Steve McQueen was trying anything and everything that he could to beat the cancer that would ultimately take his life, when he rode in the back of the truck below with the Reverend Billy Graham on the way to the airport, in 1980. McQueen was heading to Mexico for a last ditch surgery and Graham was with him in the truck to provide some spiritual guidance and strength for the ailing McQueen. Sadly, one of the coolest guys to ever grace the planet Earth was dead a scant four days later. He died with the bible Graham gave to him on their camper ride to the airport in his hands. That same 1952 Chevy truck with the neat looking custom made camper shell in the back is going to be auctioned by Mecum in their upcoming Santa Monica auction that will feature all kinds of celebrity owned and affiliated items from art to cars to personal effects (John Lennon’s sunglasses as an example).
The truck is a one ton 3800 series piece and wears the same dark green color it did back when McQueen took his last ride in it. The Loadmaster six cylinder stovebolt motor is in place and the mill is backed by the venerable and indestructible SM420 transmission. The truck is a longbed stepside unit and it is equipped with some spare gas cans, a driver’s side spotlight, and of course the custom made aluminum camper.
Built by a man named Harold Van Hoosen in 1952, the thing looks absolutely mint from the outside even today. Apparently when McQueen saw this truck in 1978 he had to have it and cut a check on the spot to become the new owner. It strikes us as interesting that of all the cool stuff McQueen could have been riding to the airport in that day while he was literally dying by the minute, he chose this old bouncy Chevy truck. Perhaps it was an effort to keep a low profile and avoid the media, we’re not sure. Either way, once he got out of this truck at the airport, it would be the last time he saw California alive.
Personally, there’s a little something creepy about this truck. The history is compelling and amazing, but we’re not sure we want the truck that is simply famous for being the last thing he rode in alive. Not that we believe it is haunted or anything, just that it is a pretty grim tale that you’ll be spinning every time someone asks you about it. The discussion between McQueen and Graham must have been extremely intense. In the auction listing they say that McQueen was asking many questions about what exactly happens when one passes away in the spiritual sense. By the sounds of it, even he knew that time was super short.
Hey, the truck is neat as hell. We just wish that the story attached was a little more positive.
CLICK HERE TO SEE THE AUCTION LISTING FOR THIS HISTORIC AND KIND OF MACABRE TRUCK
It’s a great truck. Very cool, but I gotta agree it’d be a little weird to drive around with the possible ghost of Steve McQueen in the passenger seat. vehicle wrap
I know that truck. Whoever owns it lives in the retirement community I work for, I saw it yesterday. Very cool truck, had no idea of it’s history.
I think he picked that truck because he was sick and it was the only vehicle he owned that he could comfortably lie down in. I could be wrong on that, please correct me if I am.