When I encountered this almost pristine ’71 F250 on a walk, I was instantly taken back to Towson in the fall of 1970 when I drove one identical to this, right down to the red paint. It was the first pickup I ever drove, and like most firsts, it left a lasting impression, right down to the details.
As you all probably know, I got a job that fall as a lot boy at Towson Ford. It was the perfect job for a car-crazy kid with a newish driver’s license. I hopped a school bus from Towson High to a couple of blocks away, crossed York Road and stoked my voracious metabolism with my fourth meal of the day at a little greasy spoon right next door, where the McDonald’s is in this later picture. The Greek guy that ran it knew what I was going to get as soon as I walked in: a couple of fried egg sandwiches wrapped in wax paper. Quick and cheap, to get me through until supper.
Having inhaled them, I walked next door and checked in. And on this particular afternoon, I rode with the new car prep manager out York Road quite a ways, to Cockeysville, where they had their distant storage lot. My assignment was to drive back a red F250, which had been sold and was to get prepped for delivery.
I got in and noticed that it had a four speed stick shift. I also noted on its sticker that it had the optional 360 CID FE V8, which was rated at 215 gross hp. It turned out that the majority of F-series I would drive that fall and winter came with that engine. The base standard engine was the 240 six, and the bigger 300 six was the first optional step up. But by 1971, buyers were starting to substantially favor huskier V8s in their pickups, thanks to strong incomes and cheap gas. The 390 was also available.
According to my Standard Catalog of American Light Duty Trucks, 86% of 1971 light duty (1/2 ton through 1 ton) F-Series had a V8, and 43.7 had an automatic. 57.6% had an AM radio, 35.3% had power steering, 25.6 had tinted glass, 42.4% had power brakes, and 9.7% had air conditioning. The one I drove that afternoon had just the V8, AM radio and power steering.
The 360 started up with that distinctive muted but husky FE sound. I used first gear to take off, and quickly realized that was highly unnecessary. It’s strictly for hard pulling from a start; these F250s weighed only some 3800 lbs or so, and the torque-rich 360 could have probably been started in any gear with a bit of clutch finessing. But second was of course the obvious choice.
I was on my own on the way home, which allowed me a bit of red light acceleration trials on York Road. Not exactly in the same league as the 350 HO Mustang I drove there too. For that matter, the light and lithe 2.0 L Pinto could probably shut it down. But it was fast enough for me to make myself a nuisance (and menace) on York Road. Shifting that big heavy stick coming straight out of the gearbox was a new experience, one I rather liked despite it hardly being a quick-shifting thing.
I soon learned that empty pickups will very happily lock their back wheels upon even moderately-vigorous braking. That resulted in a few hairy moments on rain-slicked down grades with a red light at the bottom. Fortunately I managed to not rear end anyone. But feeling that tail want to come around resulted in some vigorous counter-steering to stay in my lane.
Handling? York Road was straight the whole way. I did drive one to the body shop once, and that route was very curvaceous. A stiffly-sprung F250 was actually more fun than a wallowing LTD, which is saying something.
It was my first liberal introduction to all things trucks, and I relished that.
Only a few weeks later that I noticed a big red F-600 cab-chassis when I came to work after school. A salesman walked back into the new car prep bays and asked if anyone knew how to drive a truck. Without hesitation, I said Yes! The cab looked just like an F250. How hard could it be?
The salesman imparted his minimalist directions: “follow me”. I had no idea where we were going or what I was doing. I climbed up into the cab. Man, everything sure looked small from way up there. I started up the V8, probably another 360, and found the first of ten gears (a five speed and two speed axle), and released the heavy clutch as I pulled into York Road again. Once again, I had picked a much too low of a gear. Second was more like it, although third would have worked too, given its empty chassis. The first order of business: keep the big rig in my lane while sorting out the gears. Once I figured out how to stop locking the unloaded rear wheels with the grabby brakes, people stopped staring at me.
The dealership was just a few blocks off the Beltway, and our route included that and the very curvy Jones Falls Expressway, which dumped us in the heart of downtown Baltimore, where its future bed awaited it at an industrial building. I sweated bullets keeping up with him on the freeway. I had no idea where we were supposed to be going. Just stay on his ’71 LTD tail, but don’t compress it. It was another rite of passage. I was a truck driver!
That red F250 was of course just the first of many new Ford pickups and vans that I would drive that fall and winter, before I abruptly quit and hitchhiked out to Iowa, where a year or so later I got a job driving the biggest Ford Super Duty dump trucks made. They were even red too.
Given all the brutally hard loads I’ve subjected my ’66 F100 to, I really would have been better off with an F250 like this, although I’d have it with the 300 six, thank you. But I didn’t, and it’s still survived, although it’s hardly in the shape as this one, which looks almost new. Where has this thing been the last 50 years? In a garage? Lost in the back storage lot of a dealer?
So what was your first experience like driving a pickup?
In absolute terms it was an early 1970s Datsun that had been beat to Hell by it then owner. I didn’t even have a drivers license at the time but the truck had a manual transmission and I wanted to learn how to drive a stick. My own second car, which might be called a truck by some, was a 1971 El Camino with a “massaged” 350 V8 and Hydramatic. When I realized how dangerous an uneconomical that vehicle was I sold it and found a 1970 Blazer; 307 V8, 3-on-the-tree, and 2WD! It was a hoot to take the top off and go to the beach with too many friends and a few ice chests packed in the cargo area.
I did my first serious work on a car when the timing gear on the 307 shed its nylon teeth and 10 push rods and six valves where bent. When it was put back together it ran very well.
I was about a year younger than you were then, 15 with a learner’s permit, when my uncle let me drive his new GMT400 optioned-up GMC Sierra pickup on a dirt road leading to his hunting camp. It was by far both the biggest vehicle and the worst road I had driven on to date but I managed to keep it moving in a straight line for a quarter mile or so of him egging me on to go faster!
We used to heat with wood. Dad would fall the trees and cut them into rounds. My job was to move them, then split and stack them. So, there were a few days I would be left the keys to his ’68 D-200. It was equipped with a 383 and a granny low 4 speed. It also had limited slip. Someone had replaced all the gauges with Smith Warner units. I remember loading it with a full cord would barely soften the ride.
I liked fried egg sandwiches,too. Especially with a dab of hot sauce.
I had a similar job…car jockey at Budget Rent a Car here in Vancouver, BC. They had new fairly loaded Chevrolet pickups. The brand new 1973 models were a very nice driving truck. They also had some 71 and 72 Fords with 360 V8 and 4 speeds but no power steering so they were a real bear to drive especially downtown in heavy traffic.
The first car I ever drove was an old MG on a church campout at one of the adult member’s farm. I was maybe 13 at the time.
First truck was my Dad’s ’69 F-100, which would later become my own and in which both my sons learned to drive.
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/curbside-classics-american/coal-requiem-for-a-truck/
First truck I drove was a friends ’69 F-100 Ranger long bed. It had a 360, and a three-on-the-tree. Sharp looking truck, and a blast to drive.
A late 60’s Chevy with a stick. Funny how big that F20 stick looks now – like something on a bus!
The thing I loved the most about pickups from this era was that they were no-nonsense work vehicles with a minimum of extra stuff. You were happy then if the AM radio worked without too much buzzing. You’re correct; driving it was a rite of passage, and not just into truck driving. I felt like a grown – up male for the first time in my life.
My wife keeps asking me when I’m going to break down and buy a truck. I tell her – when I find one form the 60’s that’s not totally beat or that costs a fortune. Today’s trucks are like luxury cars with beds that should never see a load of stone, as far as I’m concerned.
Whoops! “F250 stick” “from the 60’s”
Interesting to note then the F-series dropped the horn ring sterring for ’71. 1970 was the last model year for the horn ring in the F-series.
http://www.oldcarbrochures.org/United%20States/Ford%20Motor%20Company%20Trucks-Vans/1970_Trucks-Vans/1970-Ford-Pickups-Brochure/index.html
Btw, it’s interesting to note they re-used some 1970 photos like the Crew Cab one and with air brushing to transform them into 1971 models. http://www.oldcarbrochures.org/United%20States/Ford%20Motor%20Company%20Trucks-Vans/1971_Trucks-Vans/1971_Ford_Pickup_Brochure/index.html
Btw, it might be worth to do a blog post about the Brazilian Ford F-1000, a pick-up based on the 1967-72 Ford pick-up who soldiered to the mid-1990s.
https://www.ford-trucks.com/articles/bizarre-brazilian-ford-trucks/
A late 70s Chevy C10.
Orange with a oil-burning motor and a bent frame.
I was 14 and it was a farm truck I drove over grass and through the woods. It was fun.
A couple of the years around 1980 I worked for U-Haul and although i worked in the back office keeping track of dealer inventory in two states, occasionally the let me out to transfer trucks all over New Hampshire and Vermont and sometimes the rest of New England and New York. I love to work the gears. Standard transmission is the first requirement for every car I have owned. Which is getting harder to find. You have to settle for small and basic, which is not such a bad thing. I never really learned to drive an automatic, cause i’d just fall asleep.
If a Chevrolet Suburban Carryall counts as a truck, then my first was one of those, in 1970, part of a fleet in a healthcare operation with which I was affiliated, and where I drove a GM Fishbowl bus that summer. It was a hand-me-down to the troops after the Director got himself a new one. It basically drove like a big car and had a 350, Turbo Hydramatic, power everything, an AM-FM radio and air conditioning.
If it has to NOT be what is now an SUV, the first truck was a Toyota pickup, rented for a few hours to haul stuff to the dump. Manual transmission, the only option a radio. And it was brand new, I was it’s first renter. I made sure to clean up the bed after the trips to the dump!
In the early 1990s I was about 19 or 20, and a friend of mine (who at that time drove a c. 1980 Pontiac Bonneville) decided he wanted to buy a pickup. He found an ad for a 1987 or so F150 in a rural area near where we lived in North Carolina, but it had a manual transmission, and he couldn’t drive a stick shift. So he asked me if I’d come along and drive it for him.
Of course I was glad to – especially since I’d never driven a pickup before. From what I recall it was a fairly well-optioned, two-tone XLT – I loved driving it, especially with the long gearshift that was unlike anything I’d driven before. I vowed that someday I’d buy a pickup too… well, here we are 30 years later and I still haven’t.
My friend didn’t buy that particular truck, but instead he bought a new, stripped-down F150. I drove that one too, and liked it as well.
First truck I drove was the one I bought in 76. The 74 Audi Fox I had since new was relegated to more light duty, like dating and other things which required pulling up in something other than a pickup.
The first truck I remember driving was an older f150 with a 3 speed owned by a friend of my fathers. It knocked my jaunty 14 year old self esteem down a couple of hundred notches, as I couldn’t quite master its worn out shifter, syncros, and touchy throttle. The shame lingers 30 plus years on!
In the summer of 1975 I had an outdoor labor job where I put in quite a few miles behind the wheel of a similar vintage F100. Six cylinder, 3 on the tree, AM radio and not much else. Certainly no power steering or air conditioning. Not sure if it was a 240 or 300, but it got moving pretty well unloaded and managed to haul some pretty serious loads too. Great memories.
Strictly speaking it was a wrecker converted from a pickup. It looked similar to the photo, but was orange. I was a 13 year old kid helping local adults set poles on a nearby hill to make a rope tow for winter skiing. The Shell station owner donated the services of his wrecker to help raise the poles. I got to move the wrecker from pole to pole. Strictly off the road. Never even got to change gears, but I did move it without stalling the engine. The wrecker was in low range and would only go like 2 mph. Probably would have been impossible to stall, but I didn’t know that at the time. I considered myself a master of the clutch after that experience. When I was a little older, I got to drive the family Rambler. It was only then I realized I wasn’t quite as proficient with the clutch as my experience with the FC Jeep had me believe.
To put this celebration of American car culture into perspective, I am 70 now and since 1968 I’ve owned many very different cars (Fiats, Renaults, VWs, Citroens, Hondas, Saabs, you name it) but I’ve never ever been in a pickup, not even on the passenger seat.
You see, I live in the Netherlands. Even today on the rural roads around my home village, I won’t very often encounter a pickup. Nearly all private drivers over here drive hatchbacks or SUVs (sadly, often wannabe-SUVs) nowadays. And all the professionals who need to haul things on a daily basis, well as a rule they use closed vans.
I can think of various reasons why the pickup body style (fullsize American, or smaller Euro variants) has never become popular here. One of those reasons might be the rainy climate, which can make it very unpractical to haul your load in an open uncovered bed.
To check if this theory is part of the explanation, let me ask a question: in the USA, are pickups clearly less popular in those regions where it rains a lot?
In my experience the only places where pickups are not popular are the congested inner core of large cities, where off-street parking is scarce and theft from an open bed is tempting.
I’ve owned a few pickups and two vans. Have one of each now. I think there’s a lot about pickups that reflects the local society and culture. Between 1996 and 2011 I traveled for business a fair amount, mostly in urban parts of Asia. China, Japan, Taiwan? Lots of vans, a few open bed trucks that were all small cabover (van platform). Hardly any pickups, though a Taiwanese friend of mine recently replaced his Mazda MPV with a Ranger. Thailand? Lots of conventional pickups. And it rains a lot in all those countries. In Europe, I remember seeing more pickups in mountainous rural areas in Switzerland, north of England, the Appenines in Northern Italy. Not sure that local conditions are that different so I chalk it up to other, less tangible factors.
Pickups are definitely popular here in WEsTern Wa and WEsTern Oregon where some people say the rainy season starts Sep 1st and ends August 15st. Many do have Canopies or bed covers of some sort but many don’t.
Personally I’ve got more time with an open bed as I often use my truck for things like gravel or dirt (which is dumped in by a front end loader), hauling various things to the recycle center/dump/transfer station. So things that don’t matter if they get wet and/or would be difficult to load w/o an open bed.
My current F-250 has a canopy that I had every intention of removing when I purchased it. It is work style canopy with shelves inside the driver’s side door and I found that set up so useful that when I can across a good deal on a F-150 that didn’t have a canopy I picked it up to have an open bed pickup. Yes it makes no sense and in hindsight the 1/2 ton should be the crew cab with a canopy and the 3/4 ton should be the super cab w/o a canopy.
My grandfather owned a 1969 F-250 (dark green with white grille) that I nicknamed, “The Bonerattler”, for its bouncy ride and beat-up condition. (Gramps was a retired cement/concrete man and this was his first ‘retirement’ truck. Around 1979-80 or so, at the age of 14, he would let me drive it around the house, acre yard, and neighborhood.
During these years, the truck was used to haul everything from scrap wood, building debris, manure for his garden, grapes to make wine with, dirt, bricks, firewood, lawn mowers, etc. It was used to move 2 households in 1979. The bed was well-scared, down to mostly bare metal by the end, lots of dents. Gramps had installed (possibly taken from a previous truck and resused, painted-a-not-very-well-matched-shade-of-green), tool boxes along the top of one side of the bed wall, complete with hinged doors secured by chains and cotter-pin-type-things. Which meant that you listened to a chorus of chains rattling over every bump, hence it’s name.
It had the standard 240 Six and the 4 speed manual. Very few options, just the AM radio I believe. Black rubber floor, black vinyl bench seat, long gear shift lever with the screw on/off shift knob, in which I used to delight in taking on and off. I recall it had tall but narrow tires and did not have very good traction in the snow at all. But it did have a nice ‘groaning’ sound when starting off in 2nd gear. I even purchased a custom-printed front license plate for it that said, of course, :The Bonerattler.
Unfortunately, the Bonerattler was sold a year or so before I turned 16 and I never was able to legitimately drive it on the road. It was a sad ending. He also got rid of a 1967 Chevy Malibu and a 1972 Cadillac Sedan Deville, all around this same year in my memory. I went from having 3 possible rides when I was licensed to zero. But those were the days when cars were considered “old” at about 5 years, at least according to my father. There was no way young Jose was going to drive a beater around and park it on HIS driveway.
First truck I drove was probably my uncle’s farm truck. Mid 70’s Chevy 1 ton dually flatbed with a 454 4 speed. I was pre-warned to start in 2nd.
First truck I drove a lot was the 1982 Nissan pickup which was the delivery truck for my summer job. 2wd long bed with a manual. I recall it being pretty hot and cramped in the cab.
Pretty big difference between the two of them!
First truck I ever drove was a 1980s Scania 93.
First truck I rode in was a Ford A Series recovery truck after my dad fell asleep at the wheel of our Fiat 126.
First pickup I drove or rode in would be a brand new Mazda, Ford Ranger, Isuzu or Great Wall and the first genuine “ute” I drove was one of those ugly double cab Holden Commodore based things – it was my housemate’s
“company car”.
I have fond childhood memories of Mini pickups and the Peugeot 504 the sheep shearers drove at my gran’s friends’ farm, but pickups weren’t much of a thing.
Mine was my grandmother’s ’78 Bronco. It was an unremarkable experience, except that the front end wandered. “You really have to steer it,” Grandma kept saying.
1969 Ford F250, 2WD, 360 V8, and a 3 on the tree. I learned how to drive in the winter in that thing.
My fathers ’48 Ford F1 farm truck which I drove in the field at 13 years old in 1970. It was a 3 speed and a 6 cylinder. This was a no option truck that didn’t even have turn signals. In order to pass inspection aftermarket turn signals were added just like those in the picture here (this is not our truck). The turn signal switch was basically hose clamped to the steering column. It was a red truck all patina’ed just like this one as well, unfortunately patina wasn’t cool in 1970.
At age 16 I had a summer job as a groundskeeper at a wealthy local businessman’s country estate. There was a full time caretaker who lived on the property, who in turn hired a couple of high school kids to do the grunt work. Our work truck was a 1988 Isuzu which I often drove on dump runs.
The following summer the owner of the estate decided to buy his caretaker a brand new truck — a probably 1997 Dodge Dakota with a V8. I drove that a couple of times, but the caretaker thought the V8 got such lousy mileage he actually went and bought back the Isuzu.
About 1978 I had a job at a place that kept a green Ford pickup for utility duty and for plowing in the winter. I think it was a 69-70, and painted that non-metallic gray-green that was on a lot of Ford trucks at the time. It was probably an F-250 and I know it had a stout V8 and a 4 speed stick. It was a low trim truck that mostly sat parked, but I was assigned to go get gas in it or something one day, and loved the experience.
It was in great condition and I harbored ideas of trying to buy it from them – it had not seen much road use and the body was great. Then somebody stole it and that was that.
I have driven lots of vans, but I had to really think about the pickup.
The first truck I drove regularly was an 01 dodge 1500 with the 360. It drank gas and with a plow on the front it required extra attention in steering and braking. I learned how to plow without getting stuck and ruining the transmission (by doing both)
Later I upgraded to a 14 Silvy HD, that does not even feel the plow hanging off the front. I still have a tough time parking however.
I’m ready for something much bigger but that is still a couple years away.
Not sure if this really counts as a truck, but I when I got my learner’s permit in the early 80s, my grandpa let me drive his ’72 El Camino (only on Forest Service roads!). Otherwise, it the first “real” truck I drove would have been a late 70s Ford F-150 that had been raised into the stratosphere. Belonged to a coworker and I remember being afraid of running into little cars that I could barely see at the height the cab was.
Not technically a truck, but a mid 1980s Leyland Sherpa van.
Rolling backwards through the fence and into the kitchen garden of our neighbor across the street in a Hanomag-Henschel double cab flatbed, at the age of circa 5.
John O’Leary is correct on no sales to speak of of pickups in urban centers. When I was working for GMC Truck Center in Manhattan on Eleventh Avenue and 58th Street in the earl 1980’s we received a directive from the home office in Pontiac, Michigan to sell more pickups! We were a fleet sales office for one and even our retail sales of light duty trucks were principally work vans. Someone in Pontiac did not consider market needs. My first pickup that I drove as a ’67 International because I worked for the International Harvester Branch in Bridgeport, CT selling trucks. Most of our sales were for work with few frills. Tough trucks.
Mid ’70s Chevy pickup. Stripped of any options, it was two (or three) across, no crew cab, and just a basic bed. Must have been a small V8, I cannot be sure. Three speed transmission as best as I can recall.
I drove a lot of pickups around the storage yard at my Dad’s repo business at age 14; this was mainly moving them around to get cars in and out and keep the engines fresh. I learned how to park all kinds of vehicles that way—manuals and automatics, foreign and domestic, large and small.
The first pickup I drove on the road was a Mazda B2000, the yard truck (and later my personal steed) followed closely by an ’81 Ford F350 with a Holmes wrecker bed and orange gumballs on the roof. It had an engine built for pulling—I have no idea what it was, and doubt it was original to the truck—and it drank gasoline prodigiously. When we were between cars I’d drive that to and from school when Dad didn’t need it for any jobs (which usually happened at night in any case).
A few summers later I graduated up to an F350 with the 6.9 diesel—I got a summer job painting horse fence in Connecticut and our work truck was a dually stake body with a hydraulic lift on the back. As a dumb 17-year-old they had me driving this rig on I-84 out into polo country by myself, loaded with drums of paint and a spray rig with only vague directions written on the back of an envelope. It’s a miracle I did not wind up as a statistic of some kind. Going from a Mazda to that giant beast was a lesson in perspective: going from the bug on the sidewalk to the boot. That job mostly sucked but driving the lift rig was one of the highlights.
That summer’s other work truck was an absolutely clapped-out F250 of early 80’s vintage which did not have a single straight panel, was covered in fence paint, and sounded like someone was playing war drums inside a water tower. But it refused to die, even as the idiots I worked with got it stuck in muddy pastures; we’d saw the automatic transmission back and forth and rock it out of bogs like we were stuck in snowdrifts. Good times.
When I was growing up in the Vancouver area, my uncle had a farm nearby. The first truck I drove was his 1973-ish F350 Supercab – brown, four-speed manual with granny first, V8. I was only 14-ish but I got to drive it around the fields as it was loaded with hay bales to be stacked in the barn.
Dad’s 1970 F250 Crewcab 4x4around the yard and in the bush. 360 4speed and 2 speed transfer case. No power steering. The picture takes me back as the cab looks identical.
He had a talent for breaking engines through sheer abuse. SBCs, a Dodge 318, a Nissan V6 all met early deaths. But the FE engine stood up to anything he could throw at it.
During the summer between the first and second years of college, I worked for the department of public works of the suburban town where I had grown up. During the first week on the job, I was given the task of reading water meters throughout our sprawling jurisdiction and assigned a brand-new Chevrolet C-10 pickup to get around.
The truck was equipped with a three-speed floor mounted stick and six cylinder engine and I had never driven a manual before. After a quick demonstration on how to operate the clutch, my boss gave me 30 minutes to figure out how to shift through the gears before sending me on my way via the highway just outside the entrance to the equipment yard. After a few white-knuckle moments and one hair-raising stall and rolling backwards at a major intersection, I got the truck moving and was soon able to get up to top gear very quickly and smoothly. I am still not much of a truck guy, but must admit I had a lot of fun driving that truck all summer.
The first truck I drove was a Canadian army 3 ton Dodge. I was 15 and in the militia for the summer. Whoever was in charge ordered me to get in the driver’s seat and follow the convoy through downtown Ottawa. I had, of course extensive driving experience. I had driven my father’s somewhat rickety Jaguar saloon car (“It goes faster than that,” he said, “Step on it.” He was a pilot and I think he thought everything confined to the ground was slow.), and an old Canadian army jeep the week before the truck. As I said, extensive experience.
1959 Chev stepside. I put a 327 V8 in it shortly after I blew the 6 cylinder. That was in 1964.
Grandpa’s farm truck, a 1953 Chevy 3600 with three-on-the-tree. It had the upgraded cab with rear corner windows.
1985 Toyota 4×4 Pickup, brown, manual, with high miles belonging to a fraternity brother around 1990 or so, my own car was being repaired I think and I borrowed this to go somewhere. It was very bouncy, very slow, but curiously very fun. And unlike the case with current small (midsize) Toyota trucks, I recall fitting into this one.
My 76 Courier, summer 1983. Dad bought it for me for my summer job that year since work was 20 or so miles from home on back roads. Too far to bike and too far to ask my mom to drive me daily.
On the day he bought it, Dad came to my work to pick me up, moved to the passenger side and told me to drive it home. I’d never driven a stick before, and the first stop sign was uphill. I actually did ok with only one stall and one clenched cheek moment. I guess I had heard the sound of shifting enough as a kid and had played with the stick in my parent’s car (Vega wagon) as a young teen, before they traded it on a 77 Impala (right before I got my license, natch).
ETA it probably also helped that a couple summers earlier I got to drive a Schramm Pneumatractor when I worked for them, though tbf that had torque to start in high gear, no clutch finesse needed. (The Pneumatractor was unique in that it was a tractor with a 6 cylinder block, but three of the cylinders had a head that used them to create compressed air so you could skip bringing a separate compressor.)
Fist pickup I ever drove was my parents ’91 Ranger. I had the spare “credit card” keys for it and would sneak it out for a drive down the road after school before I had my license. It became my truck when I turned 16 and I still own it even though it hasn’t been run in about 18 years. When I relocate to a new house with (hopefully) a bigger garage, it’s on my list of top priorities to get going again.
My first old truck that I drove was my buddies’ first vehicle; a 1977 F-250. It was two tone green and powered by a 360 with a 4 speed. We had a lot of great adventures in that truck.
My high school wheels (thanks to my brother being away at college) was his 1960 Ford panel. “223 & 3 on the tree.” I first drove it on the road in 1982. He still has it.
I last drove it on the road in 2003 and was surprised at how difficult it was to maneuver that big steering wheeled, straight front axled, drum braked, heavy & grabby clutched vehicle with absolutely no rear visibility. I had become spoiled rotten…the shame still haunts me.
To be honest I’m not sure what the first truck I drove was. The first one that counts in my mind enough to remember was the 68-72 GMC 3/4 ton owned by the owner of the shop where I worked at the time. For whatever reason we needed an alternator or starter right then so the boss tossed me the keys to the truck and had me run over to the local rebuilder to get one. It had the small block, not sure of the displacement, and an automatic. The things I remember was that it was pretty strong off the line, probably due to the axle ratio and that man it was rough crossing the rail road tracks.
I’m sure I’d actually driven a truck before that but it would have been a customer’s vehicle from the parking lot to the shop and back to the lot or my roommate’s LUV out of the driveway on to the street so I could get my car out.
I never had driven a personal truck until I bought my 65 F100 in 2006. It was a beast at the time given how much needed to be straightened out on it like constantly having carb issues. The shot below is of it when I got it but it no longer looks like this as that is it’s wrong color as per the VIN.
Wait it just dawned on me I drove a 20ft. U-Haul truck first from the Bay Area to San Diego in 1973. Actually drove U-Haul trucks a total of four times before my F100 in 2006. Those of course had power steering, power disc brakes and A/C. Two of those were into and out of San Francisco so the power assist was greatly appreciated.
1st. was my rusted out 1959 Ford F100 in late 1967 or early 1869 after it had died and wasn’t wanted for farm duty anymore .
Like everyone’s first vehicle I loved it and spent many happy hours, days, weeks etc. finding pieces for it from other rusted out junkers in the flooded lower field most farms have where they leave the junk .
I don’t think the near pristine 1952 Willys M38A1 Jeep counts ? that thing was tough as nails but not really any sort of truck although we used it as one often .
Loving the collected stories and wisdom .
BTW : I also love the series of Fords in the very first picture ~ especially in that light green color, I still seem them in VGC around Los Angeles .
-Nate
First well I guess that would be the main vehicle I learned in and in todays lingo it is called a truck though in reality it was a 1966 Austin Gipsy 4×4 hardtop I did write about it,I was 12 First actual truck ie something designed to carry a load as its primary use was a jail bar Ford flathead V8 engine 4 speed crash box and four crushed cars on the back to the local dump 3 Chevrolets and one Austin, yes I remember when tri 5 Chevs were just rubbish these had been stripped of saleable parts mashed flat with a steel wheeled Fordson and were leaving to create space for more valuable wrecks I would have been 15 at that point and has a full licence. We could fit 10 flattened cars on the yard Austin a 6 ton device with a Gardiner diesel installed from a Grader but I wasnt allowed to drive that.
In the early ‘80’s (just after I got my license) my sister’s boyfriend let me drive his old Dodge D-200 Club Cab. Great old truck. I drove a couple of rental trucks for moving – one a Chevy C-30 that I returned to the rental place for a friend, and an F-350 U-Haul with a diesel that I used to move myself and a buddy from work into our respective apartments back in 1990. In 1992 I was looking for a truck. The first one I drove was a Dakota with a five speed. Not bad, but I wanted a stretched cab for a little more room, and that summer I ended up buying a ‘92 Nissan King Cab (4 banger with a 5 speed) that was originally the parts runner for the Nissan dealer I bought it from. Nice to drive and better on gas than the Dakota would have been, but the factory tires were no good in snow so I had to replace them with something a little better. The rear end also started to make a lot of noise about 4 months after I bought it. Luckily it was under warranty, so it didn’t cost me anything to fix – just the bus fare from the dealer to my work. I sold it in 1995 to a man who was going to ship it to Jamaica and use it down there – he said it was easier to buy a vehicle here and ship it down. I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s still running. Since then I’ve had a few trucks as rentals when they didn’t have the car I ordered, and I’ve driver several of my father-in-law’s trucks – a couple of F-150’s, an old beater Dodge, and a couple of GMC 3500 crew cabs with the Duramax. I always enjoy driving a truck, and some workers at our building have a nice new black F-150 crew cab. My wife and I both like it a lot…maybe we’ll bring one home one day.
I really like that old F-250, and I always liked the names Ford gave their old pickups. Sport Custom. Ranger. Ranger XLT. Explorer. They’re a rare sight here in Ontario for obvious reasons, and any on the road now likely came from BC or Florida…or maybe Oregon. If I had one I’d find ways to keep it busy…driving the back roads with that big old stick shift in the good weather. Winters it would be stored somewhere dry.
I’ve been zooming around the Mojave Desert for two days and now in California’s Central Valley, these old rigs are every where,many still in use as daily driver’s .
I spotted a few larger flat bed ones too, I wish I was allowed to post pictures here .
-Nate
I started small, the first pickup I rode in was a U-Haul based on a Ford Courier and the first one I drove was a Ford Ranger. My one experience with this generation Ford pickup was also a U-Haul, in this case a rather tired F350 dually with a 330 FE and a 4 speed which was an experience after the Rangers ultra slick 5 speed.
Then I worked at the rental yard and spent a lot of time in the two F350 diesels.
I really like the pictured F600 farm truck, the red paint would nicely complement my 2002 F150, which incidentally is my first full size truck and the largest vehicle I’ve ever owned.
The first truck I drove was a family friend who was a contractor’s ’68 Chevy Flatbed. It had the straight (250″?) six in it, with 5.13 or something close to that gears. Obviously, it couldn’t be driven on the highway at all. It had a great lunge off the line, but ran out of steam almost immediately. It got less than 10 MPG, and close to 5 all loaded up with bags of concrete or shingles, etc. Later on in it’s life, the six was replaced with a 400 small block V8 and the axle ratio was a sane 3.50. It died when my friend, who had bought it from his dad when he went out of the contracting business, fell asleep while taking his GF home one night and ran into a telephone pole. Other than being shook up, they weren’t hurt, but that was the end of the Chevy. The replacement, a ’77 Buick Regal, would become the first of his legendary, “drive them into dust” vehicles. The second would be my former ’88 S10 Blazer that was over 20 years old, and had taught all 3 of his sons to drive, before it was finally retired.
The second truck I ever drove was a ’76 Dodge Power Wagon, with a hopped up 440, built up Torqueflite, 3.92 gears, and some very noisy tires. It was the truck that got me wanting to truck badly enough to trade my much liked ’74 Roadrunner in for a truly awful ’77 Macho Power Wagon. POS doesn’t come close to telling you how bad that thing was.
That’s an interesting question. The first pickup truck I technically drove was my tech schools well used S-10. It was just getting it out of the garage for the annual “First Saturday of the new semester is fix your own car day” thing (Which I took advantage of).
As far as driving around in a Truck everyday, that would be the old crappy First-gen Chevy Colorado that Firestone used as a truck for picking up tires. That thing was terrible, and me being the unofficial “Shop bitch” (Not a technical term for what I did, but one I gave myself), I got stuck driving it quite a bit. Cheap rattling interior, bouncy washboard ride, A/C would go out quite a bit, brakes didn’t work right (Felt like I was almost about to lock them up a couple of times in panic stops), an engine that made no power and yet drank fuel like a full-size truck, it was terrible. Of course Firestone policy made it no better (Apparently, if your truck dies or is rendered unable to be used anymore, the branch itself has to pay for a new one out of pocket, the company will not provide you with a replacement), so it was clearly on it’s last legs constantly. Put me off driving pickups until I got a taste for a newer gen GMC Sierra crew-cab 1500 at my previous job. Night and day experience that made me start to warm up significantly on pickups as a whole. Now that I drive one, I guess it’s always fun to know how far you came from.