I am pleased that you will enjoy this beautiful "old" car. It is going to be a very sad day to see it leave. We have owned the car since about 1971 when I bought it from an elderly lady who was living in a tumble down unpainted farm house near Sutton, Nebraska. She had to be in her upper 90's at that time, and explained to me that it had been sitting there since the Depression. Her husband had taken the car in on a $50 loan he made to the owner and the owner never returned to pay off the debt. Unfortunately I didn't buy it for $50, but rather about 40 times that much. It was sitting in a lento next to a barn that looked to be about ready to fall down. It had been exposed to the elements all those many years with corn growing up through the open body parts. Needless to say it was at that time what you would consider a "basket case".

I worked on it for some 20 years, taking the entire car apart to where there wasn't one nut or bolt attached to anything and started a ground up total restoration that was completed in the mid 1990's. Although I had the engine overhauled in the 1980's, the work was NOT well done and I later discovered that there was so much play in the crank shaft that in about 2004 I had the entire engine, transmission and running gear professionally rebuilt. At that time we added a Ruxtell 2-speed rear-end and Rocky Mountain brakes, a high compression head, aluminum pistons, etc so that it runs better than it ever did as a new car. My wife and I were at that time the National Tour Directors of the Model T Ford Club of America South Dakota tour of the Black Hills, a week-long tour involving 109 cars from all over the US and Canada through gorgeous mountainous country. We wanted to make sure that it ran well and didn't break down during this tour.

The old lady didn't have a title to it so I had to go through a legal process to create a new title with the State of Nebraska, transferring ownership from the original owner to me. Since we now live in South Dakota, the car is currently titled in South Dakota. So, for all practical purposes, I am only the second owner of the car. I have all the historical information about the car, date it was built, the Ford factory it was produced at, the name of the dealer who sold it, the original owner's names, etc. Another unique feature of the car is that the original fenders were in such horrible condition that during the lengthy restoration process I was able to locate a complete set of "new old stock" fenders, meaning that they were original Ford stock fenders sold to a dealer but never installed on a car until I purchased them from a farmer near Lincoln, NE and installed them on my car. In addition, the final finish paint work and upholstery were completed by professionals as you will clearly understand when you see it for the first time.

All the wood in the car was cleaned and replaced as needed as rot was identified. The biggest project was the rebuilding of the wooden structure for the roof, in that the front corner was badly rotted out, so the entire roof was rebuilt using oak, just like what was used by Henry Ford when it was new. An interesting piece of information is easily seen in the car in that history has it that Henry Ford was so frugal that he used the wooden boxes and parts from shipping boxes that were sent to him from his suppliers in the manufacture of the Model T, as a cost saving idea. In the restoration of this car we found address lettering on parts of the wooden floor boards. Extra care was taken to ensure that this was not destroyed or damaged in the renovation process. I guess it proves the theory that Henry Ford actually did indeed do that as he built Model T's.

As you can see I have a long and close history with the car and it will be sad day to see it go, but I am happy that it is going to someone who will enjoy it and drive it with other Model T enthusiasts.