pastures full of trailers

My husband and I drive a lot, and I do mean a lot.  We have 2 children in Oregon, 1 in CA,  a cabin in WA and we like to spend winters in the Newport beach area of CA, so we know all the back roads up and down the whole west coast.  Plus, we love to camp.  We could pull our teardrop off-road, so off we'd go.  Since becoming a canned ham owner a year ago, and then obtaining the Boles in February of this year, we keep our eyes peeled for those forlorn trailers parked in pastures, next to barns or old houses.  There are HUNDREDS.  I'm sure the owners would be glad to get rid of them for free or just a few pennies.  We see real classics, collector's dreams for sure.

 I could never figure out why many of these farm families would buy a trailer in the first place.  They work on their equipment most of the winter, the kids are in school, and in the summers they put in long days harvesting, so exactly when did they use these things?  The answer I think, is, they didn't.  Maybe once.  Then it got parked and forgotten...just like our Boles.  Or, just like this Aero Flight shown here.

The trailer ads in the magazines were too tempting, and after all, if you had a nine to five job in suburbia, and the kids are off for the summer having a trailer was a dream.  But, not if you are a farmer.  So, I'm not sure how to go about starting a trailer adoption business, but it would be easy to gps the location of all these diamonds in the rough as we drive along, post it and hope that all the restorers and collectors would go out and gather them in.  Just think how the trailer rallies would grow!  Not to mention how the many companies, like VTS who supply the missing parts, would benefit.  A real stimulus package if you ask me!

p.s.  Hwy. 395 north of Reno to the OR border is full of them.  Look to your right driving north.  

Reflections on 1955

Reflections on the year 1955:

The year our Boles Aero was built, I was 5, my husband was 10.  The American culture, in ten years,  had shifted from the high energy, gritty determination and angst of WWII to a calm, mellow and “cool” suburban lifestyle.  Gone was the fast beat and rat-a-tat-tat of the swing era music, in its place stepped Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Perry Como and Andy Williams crooning to our parents while they had their 5 p.m. martini, lounging in their Eames style chairs in the livingroom listening to the hi-fi.  Some of the chart toppers included "Mr. Sandman", "Sincerely" by the McGuire Sisters, "The Yellow Rose of Texas" by Mitch Miller and "Love is a Many Splendored Thing".  Had my husband and I been a bit older, we would have been spinning "Rock Around the Clock" by Bill Halley and the Comets.  Lawrence Welk and champagne bubbles were prime time t.v. fare as was "The Honeymooners", "The $64,000 Question" and the Johnny Carson show.  As kids, Mike and I were watching the Mickey Mouse Club, and Commando Cody.  

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Home life was modernizing quickly, and housewives had more time to take trips to the beauty parlor, cook recipes using the newest ingredients on the store shelves like Velveeta cheese,  and decorating their homes in the new modern look.  No more victory gardens, give me a new t.v. dinner, served on modern t.v. trays in front of the t.v. for an extra treat.

  

The aircraft industry of the war had matured into the rocket industry and the space age was becoming the wave of the future.   The “House of Tomorrow” at Disneyland propelled us away from the overstuffed, dark, clunky furnishings of our grandparents and into the sleek and modern.  Even the cars sported fins that gave them a look of going fast just sitting in the driveway.  I lived in a house in Palo Alto that was an "Eichler" clone.  If you don't know what an Eichler was, google it.  It had a flat roof, floor to ceiling windows to bring in lots of light, a quarry tile floor (no more heavy Persian rugs), a big patio for outside summer living and an outside BBQ.  This style of home was tantalizingly chic.  No more Craftsman style for us!  Our furniture was Danish modern, lots of teak and sleek.  Plastic and Formica were introduced, and kitchen appliances were now available in pink, yellow or turquoise.  (Have you seen these colors in the stoves in the old "canned ham" trailers?

Parents had time off from work now for actual vacations.  The plethora of travel trailers made the camping and trailer experience one that every family wanted to try.  But, they wanted to take along their new, modern house, albeit in smaller form, to the lake.  Hence, the Boles Aero Ensenada.  You could still have your formica kitchen and table, upholstered sofas, twin beds, and flush toilet....all in a rustic setting.  What a deal!

Pictures from the 1950’s of travel trailers and the families that pulled them hither and yon with the Nomad station wagon, or Ford “woodie”,  showed mom, decked out in pedal pushers, an ironed blouse, a smart bandana tied around her neck, earrings and a nice hairdo.  Dad had on pleated trousers, an ironed shirt (a tad more casual than a business shirt, but not by much) and a hat.  Usually he had a pipe in his mouth, to look really suburban and more like “Father knows Best”.  They sat in nice camping chairs alongside the trailer, while junior and little Debbie played contentedly nearby.  A fishing pole was usually propped against the tree.  No wonder trailers were flying off the trailer lots.  Who wouldn’t want to live like that for 2 weeks or so. 

And so today, our generation, who were junior and little Debbie, want to re-live that magical time, when life was simpler, more predictable and our parent’s choices of coffee in the percolator were either Maxwell or Folgers (not a soy, skinny, double shot, de-caf latte, with a shot of caramel), our bread was wheat or white, our lettuce was iceberg, our cereal was Wheaties, our milk was always whole and homogenized and delivered by the milkman.  We lived for a tootsie roll and a Marvel comic to read.  We played outdoors and made forts or played with dolls, and dreamed of being a fireman or a nurse.  

So, if you see us now, daydreaming in our vintage lawn chairs, under the vintage awning of our vintage trailer, cooking in our vintage kitchen, eating on our vintage formica table, you will know why.  We are livng the good life once again.

Here is the finished project

Project completed

Yup, it is all done.  It sat at the truck shop for a few days, got the axle raised, new rims, hubcaps and tires, a new jack hitch, an anti-sway bar, heavier hook up chains, and when I pulled it home to the body shop the hitch got painted black, and I painted the propane tanks a nice grey.
We are looking forward to our first trip with it to the vintage trailer rally at Lake Tahoe in Sept.

All in all, it wasn't too bad of a project.  There may be a few things we will decide to do later....Lori is really thinking she can't live without a water holding tank under the kitchen sink, and we may decide to polish out the window frames to get rid of the black pitting.

After staying in it for a few days, there are always things you find that you want to tweek, so my next posts will probably be about that.  Until then, the trailer is tucked away in a covered storage area, safe and sound.

A free trailer?

Well, free is not really free.  Actually the $ started flowing into the aluminum piggy bank before it even left the barn.  Right now I'm at 8 clicks and some C notes.  Mostly in the tires/rims/hitch/welding/upgrade stuff.
The new mattresses and awning were a click in themselves.  Now, I'm thinking of getting a restored, big engine 1955 Chevy or Ford p.u. to pull the piggy bank with.  Lots for sale.  Red would be nice...("feed the pig" as the ad on the radio encouraging us to SAVE our money says...ha ha.)

Like chickens on a junebug

Well, the Boles has been down at a truck/r.v. business for a few days getting the axle work done, the new steps welded on, and I am replacing the split rims with new ones and running the tires I bought on the new ones,but I will change them out to tubeless.  I will use one of the split rims for a spare.  While the trailer was down there, next to the busy thoroughfare, so many people stopped in to look at it, the poor guy could hardly get any work done.  Thankfully, I had locked it up and had the curtains all down, or it would have been worse.  They were just hanging out looking at the OUTSIDE.  He had to relate the barn find story to all the lookie loos.  Meanwhile, back at the ranch, I'm chomping at the bit waiting to get the trailer back so I can haul it to the body shop and have the hitch painted.  It definitely attracts attention.
Trying to get our "business" cards done with a pix of the Boles on it, but they photo-shopped off the hitch in the pix, so it looks like it will tip forward.  I told them to re-do them.
Found CHEAP insurance thru the Good Sam club's affiliation with GMAC.  Anyone out there had any experience with them?  They couldn't give me a $ value on the trailer (neither could I) or what they would pay me if it got smashed up.  Said they'd check 5 states to see what other ones were worth (yeah, right...good luck with that!).  But, for $55/yr. I guess I'm not out too much.
The wife is still shopping for 50's patio furniture....I can envision getting hauled into every farm sale from here to WA.  Geez, what have I gotten myself into?

My wife is going overboard

Yup, it was only a matter of time.  First it was collecting the 50's stuff from antique stores and thrift stores to "decorate" the trailer with.  Then having me make an "easel" shaped coffee table for our outside patio area when parked at vintage trailer rallies (as in..."all the other trailers have full patios furnished with year-appropriate stuff, so we are going to do it too") That is only the  FIRST item of many needed for the patio "decor" (you can see where this is heading).  Then, I hear her in there sewing up 50's outfits.  I put my foot down though.  I WILL NOT, I repeat WILL NOT be caught dead wearing suit slacks, a white button shirt and skinny tie and 50's hat to these things (remind you of your grand dad?) I guess because the trailer was already complete inside, with the upholstery and curtains all original, she was feeling a little cheated on doing up the inside in a big way.

By the way, the awning we ordered from Vintage Trailer Supply, (my new best friend), fit great, looks great and other than being way more than I had hoped to invest in such a thing (how about one lousy umbrella and call it good?) will look nice and packs up small enough to fit in the hatch under the beds.

So folks, if you see me wandering around the next rally, dressed like your dad or granddad, just offer me a really stiff martini.