Interesting truck and story. Hopefully Jacob or Grandpa sees this and fills us in on more of its' history.
Thats a piece of history with that body on there, that little pickup looks to have been around a while just like it is, pretty slick. I'm a little lost about Fruehauf's yellow trailers in your blog, are you refering to a travel trailer, if so I've not seen pictures of them, the website below is operated by the Fruehauf historical society owned by Ruth Fruehauf and I've seen her display set up and nothing mentioned about that. https://www.singingwheels.com/ The picture below is my 1953 Fruehauf ribbed trailer.
That steering wheel is like leaning in for a kiss and getting knee'd in the balls instead. Neat truck otherwise though.
When I search for "Fruehauf Z-Van" all I find are 70s intermodal semitrailers. I suspect the camper was built out of one of these.
All the Fruehauf's I ever saw were either red, black, or blue. Maybe a regional company thing? I pulled a new 45' Fruehauf flatbed for a couple of years back in the late 80's, it was blue. I remember they were a bit strange, you had to use Fruehauf parts because other standard trailer parts didn't fit--wheel bearings, seals, lights, etc. Even the lug nuts were an oddball size. Fruehauf was bought out by Wabash in 1997, and quality went to shit. I think they used up the remaining parts inventory then retired the name.
Hello, Being in the old photography days has brought back many memories to this old guy. Hot rods, whether styled in 1955 or 1965 still ring true to the day. We used to see old trucks in our neighborhood before we saw old hot rods. Why? They were used by the local merchants and mechanics for parts, service calls and deliveries. That 1935 Ford pickup has the look of a truck that could have been rolling down the street on the Westside of Long Beach, just about any time of the day. The local gardeners had all sorts of trucks from creepy old rusty ones to the latest (53-64) trucks of all kinds. Our next door neighbor even bought a new 64 El Camino for his latest truck. We were impressed with that one, v8, 3 speed column, etc. But, it was not until we started driving that we continued to see more trucks at the high school, cruising around, drive-in restaurants, the local college, and at the dragstrip. I needed a truck to haul my desert racing motorcycle. So, I bought a new 65 El Camino for my next 10 year car. During this time, we also got back into hot rods, customs and expanded my photography business. As it rolled into the So Cal hot rod days, I met a lot of nice hot rod enthusiasts at various gatherings, car shows, and at the local hang out spots. I was fortunate enough to meet a young, Larry Wood and Steve Pennington from the Early Times Club. We got talking about the 29 Ford Truck and Sedan Delivery. I was amazed that they did not have any magazine coverage for such cool hot rods. Jnaki Having grown up in So Cal, we all knew about several nice locations for the photo shoots that we set up for the following weeks. The tall truck had all of the power and running gear to make it a smooth riding/handling truck for daily driving and outdoor mountain road climbing. That is in comparison to my first 1940 Flathead Ford Sedan Delivery that never went to the local mountains, due to lack of power going up those steep roads to the destinations. With the added homemade wooden camper shell on the back, the truck had its own portable rest spot on any So Cal cruise or overnight. “THE HOUSE THAT WOOD BUILT…”
The Jalopy Journal
