The Farmer’s Old ’40s Ford
There’s something about an old abandoned car that get us to thinking (ouch, it hurts). Who owned it, where did they travel…what’s the story here? Answers never come, but still we ask. Once someone’s pride and joy, it’s now nothing more than a forgotten hunk of rusted metal dumped in a field long ago. In the big city it’s off to Pick & Pull, but in rural regions, take it out back and forget about it. Here it’s just such a beast located down on the farm, an old ride that’s called this field home for a long, long time.
We’re looking at a 1946-1948 Ford , a pretty common car of the era. This model was available as a two door coupe or sedan, two door convertible, four door wagon and as seen here a four door sedan. Power came from a base six cylinder engine or Ford’s famous Flathead V8. Trim levels included Special, DeLuxe, and Super DeLuxe. Push button start was standard…and here you though this a modern thing. They could also be started by a hand cranked if needed. By the 1940s, this was an anachronistic feature, but one that could come in handy if stranded on some rural road account a dead battery.
No one knows how long the car’s been sitting here – we talked around. It’d be safe to say a good sixty years or more. Rural folk squeezed ever last mile from their rides, particularly back then, so unless there was a catastrophic failure, they’d typically drive these till the wheels fell off. That might take eight to ten years or maybe more. It’s a rough life. It’s not known if the car was stripped on being retired or if later savlagers did the deed. Many old farm cars have surrendered parts to classics being rebuilt.
We imagine the farmer heading to town on business in this very car. Or maybe it was a run to the grocery store. Perhaps it was he and the family off to church. Dusty old roads, so many miles, so much toil but now there’s nothing more to do but rest.
Something similar…
Forgotten Farm Truck – parked long ago.
Short Subjects: reports that for any number of reasons are brief in nature. They might be updates to older articles, previews of posts planned or not yet published, brief snippets of things that don’t fit in anywhere else or subjects that are so obscure that information on them can’t be found. Or sometimes we just ramble on about Lord knows what.
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Date of adventure: April, 2019.
Location: Special Areas, AB.
In retirement…
…The farmer’s old ’40s Ford.
Awesome!
I know!
Lovely! Great finding rusty cars on the backroads!
Us too. Sometimes an old car is more interesting than anything.
These old cars always make me think of my Dad. He was a self-taught mechanic. He learned by taking a motor completely apart and then putting it back together again
And they did it with only a few basic tools too. Thanks for commenting!
This is beautiful I love your page .
Thank you! Drop by often.
Ive seen old vehicles like this in Alta too, on the prairies in the middle of a wheat field and in the Coulees around Lethbridge. I lived in Hardiville, Sterling and Picture Butte, and visited folks in Raymond Alta.
It was common for farmers to retire old cars to the corner of some field.
Looks like a 46 ford sedan by the rear fender stainless. Solid looking body.
Thanks for adding to the story. It does appear, however, that other years had this too.
Conquerville Ab.
I can’t say where, but it’s not there.