a half an hour. If you were lucky, and had properly set two small levels on the steering wheel to advance the spark and feed the gas and had not broken your wrist, hand or arm cranking the cold engine, the T’s motor usually coughed and sputtered into life.

Winter driving in the Model T wasn’t a very enjoyable experience. There were virtually no comforts for either the driver or passengers. As Hal Borland described the scene in his book Hill Country Harvest (1967), “It was probably the coldest vehicle ever built, colder than a buggy because it went faster and had more cracks for the air to get into.” (The early T’s had no left side door; it had a folding top with side curtains that buttoned up; no heater, or windshield wipers. If you wanted to see in a storm you stuck your head out).

Model T’s had a very long life expectancy. When the last Model T was built in 1927, 75 percent of all T’s built were still on the road!

In 1914 for example Mike Tonis of Sacramento, Calif. bought a Model T. It was a 1926 Model T Coupe he saw sitting alongside a road with a “For Sale” sign on it. He asked the owner the price. The man said, “Whatever you got.” This was in the Great Depression and the man hadn’t eaten for several days. Tonis had only $5 in his pocket. Sold. Over the years he would drive that $5 auto over 650,000 miles! Tonis never spent a dime in a garage for repairs. In fact he added a second transmission behind the first that gave him nine speeds forward and three in reverse.

The first car writer Hal Borland ever had was a second hand Model T. It had been in a wreck. He bought it for $37.50, stripped it to the running gears, put in bucket seats, a big gas tank and new hood. Borland drove it 100,000 miles, sold it to a rural school teacher who drove it for five years. She sold it to a rural mail carrier who made it into a “mud buggy” and used it several months a year on the unpaved roads in eastern Colorado. Borland lost track of it after that but was sure “it didn’t die.”

Examples of the Model T’s versatility could fill a book. Its uses were endless: from pulling a field plow to supplying the power to buzz up firewood. Its adaptability had few limits!

The Model T was also very fixable. Flat tires were frequent. One could “cold patch” it on the spot and shortly resume driving. In hot weather, however, those patches tended to come loose with the inevitable result.

Many hardware stores in those days carried in stock the most frequently needed Model T parts. They were plentiful and very cheap.

Borland and most Model T owners were usually their own mechanics.

Every 1,000 miles or so, for instance, you’d pull off the motor’s head and scrape off the built up carbon. Then you’d put the head back on and you were off once again. One time Borland blew a head gasket 40 miles from town. He cut out a new gasket out of the only material at hand, a Uneeda Biscuit cracker box. It worked. He drove the T several hundred miles with that cardboard gasket!

Another man burned out two rod bearings on a lonely rural road. He replaced them on the spot with pieces of bacon rind. He drove a thousand miles with these makeshift bearings!

The planetary transmission gear set the Model T apart from all other autos of that era (and ours). The T’s had no gear shift, just three shifting pedals on the floor acting on the planetary gear. The left pedal started the auto forward in low gear. Release of that pedal placed the car in high gear. The far right pedal was the brake and the center pedal when depressed moved the car in reverse. (Transmission bands had to be occasionally adjusted and replaced when worn out). Borland recalled that when the brake pedal wore down you could use the reverse pedal for a brake).

The gas tank was under the cushion on the front seat. If you were running short of gas you could add if you had it kerosene and the motor would run. As Borland noted, “It smoked like a wood burning locomotive but it ran.”

Many “seniors” today still fondly remember ancient Model T’s that they tinkered with as teenagers. They could usually find them in junkyards, hedgerows, etc. They had been replaced by fancier, more powerful and expensive all weather vehicles.

But the nostalgic and practical charm of the T’s has remained as contagious as ever even a century after its conception.

If you seen one at the 40^th Wheel Days held in September you’ll understand the Model T’s charisma and enduring charm; its qualities that this simple country man and many others look at with great envy and maybe even longing.

Hobie Morris is a Brookfield resident and simple country man.