Trucks nowadays are overloaded luxury barges in the fine tradition of land yachts, boulevard-crushing station wagons, and the megalithic sports-utility vehicles…they are big, powerful, cartoonishly masculine to the point of insecurity, and are usually wrapped in leather. There’s plenty of jokes there, folks, choose your own. Whatever happened to the days when a truck was a freaking truck…an implement…a tool? The cab occupants were comfortable, the bed was meant to be filled, the chassis rating was actually a legitimate concern instead of a status symbol, and the entire point of purchasing one was to work it until it quit working altogether. That train of thought plunged off of a cliff in spectacular fashion sometime between 1988 and 2002 (depending on which brand you follow), but prior to, trucks were the workhorse, the tool. You could find GMCs, Dodges, Fords and Chevrolets all over the country hauling, towing, and earning the owner a living, instead of the envy of their friends and Neighborhood Association members.
If you want to get the true idea of what a truck should really entail, check out this sales training film from 1951. Here, Dodge is promoting the then four-year-old B-series half-ton and three-quarter ton series and you can see for yourself where the priorities are: function, function, and function with just a quick discussion on the safety and comfort of the owner/operator. It’s not a decked out Cummins-powered Laramie versus a King Ranch Super Duty…and that’s just fine by us.
