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01-06-2024, 10:27 PM | #1 |
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Ma Bell's working woodie wagon?
I found this somewhere on the web. Of course I liked the photo immediately as it shows a woodie being used for work and it has no signs of surf stickers, surf boards or anything vaguely reminiscient of the sport of surfing. The general public tends to think of these wagons as a surf vehicle and I am reminded of this almost daily by the comments I get when I take mine into town in the summer. The one pictured sure seems to have a bell on the driver's door and there's no doubt it is hard at work.
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Owner/Operator of 'Jailbar Ranch' on the side of Mt. Pickett. Current stable consists of 1946 1/2 ton pickup turned woodie wagon with FH V8, 1947 Tonner Pickup (red) mostly stock with exception of a cummins 6at turbo diesel, 1946 Tonner Pickup (green) with 226 cu in 6 cyl flathead, 1979 Toyota landcruiser wagon, completely encased in 1947 Ford Jailbar sheet metal. Ok, cornbinder rear fenders..... 'Rusty ol' floorboards, hot on their feet' (Alan Jackson) |
01-06-2024, 11:32 PM | #2 | |
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Re: Ma Bell's working woodie wagon?
Quote:
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The only thing nice about being imperfect is the joy it brings to others.... "Silver rings, your butt! Them's washers!" "We shot our way out of that town for a dollar's worth of steel holes!" - from 'The Wild Bunch' - 1969 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7NReUd2_0u0 |
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01-06-2024, 11:45 PM | #3 |
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Re: Ma Bell's working woodie wagon?
Attaboy Pete! Anyone know of any other pics of woodies used for commercial purposes? I know James Wagner's 'FTS'05' book shows a Marmon Herrington converted wood wagon involved in oil exploration in Saudi Arabia.
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Owner/Operator of 'Jailbar Ranch' on the side of Mt. Pickett. Current stable consists of 1946 1/2 ton pickup turned woodie wagon with FH V8, 1947 Tonner Pickup (red) mostly stock with exception of a cummins 6at turbo diesel, 1946 Tonner Pickup (green) with 226 cu in 6 cyl flathead, 1979 Toyota landcruiser wagon, completely encased in 1947 Ford Jailbar sheet metal. Ok, cornbinder rear fenders..... 'Rusty ol' floorboards, hot on their feet' (Alan Jackson) |
01-07-2024, 01:12 PM | #4 |
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Re: Ma Bell's working woodie wagon?
Two "Woodie" commercial pictures that come to mind are of the Ansel Adams photographer on the roof of his 1941 Cadillac Station Wagon and Dorothea Lang, also a photographer, atop her 1933 Ford Wagon. You're right about the general public equating Woodies with surfboards. Every car show I go to with my '46 someone always asks "where is the surfboard"?
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01-07-2024, 01:41 PM | #5 |
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Re: Ma Bell's working woodie wagon?
I know that in 1940, in Canada some were converted to ambulances. A friend of mine up there had one and removed the 2 doors that replaced the tailgate/rear window and made it back into a regular woodie. He always regrets getting rid of those rare "ambulance" doors. This same conversion happened during WW2 as I have seen pictures of those too.
Woodywagon46--I get the same question and I just tell them it didn't come from the factory with a surfboard. |
01-07-2024, 02:26 PM | #6 |
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Re: Ma Bell's working woodie wagon?
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Last edited by mh_merc; 01-07-2024 at 02:40 PM. Reason: photo |
01-07-2024, 02:48 PM | #7 |
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Re: Ma Bell's working woodie wagon?
Shades of Ansel...here's my '47 Merc with ornithologist/photographer Don Bleitz preparing to shoot. I must add that as a surfer of more than 50 years, I never presented this car as a 'surf wagon'.
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01-07-2024, 03:03 PM | #8 |
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Re: Ma Bell's working woodie wagon?
__________________
The only thing nice about being imperfect is the joy it brings to others.... "Silver rings, your butt! Them's washers!" "We shot our way out of that town for a dollar's worth of steel holes!" - from 'The Wild Bunch' - 1969 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7NReUd2_0u0 |
01-07-2024, 07:56 PM | #9 |
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Location: Southern Massachusetts
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Re: Ma Bell's working woodie wagon?
Here are some Bell System Woodie photos I have had for a while:
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No job is so important and no service is so urgent- that we cannot take time to perform our work safely. -Bell System |
01-07-2024, 08:38 PM | #10 |
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Join Date: Jan 2014
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Re: Ma Bell's working woodie wagon?
Wow! A treasure trove. Thanks.
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Owner/Operator of 'Jailbar Ranch' on the side of Mt. Pickett. Current stable consists of 1946 1/2 ton pickup turned woodie wagon with FH V8, 1947 Tonner Pickup (red) mostly stock with exception of a cummins 6at turbo diesel, 1946 Tonner Pickup (green) with 226 cu in 6 cyl flathead, 1979 Toyota landcruiser wagon, completely encased in 1947 Ford Jailbar sheet metal. Ok, cornbinder rear fenders..... 'Rusty ol' floorboards, hot on their feet' (Alan Jackson) |
01-08-2024, 03:03 PM | #11 |
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Re: Ma Bell's working woodie wagon?
When I was just a lad of five or six my Dad was a surveyor for the State of Idaho and one of his coworkers had a 46-8 woody they used as the work vehicle . My Dad always told us boys he should have bought it when it went up for sale. I wish I had a picture but it's only a memory now. Dead black paint, weathered wood and no hubcaps. Tim
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