Of ugly warts and rabbit holes and Indianapolis and space heaters (but not the ones you think)

"Just Jeepin'" (macintux) 04/22/2020 at 09:15 • Filed to: None

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Speaking of !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , and !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , this !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! . And it’s...quirky.

First thing I noticed wasn’t the ungainly growth behind the hood, but the awkward hard top/bed combination.

However, that’s not the cool thing I learned more about.

Instead, let’s take a closer look at the wart.

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First clue as you scroll through the images:

Well, I guess that’s not so much a clue as a giveaway.

A look at coverless wart.

Would you look at that! Indianapolis! Where I is, and have been most of my life, and almost certainly will be stuck here forever!

Anyway, I suppose it’s not unexpected that a Minnesota Jeep would have a hard top and graft-on heater. Wimp.

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I imagine some of you are already familiar with the manufacturer, but this was my first exposure to them, and researching them sent me down a bit of a rabbit hole.

!!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! : their speedometers were used in the Model T, and they’ve been making automotive gauges ever since. They started and were headquartered in Chicago, and while the Wikipedia entry doesn’t mention it, the badging indicates they had a factory in Indianapolis.

Looking for more information about that factory led me to a pretty cool guy.

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Oran Mitchell worked at the Stewart-Warner factory in Indy, and he got to work on a different piece of transportation history.

Specifically, !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , as part of the Apollo 11 lunar module.

Stewart-Warner had been awarded a contract by NASA to make the helium heat exchangers for the Apollo program. The exchangers allowed the lunar module to descend correctly and land gently. He used the designs provided by NASA, and assembled the 10-inch by 12-inch out of titanium and other alloys. The pieces had all kinds of odd shapes sticking out of it, and creating one took a considerable amount of time.

The pieces were soldered together with gold dust. Mitchell helped build several copies of the part, pressure-testing them before shipping the heat exchanger to NASA.

Curiously, the company’s slide show omits this stellar bit of hardware; I’d recommend !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , because there are some gorgeous classic car dashes.

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You may recall an earlier rabbit hole of mine:

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Something I noticed as I skimmed through the Stewart-Warner slide show was a WWII ad. This isn’t the same one, but it makes me think it might be time to revisit the theme.

They clearly were not constrained to automobile parts; they also sold tube radios and manufactured munitions during WWII.

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The final rabbit hole wasn’t really any of the above, however, at least not directly. The rabbit hole that currently has me up at 2am is the collection of other, long-lost business names I’ve stumbled upon from the first half of the 20th century.

I !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! (warning: PDF) capturing the memories of several people who grew up on the west side of Indianapolis; it was the only place I could find with approximate dates for the founding of the Stewart-Warner presence in Indianapolis.

In 1914 Stewart-Warner built its Power House and Gear Plant. The main plant was built in 1918 with a large addition in 1927.

From that same west Indianapolis document:

Another of the earliest industries was the Perry Manufacturing Company known as the world’s largest cart, wagon and carriage company. This company later built the Marion Motor Car. Martin became associated with Perry, and then later it was known as the Perry-Overland Company which was bought by the Chevrolet Company.

(As far as I can tell, “Martin” in that quote should be “Marion”.)

My attempts to find any more information about Perry-Overland have failed. !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , but just its dates of existence, 1904-1915.

I did find this article from the Mohave County Miner in Arizona, October 7 1916, but it seems unlikely that this Perry-Overland and the Indianapolis Perry-Overland are the same company despite existing at roughly the same time.

An even less-likely candidate I include just for curiosity’s sake: it is, apparently, a Willys-Overland dealer in Perry, Oklahoma. June 21, 1923. Maybe some Oppo has ridden in an Overland Red Bird.

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One car company indirectly mentioned in that document that does have some information online is the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! .

That’s a 1923 Marmon 34B 2-seater Speedster. No, I’d never heard of it either. (Or, heck, given my general automotive cluelessness I’m the only person here who hasn’t.)

Marmon manufactured their cars on the same property that Eli Lilly currently manufactures drugs; I’ve worked at and around Lilly for a significant chunk of my career, coincidentally enough.

Another Indianapolis auto company mentioned in the document is !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! ; here’s one of their ads. A super-standard poem in steel, one of the most ultra-beautiful and sumptuous cars ever built.

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Another Indianapolis transportation company in that document is Ellis Trucking. Can’t find anything online except, again, through newspapers.com (no, this really isn’t an ad for the site, I just every few years find myself diving into their archives).

Ellis would have greatly appreciated the new extension of I-69 through southwest Indiana; they just missed it by 50 years.

Once again, I have no idea what happened to Ellis: swallowed, collapsed, no clue. !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! ; for $16 I might just have to grab it as a keepsake.

I have no real point to this, other than I find it somewhat melancholy how fragile history is. Wikipedia has (or had, last time I looked 15 years ago) excruciating detail about the Tour de France, as enthusiasts recorded every tidbit of the event in real time, but a company like Ellis or Perry-Overland, who had the misfortune of being founded and vanishing before the Internet was a thing, practically never existed. If it hadn’t been for someone writing down some memories in 1979 and that document landing online, I never would have known about them.

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One final bit of Indianapolis history, basically a note to self for me to try to find out more about these... from the Indianapolis Times, an evening paper that closed up shop in 1965 , this !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! has recommendations from the chamber of commerce for items to be added to letters to promote the city. (Speaking of the Internet, dissemination and discovery of useful information was considerably harder 100 years ago.)

Indianapolis—B.Y.P.U. National Convention, July 8 to 12

Indianapolis—Home of the John Herron Art Institute

Indianapolis—National Dairy Show, Oct 10 to 17

Indianapolis—Motor crossroads of the nation

Indianapolis—Almost 6,000 acres added to city since Jan 1

Indianapolis—Thirteen acres added to city parks in 1925

Indianapolis—A city of inspiration

Indianapolis—America’s largest inland city

Indianapolis—has world’s largest outdoor swimming pool

Indianapolis—Covers an area of sixty square miles

Indianapolis—Has ideal labor conditions

Indianapolis—Home of The American Legion

Indianapolis—Mecca of America’s home builders

Indianapolis—Has world’s largest shock absorber factory

Indianapolis—Has 4,300 retail stores

Indianapolis—America’s economic distribution point

Indianapolis—Has model downtown business district

Indianapolis—Has world’s largest motor bus terminal

Indianapolis—Home of Butler University

Indianapolis—Unexcelled warehouse and railway terminal facilities

Indianapolis—A picnic proof city

Indianapolis—A city of neighbors

Indianapolis—logical distribution point of America

Indianapolis—A pivotal industrial center

Indianapolis—Seventy-five incoming mail trains daily

Indianapolis—Indiana’s wholesale center

Now, don’t you want to know what the world’s largest shock absorber factory was in 1925? Rabbit holes, commence!

pip bip - choose Corrour > Just Jeepin' 04/22/2020 at 09:27

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do tell us about the shock absorber factory when you can.

:D

Jayvincent > Just Jeepin' 04/22/2020 at 09:39

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as someone who almost minored in industrial archaeology in college, I feel your pain and joy at rediscovering this almost lost time period. My particular rabbit hole is steam powered dredges and shovels:

Just Jeepin' > Jayvincent 04/22/2020 at 10:08

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That’s pretty cool. I stumbled upon a remnant of the Whitewater  canal in southern Indiana last year, but of course I can’t find my photos now.

Who is the Leader - 404 / Blog No Longer Available > Just Jeepin' 04/22/2020 at 10:28

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So is it a small factory that produces the world’s largest shock absorbers for the world’s largest cars? Or is it a large factory for small shocks?

vondon302 > Just Jeepin' 04/22/2020 at 10:32

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Neat stuff.

The Gilmore car museum archives might be of some assistance. I know they had a few Marmons last time I went.

https://www.gilmorecarmuseum.org/discover/research-library/

Just Jeepin' > vondon302 04/22/2020 at 10:37

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Nice, thanks.

That reminds me I spotted some aeronautical museums as I was passing Grissom AFB this week, need to visit them and write up a report once that’s possible.

Deltyn drives a meh car > Just Jeepin' 04/22/2020 at 10:52

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My dad used to tell stories of an Arctic top M 35 he had bought in Colorado in the 70s. I remember him saying it had been used as a snow plow when he bought it.

Just Jeepin' > Deltyn drives a meh car 04/22/2020 at 10:58

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Your comment reminded me I wanted to look those up. Found this great resource:  https://cj3b.info/Hardtops/ArcticTops.html

BrooklynEagle > Just Jeepin' 04/22/2020 at 11:04

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Epic rabbit hole. I’m guessing the Jeep saw cold weather service at an airport or air base?

Just Jeepin' > BrooklynEagle 04/22/2020 at 11:10

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Possibly. This resource indicates the tops were used in Korea; certainly, if my MASH viewing days are any reliable guide, it gets pretty bloody cold during the winter there.

https://cj3b.info/Hardtops/ArcticTops.html

Chariotoflove > Just Jeepin' 04/22/2020 at 12:22

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That war ad is dark. We’re not used to anything like that these days. This history of advertising is interesting in itself.

The Indianapolis auto industry was a wild scene in the beginning. There were so many car companies with so many innovative designs that popped up, thrived for a time, and faded into dim memory. Now, you have to specifically look for histories to learn of all these forgotten companies.

My dad lamented the loss of the Indianapolis News when it went out of print and left only the Star. He preferred an evening paper to read when he got home. He complained that the news from a morning paper  was already a half day old when he got to read it.

Just Jeepin' > Chariotoflove 04/22/2020 at 12:27

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Oh, that’s right, the News was the evening paper that went out of business when I was younger. Looks like the Times was also an evening paper, but it expired before I appeared on the scene.

Chariotoflove > Just Jeepin' 04/22/2020 at 12:31

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Both shuttered long before the rise of internet news on demand, which kind of says that the city didn’t have the market for both a morning and evening paper. That surprised me for a town of such size. Sure, it wasn’t at its zenith in the 90s, but it was dramatically improved from the Nap Town days of the 70s and 80s.