The "modern Ford" of 1915

George Fenwick with his wife Debra's 1915 Model T Ford
T. Lucas photos

Toni Lucas

George and Debra Fenwick of Cowley Alberta are the proud owners of a 1915 Model T truck with a wooden C-cab, which was on display at Kootenai Brown Pioneer Village's 2013 Harvest Festival earlier today, September 21.  Named a C-cab after the distinctive shape of the door cut out, there was an unusual process to getting your vehicle in those days.


"You would buy the chassis from the Ford factory," said George Fenwick.  Ford would supply the chassis, front fenders, headlights, radiator, hood,  cowl and windshield.  "Then you would get a carriage maker to make your truck up."  He explained that most carriage makers would have at least one person on staff that would design the vehicle bodies.

"In about 1924, 25 they (Ford) started making the bodies for the trucks as well.  Then they turned out like Ray's," George elaborated, meaning Ray Degan, who also was showing his antique vehicles (including his 1927 Model T truck) at the Harvest Festival.

George said that it really is his wife Debra's car, they both love collecting unique vehicles.  "We've only had this one for a couple years. We bought it from a family in Medicine Hat."  The father of that family owned and worked on getting it in good shape for a few years, but when he passed away "No one else in the family could get it going.  So we bought it from them, tuned it up and have it running pretty good.  It's quite the car."

A streamlined C-cab

With a top speed of 40 miles per hour this one had a feature most people would not expect from a vehicle built in 1915.  "Modern cars, most of them are automatic transmissions, or a planetary transmission. This actually has a planetary transmission."  George explained that this was an automatic transmission, but slightly different from what you expect from a modern automatic.  "In your car, when you put it in drive and you step on the gas, you have a valve body that grabs your low gear and takes off.  This car, if you push on that pedal, you are engaging  a band that starts your low gear up."

"Once you get going about 28 miles per hour, you grab that lever and you shove it all the way forward. That engages the high speed band.  Then you chugga-chugga down the road."

"The funniest thing is that all the other cars had a gear shift and a clutch and they looked down on the Model T because they thought the planetary transmission was not the way to go.  Now they're all planetary transmissions."

Taking about how it differed from the modern transmission George elaborated by saying,  "You just put it in drive nowadays and step on the gas.  You don't need to push down these pedals," he said, indicating the three pedals in the cab.  "In this, There's no real clutch.  You just slowly engage that band, and take off in low gear. These are really, really unique."

Wooden body on the factory chassis

• For more stories related to Kootenai Brown Pioneer Village click here.