MTFCA Forum

A friend and I attended the EAA air show at Oshkosh last week. As many of you know, Ford and the local Model T club offer free Model T rides to airshow attendees, here are some pictures of the cars folks had to choose from. I went for a ride in the back of the 1921 touring car.

Some great choices for a ride !

About 20 years ago I was attending the Grassroots Fly-In at Brodhead, Wisc. There was a fellow there giving Model T rides in a nicely restored 1912 Touring. The car had a Ruxtell, which I was curious about as I had never actually seen one in operation. The owner very graciously demonstrated the Ruxtell and then asked how I came to know what it was. I replied that I too had a '12 Touring, except mine had a Warford.

The owner smiled broadly and said, "I've been hauling riders all day and I gotta take a break. Here, you haul them for a while." With that, he climbed out and made a beeline for the restroom. After a couple of hours I knew exactly how he felt, only it wasn't my car and I didn't have the option of handing it off to another driver.

As nice as the car was, I sure was glad to pick his face out of the crowd and give him his car back.

I gave rides all 5 days. Could not have done it without the super fantastic help of the ladies that assisted every rider find a car, and helped them get in the cars, take pictures, hold purchases, etc. Not to mention keeping us supplied with cold water.

I was at the EAA on Monday and Tuesday giving rides in my '14 Touring. I gave rides to 39 people on Monday and another 39 on Tuesday. Each day Monday through Friday we had about 9 to 10 Model T's there giving rides. If you extrapolate out the 78 people I gave rides to, we probably gave 1,000 people rides during the week. When we are giving a ride to someone who is really interested in T's, we tell them about the Model T clubs and give them a membership application for the MTFCA, and we have received several new members as a result. I put a Ruckstell in my '14 Touring specifically for this event since there are so many pedestrians all over we have to drive really slow. I just put it in Ruckstell and leave it there the whole time. The Ruckstell also works great at the OCF where you can also only drive slow.
I gave a ride to one guy from Nevada who has an '11 and two '14's. He had never seen a Ruckstell and didn't know how they work, so I showed him. He had lots of questions. He also did not belong to the MTFCA, so I gave him a membership application right then and there!
Keith

I was the sole Michigan Oshkosh driver. I joined the Dairyland Tin Lizzies mostly so I could participate since I'd be coming to Oshkosh anyway (45 years now.) We had up to ten cars each day and drove for a total of four hours each day. I drove for three days, made 59 trips driving 75 miles (mostly in low gear) and introduced visitors from 27 states and one country (France) to the Model T. Practiced my Spanish on a fellow from Argentina that showed me photos of his '25 Touring.

Dave is right that the hardest working group was the women organizing the riders and getting them into the cars, my wife among them. Next year she says she wants to drive

Our riders seemed to thoroughly enjoy their rides. Each year Oshkosh attracts over 600,000 people and in excess of 7000 airplanes. It's the busiest airport in the world for a week and you can see airplanes that you'll never see anywhere else. Aviator's heaven!

Been there several times. Flew my Comanche in each time. It is fantastic. I never saw Model Ts there, but this was the late '70s and early 80's. My most memorable experience was watching a Harrier hover. You don't know what loud is until you have seen this.

Our Club, The Dairyland Tin Lizzies, has been doing this since about 2006. We are guests of Ford. They don't pay us, but provide gas and feed us quite well. I gave a ride to Henry Ford III and his Wife a few years ago and he autographed the coil box cover on my '14 with a silver Sharpie marker. Another time when I first met Edsel Ford II, he said can I ask you a question? I said sure. He said what model Buick do you drive? I said, oh no, I've got 9 Fords. I passed the test.
Note to John Codman, if you come to the EAA again, we are located on the North side of the Ford Building complex. We have a blue canopy where riders sign a waiver and then the ladies arrange them for their rides. This year we had mostly touring cars plus two speedsters and two depot hacks. We give rides from 10 am to Noon and again from 1 pm to 3 pm on Monday through Friday during the event.
I encourage any and all T owners or those interested in T's to come and take a ride. It's a PR thing for us and Ford & we have a good time.
Keith

For those with Facebook accounts, I have posted all 230+ pictures that I took at the show in an album on my Facebook page.

Mark

Maybe I am looking in the wrong spot. I pull you up on FB and I see a total of 5 pictures. No album.

Try here.

https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id ... tos_albums

Hi Mark, You obviously enjoy planes as much as Model T's! Next year, June 19th to 24th, our Wonderful Wisconsin MTFCA Tour will be going to the EAA Museum on Friday of the tour week. We'll be having a catered lunch in the museum. Will you be on the tour? Just wondering.....
Keith

I couldn't find the album either.

Tim, Use the link that Mark posted today at 5:34, I think. I used it and saw the entire 232 pictures Mark posted.
Keith

No go. Total of 5 photos. That is it. Keith, you are probably a friend of his so you can see them. His profile might be private.

I will look to see if the album is "private", if it is then I will try to set its access to "public". No guarantees.

Update - I didn't see an obvious way in Facebook to make just one of my photo albums "public", so I am transferring a copy of the photo album to Google Photos. Hopefully there will be a way to make it public there. I'll post a link once the public copy is available on Google photos.

The transfer of a copy of my Oshkosh photo album to Google photos was successful, here is a link to them:

https://photos.google.com/album/AF1QipM ... RVv9D1YCme

Didn't work either. Google error message

Sorry, try this link:

https://photos.app.goo.gl/rVqeC2a14KtMJUEX7

Success! Thanks!

Excellent! It was hard for me to test the other links because they all worked for me (since I was the account holder).

The google photos were great. Liked the b17 and B25 as well as the corsair. The corsair was one that flew off a carrier. My brother-in-law flew one as a Marine during WW11. He flew off from temporary air fields on captured islands. He would take a small tent and a sleeping bag and came from CA each year for the Oskosh air show.

Thanks Mark for posting, great coverage. jw

Keith,
Thanks for the information, but I think my Oshkosh days are over. I have reached the point in life where I think that "roughing it" is slow room service. If things haven't changed, a person has to make hotel reservations literally years in advance. I try not to plan that far ahead.

Hi John, I understand. Yes, motel reservations near Oshkosh during their big event are hard to come by. Many stay in the Northern Milwaukee area. Those of us who give rides are allowed to park our motor homes, or tents in Lot "C", which is near the Pioneer airport and right at the end of the main event area, much closer than the main parking areas. From where we live it's about 110 miles to the EAA, so we could commute there for those couple of days if we had to.
Even considering all the traffic, lots of people, etc., it's still a great event and we enjoy it very much.
Keith