Hi all,
Well....my father and I have decided to do it again. We, as part of the Flatland T's, are hosting a weekend T tour September 20-22, 2013 here in McPherson. We will tour the area Friday through Sunday with mileages ranging from approximately 35-120 per day. Here's a brief rundown of the activities:
Friday - Tour to Hutchinson and back. On the way, we'll visit Inman, Buhler and Medora. They are quaint towns with historic buildings and shopping. In Hutchinson we'll visit the Kansas Cosmosphere. It is a Smithsonian affiliated museum that is world famous for it's artifacts and the stories they tell. It is always changing so even if you've been there, it is worth a visit.
Friday evening we'll have an ice cream social at McPherson College.
Saturday – Tour to Ellinwood and back. We’ll tour through Alden and Raymond on our way to Ellinwood. Ellinwood is home to the underground world and haunted Wolf Hotel. The underground is a series of businesses that were open in the late 1800's and early 1900's. Here's a link that explains it better than I can: http://kansastravel.org/ellinwoodunderground.htm
Sunday – Tour of McPherson and Galva.
We’ll start with a visit to a couple local McPherson sites then tour to Galva for lunch at a small private collection of T's and such. We should be done around 1pm to allow for heading home. It will only be about 35 miles total.
Feel free to join us for one, two or all three days. We’ll be touring all back roads. At this point we haven't planned any dirt roads. That may change, but paved roads will be available as well (it just won’t be as scenic, and there will be more modern traffic).
If you would like to join us, even for just one day, please call or email for a registration form. Thanks!! Chris Paulsen 316-648-7887 paulsenc at mcpherson.edu or Gary Paulsen 620-755-4730
Hopefully some participants that joined us last year will chime in with comments (positive comments only, please).
Last year I drove up just to take a few pictures, and had to go by Camry. With any luck I'll have a T ready to go this time.
Thanks, Steve, for posting the photos. I hope you can make it this year.
Last year we had 23 cars. We are still adding some details and I'll update the post as I finalize them.
I'll be back too with the Model T and no switch problem, I hope.
Can't believe it's been a year already! I'll be there with my new top! thanks, Chris and Gary. Steve
I would love to come tour but four days on the road for a three day tour is too much on the ole bod.
Rick
I'm about 135 air miles south of McPherson. If Chris and Gary have this tour again next year, maybe I should stage an after-tour down here. Folks could spend a day or two exploring Osage country after they finish in McPherson.
Thank you for the responses I've gotten so far. We've tried to include a lot of the comments we received from last years participants to improve this years event. A few people commented on the amount of dirt roads. We'll have a lot less this year; probably only 1/2 mile. Here's a picture (taken yesterday) of our 1911 Paige-Detroit on that road. It's a pretty good road. Sorry for the non-Ford.
That must be one of the most beautiful cars I've ever seen, with a patina to die for. Want.
The T era country roads don't bother me. I like 'em.
Thank you, Bernard. It is a fun car. We got it last fall. It is totally original (paint, upholstery, etc). It is actually a surrey (has backseat same as the front), but we took it off for cleaning.
I agree Steve. The roads around here are fantastic. I use them often. Planning to tomorrow, in fact.
Chris P,
I did not know you had a Paige! Is that your personal car? How long have you had it? Paige has been one of my favorite marques for many years. One of my dreams has been to have a brass era Paige. But I guess I'll have to be content with the brass era cars I have and the '27 Paige 6-45 sedan I have. I would like to see a lot more pictures of that car , though. Not many brass era Paige cars around. That is a nice one!
Paige has a marvelous history. They were one of the most consistently profitable smaller automobile companies of the era. They lost money only one year between 1911 and 1927. They did not compete in auto racing as a company, because Harry Jewett did not want to. But were often raced by people that could not afford the Mercers, Stutz, Nationals, or other best known cars that did factory race. One year, E L Cord of Auburn/Cord/Duesenberg fame won the annual race from Los Angelas California into Phoenix Arizona driving a Paige. This at a time there was almost no road there.
There was a board game popular in the 1920s having to do with an auto race. One of the game-pieces was marked as a "Paige". I have one of those pieces. For one year ('25 or '26 if I recall correctly), Paige/Jewett was the ninth largest producer of automobiles in the U S. Not a bad feat at a time when there were over fifty companies producing automobiles.
By the way, Chris, do you still have the Brush?
Boy. Can I wander off topic.
I hope you have a wonderful tour in September! Wish I could be there then.
Drive carefully, and enjoy, W2
Wayne-
My father and I are partners in the Paige. We bought it last fall. It hadn't run in years and we soon found out why. The countershaft in the transmission was broken in half. After quite a few new parts in the transmission and clutch, we've got it back together and running pretty well.
Thank you for the Paige-History. This particular car was owned by the Graham-Paige dealer in Lincoln, Nebraska until the company stopped building cars in 1940.
We sold the Brush. Unfortunately most of us can't keep them all.
Chris
Saddened to hear about the Brush, but I know that feeling.
If you are interested in Paige history, it is quite interesting. Not a lot of it available on the web. That in spite of the fact that there are several websites devoted to Graham, Paige, and Jewett.
The best single source of Paige history is the book The Graham Legacy: Graham-Paige to 1932, by Michael E Keller. There is a followup book (1933 to present I don't have). The first book shows up often on the usual book sites.
The funny relationship between Paige and Graham is that most Graham hobbyists treat Paige like a distant and unliked cousin. The Graham Owners International club claims to be for all owners of Graham-Paige, Graham, Paige and Jewett automobiles. But many years ago, on their web forum, I found that they welcomed a Coke Cola bottle owner with more welcoming arms than they did the owner of any Paige automobile. Did you know that the Graham brothers invented the machine that made the iconic Coke Cola bottle possible? It was their first major fortune along with the foundation of what became Corning Glass.
The Keller book has a lot about the brothers, the glass works, form-a-trucks, Graham-Dodge trucks and the early Graham-Paige automobiles. But it also has over sixty pages devoted to Paige, Jewett automobiles and Harry Jewett.
Paige did offer a model called the "Speedster" in (if I recall correctly) 1913. It looked a bit like a Stutz Bearcat for a fraction of the cost. I had an opportunity to buy one some years ago, but the timing was wrong for me and I was not able to make it happen. It was a bad restoration, with many wrong parts on it, but was claimed by the fellow that restored it to have been an original Paige factory speedster.
Pictures of your Paige make me ache for an early Paige, or my old Fuller, which had a removable rear seat like that. But I still want to see lots more pictures of it! Here or elsewhere.
Drive carefully, and enjoy, W2
In a cheap attempt to bring the tour back to the top, here are a couple photos of our speedster. My daughter and I had it out yesterday. This is one of the country lanes we have available in this area.