MTFCA Forum

-
Hello Fellow Model T-ers,

On our Steve Freegard Southern Arizona Tour a couple months back we stopped off at the Tubac Mission. The National Parks Ranger there brought out this 1916 era photograph of the mission’s only vehicle at that time in its history and asked if any of us knew what type of car this was. None of us did. Can anyone here provide him with this information?
-

My guess is a Revere.

Probably another car that didn’t make the cut for longevity. I don’t know what it is without a lot of research and was among lots of other less known brands that were gone by the Model A era. It’s a neat car though.

Harding out of Cleveland, OH?

Looks like this 1916 Olds

Tadpole may be right. What’s kind of unusual about the car in the old picture I is what seems to be a larger wheel or tire on the drivers side. Is that area close to the Grand Canyon or a area where there are narrow trails that required a car to have the drivers side tire to be larger? I don’t know the area. That’s just a wild guess of what the reason was for the different size tire or wheel.

I think a Model 44 with V8, the grille is not typical, but I have seen them before. Maybe some kind of accessory or factory dress-up of a previous model?

Nice work Tad. I looked at Fiats and Reveres with no luck. Even Olds but didn't see that one.
The rear window and windshield clinch it don't they?
Rich

I don't know why the wheel on that picture looks larger, however I have a friend who in the 1950's had a Graham. It had wood spoke wheels and he had a flat tire so he drove home on the rim and ruined his wheel. So he looked in the wrecking yards and found another car which had a wood spoke wheel and put it on his car. It was a different size from the original wheels.
Norm

Wow! I looked at Olds photos first, but didn't see any with the radiator sloping down to the front. They all had flat faced radiators and all had Olds emblems on the radiators. But yes, an Olds it is!! What a nice car!

I looked at that old picture again and I noticed the fender on that side looks much larger too, so maybe the size is the same but something about the photography made it look larger.
Norm

RE: distorted photos

If you use a camera (film or digital) to copy a photo and the photo is not laying perfectly flat and the lens of the camera is not perfectly parallel to the photo, the resulting photograph will be distorted. (If you want to see examples of this, just browse period photos on eBay and you will find many listings where the photo is distorted because the seller used a camera instead of flatbed scanner in order to make a digital copy to include in the listing.)

Or,

If a camera with bellows was used to take the original photograph and the camera lens is not parallel to the film or glass plate, that will result in a distorted negative and, ultimately, a distorted photo.

Eric makes a good point. The camera angles can make a big difference in how proportions look. If you look at the individual pieces it's hard to doubt they are much the same.
Good points all around.
Rich