Category: History

Scouting History

Here’s a recently unearthed shot of Chewbacca on the beach in Nag’s Head in about 1999 or so. My friend James is flying my kite over on the right side. In retrospect I’m amazed at how naive and trusting I was to drive 300+ miles in a truck I’d only recently bought, but I’d already taken her across the Eastern Shore to Assateague (150 miles) with no problems. She ran like a top, and it was loads of fun to shift into 4-Lo and get her out on the beach. I think we probably drove 3-4 miles over the sand until we found a section we liked.

Posted on   |   by bill   |   Leave a Comment on Scouting History  |  Posted in Chewbacca, History

Historical Documents

I’ve embarked on a project to digitize all of of my old paper files after I found out that the big multifunction copiers at work are back online and are able to email again. They have batch scanners that will take a giant stack of papers and smash them into one PDF that I can then email myself. Going through my overstuffed file cabinet I found a long-lost folder of Scout documents. It’s all Chewbacca era stuff, including the original lineset ticket, most of the receipts for the registration, an April 1972 copy of Mechanix Illustrated with a review of the new Scout II, and a bunch of other assorted papers. I was happy to find pictures that I thought I’d lost as well as correspondence from the original owner I bought it from in 1997. I’ll start posting them here as I process all the files.

This is the original listing for Chewbacca from a nice man up in Lancaster, PA. I bought this truck the day before my birthday in 1998.

Posted on   |   by bill   |   Leave a Comment on Historical Documents  |  Posted in Chewbacca, History

Right In The Feels

This old girl showed up on Barnfinds.com today and it hit me right in all the sensitive spots. This rig is an exact copy of Chewbacca back in the day, except for the Diesel badges on the fenders and the license plate arrangement on the tailgate. Like this truck Chewbacca was a 1978 painted Siam Yellow with no exterior trim, had all four stock hubcaps, a color-matched traveltop with no roof rack, and inside was the same Tanbark high-back bucket seats, rubber floor mats, green accents, and 4-speed stick. Chewbacca had regular side mirrors and BFG Mud-Terrains. The example for sale has some serious rust in the rockers and quarter panels, some road rash and there’s a Nissan diesel under the hood, but if I squint just a little bit I can see ol’ Chewbacca parked out in front of my house waiting for another trip to the beach.

Posted on   |   by bill   |   Leave a Comment on Right In The Feels  |  Posted in Chewbacca

I See What You Did There

This nice-looking Traveler showed up on Craigslist and FB Marketplace for around $17K, which is a pretty good price for what they’re offering. What caught my eye, beyond the obvious good looks and desirable extra 18″ of wheelbase (and thus cargo space) was the location of the first staging shot:

That’s the former location of East Coast Scouts, my local IH mechanic in the early days when I had Chewbacca. He closed up shop in the early 2000’s when it got to be too much to stay on top of; he’s back in the area after moving to PA for a while and I traded emails with him last year.

East Coast Scouts, 2002

Posted on   |   by bill   |   2 Comments on I See What You Did There  |  Posted in Chewbacca, History

Hemmings on the SSV

Hemmings has a good writeup on the Scout SSV, which was to be International’s successor to the Scout II. From what it sounds like, they were aiming for the fences at a time when they could only afford to polish what they had.

Light trucks, on the other hand, were becoming more of a bother to the company. It discontinued its Travelalls and pickups in 1975 in response to the 1973 oil crisis, had trouble meeting the Environmental Protection Agency’s fuel economy standards set to take effect in 1979, and faced a second oil crisis that year.

I’ve always thought the SSV was a hideously ugly design that looked more like a Tonka truck than a production vehicle; even if they’d been able to pull this out of their hat, I wonder how many of them they would have sold—it reminds me of AMC’s attempts to shake things up with the Pacer, and later the Matador. And we all know how that went.

There’s a presentation at the ACD Museum in Fort Wayne about this subject on Saturday, which I’d love to be able to listen in on—but it doesn’t look like they’ve accounted for, uh, COVID. It’s a shame, because I’d definitely log in to a ZOOM call if I could.

Posted on   |   by bill   |   2 Comments on Hemmings on the SSV  |  Posted in History

Decoding

I got the Line Set Ticket from the frame serial back from Super Scouts this morning, and, well, the mystery continues. Here’s what I know so far:

Knowing that, I have to go out and see if I can read the engine serial to see if it matches what’s on the LST (311593) for confirmation.

As is common with most Scouts of its age, it’s a jigsaw puzzle from many different trucks. Maybe someone out west put it together and then shipped it east to sell?

 

Posted on   |   by bill   |   Leave a Comment on Decoding  |  Posted in History

Nine Years Later

In between Scouts, nine years ago, I went up to White Marsh to look over a Scout on Craigslist. What I found was a rough example with a lot of rust, bondo, and primer. It was a non-runner, up on a trailer, and the victim of questionable aftermarket mods, the best of which was a chain steering wheel and skull shifter knob. I snapped a picture and left.

chain wheel, death's head knob

Imagine my surprise when a Scout showed up on Craigslist this week with the same shift knob. A little comparison shows it’s the same Scout with a new steering wheel. The rest of it looks exactly the same: rust, bondo and primer.

I didn’t buy it then and I wouldn’t buy it now.

Posted on   |   by bill   |   2 Comments on Nine Years Later  |  Posted in History