History The Salt Lake Diamond T: A History of Tires, Bonneville Racing, and Old Farmers

I see you now have it for sale .

http://www.hemmings.com/classifieds/carsforsale/diamond_t/unspecified/1572402.html

 

I guess I'm glad I bought mine when I did.

 

I'm not advertising here. I want to document this history as I've pieced it together. Some of these details don't exist anywhere else. I don't want them to be lost, and hopefully others will enjoy or add to the story.

 

The Salt Lake City Auburn Cord dealership was a natural staging location for for the ACD cars that would be run on the Salt. It would make sense that Wilkinson provide some ground support for the runs that were being made to promote Auburn and Cord, and by association, his dealership.



Everything on the Salt Flats had to be trucked out for speed runs. Tent cities were erected and every comfort and necessity was delivered by truck.

It would be only natural for Wilkinson to use trucks, which he had at his disposal to assist with the land speed record attempts that were promoting his Auburn Cord dealership. Indeed, we see Diamond T trucks, like this flatbed COE filming the Mormon Meteor II.

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Wasn't an Ab Jenkins car Best of Show at Pebble Beach a few years back? Wonder where it was between PB and its "real life"?

 

You're probably thinking of the Duesenberg Special also known as the original Mormon Meteor. I saw it at Auburn back in the 90s. It has been rebuilt to the original configuration.



The Mormon Meteor III is in the price Museum of Speed.

 

Fantastic trip through history, Thanks for all your efforts!
KK

 

What a great looking truck Brian!

Sam

 

The following photo is the holy grail of my research. It clearly shows the Diamond T 201 pickup on the salt with Ab Jenkins and the Mormon Meteor III. The Diamond T logo on the door of the pickup indicates that it is a service truck from the Wilkinson dealership. The Utah archives, where I found this photo, dates it circa 1938. We know this is incorrect based on the vintage of the Dodge panel van and the Ford woody also in the photos.
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This photo was taken well after World War II. By this time, the Auburn, Cord Duesenberg empire had long dissolved. In fact, when Ab Jenkins was racing front-Drive Cords back in 1937, production back in Indiana had already shut down permanently. The relationship between Wilkinson and Jenkins endured even as the Auburn Cord dealership ceased operation. Were Ab and O.J. friends? All the literature describes Ab Jenkins as being friendly to almost everyone. We don&#8217;t know specifics of their personal relationship. We do know that politics remained a force to associate them. Jenkins was mayor of Salt Lake City. Wilkinson chaired the Republican Party, for which Ab campaigned enthusiastically.
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Here are a couple more photos from the same day on the Salt where the Diamond T is servicing tires on the Mormon Meteor III

 

Here's another photo of the Mormon Meteor being loaded onto a truck with the Diamond T in the background. In the Boys of Bonneville movie, there is a close up photo taken the same day of Ab and his crew in front of this transport truck.

http://www.boysofbonneville.com/

 

Great read, thanks.

 

Wow! Incredible research! I won't even be mad at you for grabbing a piece of Utah history!

Sent from atop my toilet using the TJJ app for Android.

 

Great read and a great catch too!

 

Does anybody know how to date ball point pens?

I found this pen in the dispatch pocket (a.k.a. glovebox) of the Bonneville Diamond T. It advertises preffered risk insurance "For Non-Drinkers".

In Ab Jenkin's book and in the Boys of Bonneville movie it is recorded that Ab gave credit for his endurance, physical, and mental health to abstinence from drinking. I'd love to think there is an actuall connection here, but I'm guessing that would be pretty common in Utah.

I googled the name of the insurance agent, and the first hit I got was a mugshot of a fellow booked for drunk driving. Ironic, huh? Probably the guy's great grandson or something?

 

Dual vs. single rear wheels?

This particular truck was delivered from the factory with single rear wheels as were most Model 201 trucks. This truck ran single rear wheels for its entire history in Salt Lake City and rural Utah. Dual rear wheels were a $108 option on a $1500 truck in 1947. It was a pretty rare option. The dual option used the same rear axle, brake drums, and even the same outer wheel rims. The only difference is the cast-iron wheel center. I happened upon a parts truck with the dual option, so I thought I would mount them up on the Bonneville truck to see what they looked like. Here are the results. What do you think?

Here is the original, single, rear wheel with a set of new 225 85 16 radials.



Here is the new, dual wheel, cast iron center with the inner wheel rim already installed.



The next photos show both duals installed.







Finally, you can run a single rim on the dual wheel center, so this optional wheel really gives you both options. Here is a single wheel mounted on the dual center for comparion to the less versatile single in the first photo above. This is how I left it, but I can always go back to duals if that is the preferred look.

 

After researching the truck's history, I couldn't resist bringing some of the original signage back based on what I learned. Had a blast today driving it around with the newly painted sideboards.

 

I'm on the other end of the state, but I sure wish I had something to help you. Too cool, and I love the effort you're making to document this truck!


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Mid to late 1960s. My uncle had a business and he gave out pens like that one with the clear barrel and name of the business printed on a tube that was inserted inside. They were very cool looking in a mid-century way.

This is a great story and project!

 

Thanks! that would be consistent with the other papers I found in the truck dated 1965.

 

On your truck, the duals look better. Not to hijack, but we are having a BALL. With our 201 touring the country. In Kearney NE now on the Lincoln Highway tour. People love the truck, it's a huge hit out here.

 

I do not disagree. One minor downside to the duals is that it could be mistaken for a 1.5 ton. With the exception of the 201s, which are rare in themselves, single rear wheels are uncommon among Dimaond Ts, most of which are bigger, heavier trucks.

How far are you headed on the Lincoln Hwy? My Utah truck most likely cruised a lot of that highway between Wendover and Cheyenne back in the day.

I saw this truck on I-80 in DesMoines on May 28. Four days later it was at the ATHS show in Yakima. It had Ontario plates. Don't know the owner/driver, but got to respect the miles they're putting on the old truck.

 

Speaking of miles, we've been driving the Salt Lake Diamond T and have a little video to share.

 

Here are a couple more clips of the engine running. I've been working under my Dad's tutelege for 40 years, and I am continually impressed with what the man can do. The old farmer that owned this truck forever told me he thought it had been 7 or 8 years since he drove the thing. At that moment, his wife corrected him and said it had been more like 12 or 14 years. I'm guessing they were both wrong and this truck had been sitting still even longer than that. Regardless of the legth of its suspended animation, dad breathed life into it as if it had never run better. A momentary touch to the starter button is all it takes for it to spring to life. It doesn't even need a choke and it's purring like a sewing machine.

See for yourself:



and

 

Here's a photo of the driver's side. The slogan on this side came from the medalion on the dash.

 

What is the engine, a flathead L-6?

 

Yep, built by Hercules.

 

Somebody had a sense of humor.

I didn't notice it for a while, because it is in pale, yellow crayon or grease pencil, but somebody sketched a 10,000 RPM tachometer on the dash of the Diamond T right under the steering wheel.



I suppose it could have been done by the same kids that broke the glass out of the speedometer. Who knows how long it's been there, or in what context they dreamed of cranking the old Hercules to excesive speed? The"World's Quickest Stopping Tire" medallion is visible to the right of the instruments.

 

When we stumbled upon this truck in Utah, I knew right away it was a sweet treasure being such a small truck in size, but with the style of a much bigger, heavier truck.



I bought it becuase it was cheap; I liked the story, and the fact that I stumbled on a two-owner truck that had not been advertised for sale since originally sold in 1947. But in the back of my mind, I also thought it might be a good place to stick the extra Diamond T pickup bed I had acquired with my Missouri barn find.



However, as I learned and documented more of the truck's history, I became less eager to molest its appearances and more interested in preserving it-right down to its custom bed. The flatbed was a factory built unit, but the side panels were hand made. Someone had carefully curved the front corners and the rear edges of the side board-presumably to haul tires in style.

Armed with what I learend about the truck and General Tire in the 40s, I decided I wanted to freshen up the wood panels to accent the original lettering on the doors. It took me two whole days to remove the old wood panels I wanted to preserve them for patterns, which meant I had to remove 110 carriage bolts with square (or diamond in this case) nuts that had been in place for 66 years.

I decided to weld nuts on the heads of the carriage bolts. I had to grind off the rust and plating. I needed nuts with big enough holes that I could really burn my welds into the heads. A shotty weld would just twist right off. Drilling nuts with a counter-sunk bit might have given enough room for the tip of the welder, but I just used 3/4" nuts with much success.



Repeating this 110 times consumed a lot of time and welding wire, but it worked great. I suppose soaking the bolts with this kind of heat also helped loosen up the rusted nuts. Only a few bolts twisted off, which made it easy to resuse most of the original square nuts.

 

It looks kind of sporty without the sideboards.