The Dust Bowl Days and the Model A...

[Steve Plucker]

I just started reading the book "The Worst Hard Time" by Timothy Egan about the Dust Bowl Days.

The Dust Bowl Days were from 1929 through about 1938 in Colorado, New Mexico, Texas, Kansas and Oklahoma and removed one heck of a lot of soil from the southern plains and deposited it all over the place.

This got me to thinking...Since that time, has anyone ever heard of any unearthing of any old cars, Model A/AA's or other types, that got covered up in this area of the southern plains during these days? Interesting.

I just got off of Google Maps and one can still see the devistation in these areas.

God Forbid if it ever happens again!
Pluck

[Fred K-OR]

Pluck,

There is a site on Face Book called "Abandon Oregon" that has pictures of abandon places and things in Oregon. It often has pictures of old cars, trucks and many other things abandoned in Oregon. It has had a few Model A's in some of the pictures. Don't know if this is something you may be interested in.

[updraught]

"God Forbid if it ever happens again"

Must have been all those horse plows that did it.

[31 Model A]

Originally Posted by updraught

"God Forbid if it ever happens again"

Must have been all those horse plows that did it.

Actually you're not far off. Soil Conservation wasn't practiced back then and never had been and after it was all over, we found ourselves in WWII where resources was even stretched further. But after WWII, conservation took off and it was soon after we became the bread basket of the world again. It was a sad time for share croppers back then, from the Great Depression to the Dust Bowl but our ancestors persevered through the Great Depression, the Dust Bowl and WWII and six years later, Korea. If it happens again we won't survive, the Greatest Generation is all but gone, no one left to pull this country through.....IMO.

[updraught]

My guess is the introduction of the tractor enabled much more plowing than previously.
You must of had drought before the 1930's without the same impact?

"Henry Ford, who had tinkered with steam and gasoline tractors prior to achieving his success with automobile production, introduced a small, inexpensive model which he called the Fordson during the World War I. This model sold well for several years, aided considerably by a war-caused shortage of horses. After a post-war crash in farm prices drastically reduced sales in 1920-21, Ford initiated a price war in 1922 by cutting the price of its Fordson from $625 to $395. Alone of the large competitors, International Harvester matched Ford’s price, and sales boomed for those two firms throughout the rest of the 1920s. Ford’s production of tractors were always a sidelight to his main business of manufacturing automobiles, however, and when the Fordson production lines were needed for the critical Model-A launch in 1928, Ford decided to leave the tractor business."
from: https://eh.net/encyclopedia/economic...united-states/

[modelAtony]

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It was found that the govt was trying to get western farmers to grow more crops and clear and plow the land . What happen is they didn't realize that the prairie land need the special grass and what not to hold it together. Nothing was left to hold the top soil. Modern govt agriculture ideas brought on the dust bowl with a little help from MOTHER NATURE. Have fun modelAtony tony white Lafayette, LA

[newshirt]

+1 for The Worst Hard Time. But once you read it, it will affect you deeply and never leave you. People lost decades of their lives, and the depiction in that book will quite likely disturb you. Hard stuff.

I had dinner with Millard Fowler in Boise City and asked him about Model A's. He said there were 25' drifts of sand, and some cars and tractors were buried, but they dug them all out. He offered to show me the drifts, which he said are still there. He has some Model A survivors in his museum in Boise City.

I tried to organize an 80th anniversary Dust Bowl tour to Boise City in 2014, but got no takers. I'm not a very influential promoter, and the idea of reliving one of the worst natural disasters in American history evidently did not appeal to many. But I'll drive down there again some year because I like that sort of thing. I just hope I can spend some time with Millard and his son again before he passes.

http://www.pbs.org/kenburns/dustbowl...illard-fowler/

[Ted Duke]

Government

[31 Model A]

Originally Posted by newshirt

+1 for The Worst Hard Time. But once you read it, it will affect you deeply and never leave you. People lost decades of their lives, and the depiction in that book will quite likely disturb you. Hard stuff.

I had dinner with Millard Fowler in Boise City and asked him about Model A's. He said there were 25' drifts of sand, and some cars and tractors were buried, but they dug them all out. He offered to show me the drifts, which he said are still there. He has some Model A survivors in his museum in Boise City.

I tried to organize an 80th anniversary Dust Bowl tour to Boise City in 2014, but got no takers. I'm not a very influential promoter, and the idea of reliving one of the worst natural disasters in American history evidently did not appeal to many. But I'll drive down there again some year because I like that sort of thing. I just hope I can spend some time with Millard and his son again before he passes.

http://www.pbs.org/kenburns/dustbowl...illard-fowler/

Fantastic link...thanks, will give me some great reading.

[2manycars]

Originally Posted by updraught

My guess is the introduction of the tractor enabled much more plowing than previously.
You must of had drought before the 1930's without the same impact?

"Henry Ford, who had tinkered with steam and gasoline tractors prior to achieving his success with automobile production, introduced a small, inexpensive model which he called the Fordson during the World War I. This model sold well for several years, aided considerably by a war-caused shortage of horses. After a post-war crash in farm prices drastically reduced sales in 1920-21, Ford initiated a price war in 1922 by cutting the price of its Fordson from $625 to $395. Alone of the large competitors, International Harvester matched Ford’s price, and sales boomed for those two firms throughout the rest of the 1920s. Ford’s production of tractors were always a sidelight to his main business of manufacturing automobiles, however, and when the Fordson production lines were needed for the critical Model-A launch in 1928, Ford decided to leave the tractor business."
from: https://eh.net/encyclopedia/economic...united-states/

Ford did not leave the tractor business. He had an agreement with Ferguson who invented the 3 point hitch, and made the 9N in 1939, the 2N in 1942, and the 8N in 1948, and then a whole string of tractors up until recently when New Holland bought the Ford tractor line. My son has a Ford 9600 that he uses on the farm.

[mhsprecher]

It is an interesting story. Charlie Sorensen talks about the "deal" with Ferguson in his book.

I thought that Ford bought New Holland. Did they later spin off New Holland and the tractor business, too?

[DougVieyra]

While it is true that much of the Dust Bowl blew soil Eastward (at times covering New York City), additionally, and of great impact, the Dust Bowl also blew a mass of humanity Westward, into California and Oregon. "Them Damn Oakies flooded the Central Valley like locus (sp?)."

Definition of "Oakie" : anyone who left the central plains of the "Dust Bowl" during the 1930's. An "Oakie" could have come from Kansas, Texas, Oklahoma and other parts of the "Plains Region".

My own "Oakie" mother and her family came from the Pan handle of Texas in 1936, settling (like some many others) in California's great Central Valley. There they experienced and did all the things that John Steinbeck said they did.

My Mother's family came to California in a 1929 Ford Townsedan. Later, their 1928 Ford Touring Car, which had been left behind, eventually made it to California as well. I still have and drive that 1928 Touring car today. While it was not covered in dust (well, not too much anyway) as it was parked in a barn, it too (like the rest of the family) can be called a "Dust Bowl Refugee".

[40 Deluxe]

Originally Posted by modelAtony

It was found that the govt was trying to get western farmers to grow more crops and clear and plow the land . What happen is they didn't realize that the prairie land need the special grass and what not to hold it together. Nothing was left to hold the top soil. Modern govt agriculture ideas brought on the dust bowl with a little help from MOTHER NATURE. Have fun modelAtony tony white Lafayette, LA

In fact, one so-called expert official came up with the idea that "The rain follows the plow", thus promoting the Dust Bowl debacle! Wonder what scientific proof he had for that idea!

[40 Deluxe]

Originally Posted by 2manycars

Ford did not leave the tractor business. He had an agreement with Ferguson who invented the 3 point hitch, and made the 9N in 1939, the 2N in 1942, and the 8N in 1948, and then a whole string of tractors up until recently when New Holland bought the Ford tractor line. My son has a Ford 9600 that he uses on the farm.

In fact, he did not stop making the original Fordson. He moved production to Ireland and the same tractor with some updating was built until the late '40's, at least. He even imported them from Ireland back to the US for a few years, before the 9N came out. I have seen Made in Ireland Fordsons at farm sales.

[2manycars]

Originally Posted by 40 Deluxe

In fact, he did not stop making the original Fordson. He moved production to Ireland and the same tractor with some updating was built until the late '40's, at least. He even imported them from Ireland back to the US for a few years, before the 9N came out. I have seen Made in Ireland Fordsons at farm sales.

Yes, and I think the Irish Fordsons had high tention magnetos, in place of the model T mag.
There are a lot of Fordson Majors still running in Britain.

[Steve Plucker]

Originally Posted by 2manycars

Yes, and I think the Irish Fordsons had high tention magnetos, in place of the model T mag.
There are a lot of Fordson Majors still running in Britain.

I know of 4-5 in this area...should go buy one.

Pluck

[Hoogah]

The Ken Burns Dustbowl series was run on television here a year or two ago. It is compelling viewing, with many firsthand interviews and original footage.

https://itunes.apple.com/us/tv-seaso...wl/id566368963

I have had a strong fascination with that era since studying Steinbeck's "The Grapes of Wrath" at school. It has never left me. Owning a Model A is a connection to the era and that event, as is the music of people like Woody Guthrie (reprised for the more modern ear by Ry Cooder).

My other car is a '28 Nash. While trawling around the web a few years ago, I came across this fascinating story of Brian McKay who preserved his 1930 Nash 450 as a dustbowl refugee car c.1937 and drove it westwards to California in 2004, recreating the journey of the original refugees.

http://www.nashcarclub.org/b_mckay.html

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dwvm5kgvu-s

I had one brief email exchange with Brian before he died of cancer in 2010. The car survives in a museum in Calgary CANADA.

[Patrick L.]

Mother Nature hick-cupped, as she often does in certain locations, and turned off the water in about 1929-30 and did not turn it back on again until 1939.
That, plus, poor agriculture practices of the time attributed to the dust bowl years.


Ford did continue to build tractors [ good tractors] for many years after the Model A.

[CarlG]

Sears built these using "used" Model A parts:

[pj's junkers]

I remember in the early to middle 50's we would still get dust storms from Texas. They would roll in like red tidal waves and we would run to close all the windows before they would hit