The Scout was the first competitor to the Jeep, reflecting the rising interest in off-road capable vehicles. But it was still early days; only the gnarly JC and the slightly-less so Jeep Wagon (and Pickup) were in the field at the time, and it’s not like sales were exploding, although Willys was growing and quite profitable, finally giving the Kaisers a happy solution to their travails with Kaiser-Frazer.
Who was going to be the first to jump into the market? Not the Big Three, yet. But International did, and that’s not too surprising given the popularity of their Travelall (available in 4×4) in the recreational market.
In a reflection of the times, the Scout that Car Life tested did not have four wheel drive. This may seem curious now, when just about every CUV has it, but back then 4WD was still seen as a rather expensive option for those situations where it was truly needed; high clearance vehicles with RWD were still the norm even in off-road settings.
CL starts by noting that the Scout was not just a “rehash of the old WW II Jeep”. Yes, by 1961, the Jeep, which had changed very little since the war, was beginning to look a wee bit old. Yes, the ride was better than the Jeep, but only so much, given the off-road capable stiff springs,
The 4.27:1 rear axle ratio was a bit short, but it did allow the Scout to hit 80 mph (when fully broken in), but a cruising speed on the highway of 65 was about as fast as one would normally want to push it.
The rather abbreviated off-road driving that was undertaken didn’t faze the Scout: “only a 4-wheel drive model could have exhibited any greater ‘go-anywhere’ ability.” It’s hard to argue with that logic. An unexpected desert storm did show a weakness: the Scout’s body leaked like a sieve.
Fuel economy was surprisingly good, with a range of 18-22 mpg. The 87 hp 152 cubic inch four was of course essentially one half of International’s 304 V8. “It is smoother than you might expect from a ‘4-barrel’ and delivers great gobs of torque at ridiculously low rpm”. (“4-barrel” was a common term for four cylinder engines before the widespread use of four-barrel carbs). CL seemed to find the acceleration (0-60 in 21.1 sec.) quite adequate for the intended purpose. The three-speed floor shifter required a fair bit of muscle power when rowing the gears.
The steering wasn’t light either, which “makes this a real man’s car. The ladies may think its cute but they aren’t going to think it’s fun after they’ve grunted it around the block a few times.” We’ve come a long way…
CL asks the rhetorical question as to who is going to buy the Scout. Obviously farmer, ranchers and certain fleet operators. “Well, we thought perhaps you might—and don’t look surpised. Outdoors is a big business in America today…Why? Because living in such close proximity to each other seems to be giving some of us sort of a…type of claustrophobia, and only getting out into the boondocks occasionally is going to cure it.” Yup! And the boom is still…booming.
CL asks you to picture yourself with a station wagon for the wife and a Scout for you, to drive to work during the week and then the wife and kids head off into the great outdoors.
One final observation: the tough looking Scout keeps folks from cutting one off. That alone might be worth it, right? Isn’t that one of the main reasons we all drive such big, tall vehicles now?
Related CC reading:
Curbside Classic: 1963 IH Scout 80 – The Advance (SUV) Scout
Nowadays, the question would be: Who would buy one with only RWD?
4wd is optional on many SUVs and CUVs. It isn’t even available on the Nissan Kicks. There’s a gag in the movie “M3GAN” where a character says, “It LOOKED like it had four wheel drive!”
This light truck was a noisy tough vehicle with the four-banger engine. Certainly not a cruiser but a good workhorse. I sold IH’s in the late 1960’s.
As Paul might attest from his off-roading adventures, 4WD isn’t really a necessity in much of the west, unless you want to get into some really serious stuff. And I can think of some edge case roads I’ve driven with two rutted tracks and a big rocky ridge in the middle, where having a “pumpkin” hanging down below your solid front axle would be a bad thing to smash on a rock.
It looks like the Scout is back, as the Ford Bronco.
The remains of IH (Navistar International) were bought by VW a couple years ago. They also own the intellectual property and naming rights. VW has already said it will produce an EV Scout in 2026.
Wow I just did a Google search on the EV Scout. I don’t know how I missed this! Apparently announced a few months ago. Lots of press and a few video teasers on this new Scout. I hope it works out for VW.
In snow country, 4wd helped you go. What it didn’t do was help you stop or steer.
Our regular wrecker driver – who was a bit contemptuous of 4wd – used tell anyone who’d listen that 4wd was only good for getting you stuck in conditions when you shouldn’t be driving.
Luckily our sales manager didn’t listen to him. When Ford introduced the original Bronco, he refused to stock any price leader 2nd units.
IIRC_International figured most of the sales of the original Scout were going to be the pickup version.
I’ve never heard that, but that certainly was what the early trucks were designed around. No matter if a roadster or which top you ordered there was a welded in bulkhead behind the driver’s seat. They eventually changed that to a bolted in bulkhead which finally made into a true wagon. Some people did cut the bulkhead out of those of the early models.
What I did read, in a period review of the second model year, where they asked IH about the 4wd take rate and IH stated that about 75% were so equipped but when they launched it they had only expected that to be around 25%.
I gotta admit that the 2WD Scout pickup as tested in the article would be a cool; rig to add to my “if only I could afford to do so” motor pool.
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I got to drive one of these, a 4WD with the full roof and a plow on the front. The place where I worked right out of high school used one to plow the lot at its south side location, and they needed it brought up to the north side place where I worked. It was probably a 10 mile drive that took 20 minutes or so, all on city streets.
I don’t remember the he-man qualities of the car, and don’t recall the steering as anything out of the ordinary for a manual steering truck of the time. But it was certainly crude – a fun kind of crude, but not something I would have ever wanted for my main car. It was probably 10-12 years old at the time and had never seen much road used. The Scout II was FAR more civilized.
I didnt know they built a 2WD only model, the only Scouts we saw here were 4WD, I think Australian built they competed with Landrover and sold mostly to farming people where 4WD was a must steep muddy paddocks are not 2WD or Jeep friendly which we couldnt get anyway.