Reflections on an Early 1950s Studebaker Truck

The curfew tolls the knell of parting day,

The lowing herd wind slowly o’er the lea

The ploughman homeward plods his weary way,

And leaves the world to darkness and to me.

Now fades the glimm’ring landscape on the sight,

And all the air a solemn stillness holds,

Save where the beetle wheels his droning flight,

And drowsy tinklings lull the distant folds;

Save that from yonder ivy-mantled tow’r

The moping owl does to the moon complain

Of such, as wand’ring near her secret bow’r,

Molest her ancient solitary reign.

– “Elegy in a Country Churchyard,” Thomas Gray

TIVOLI, New York – Gold is surging in the wake of China’s currency devaluation.

What a beauty. Technology from 65 years ago. But what struck us was how little has changed.

A man driving a Studebaker pickup in 1950 was in a new world compared with the man coming into town a half-century earlier. In 1900, he would have had a horse, not an internal combustion engine.

But this antique Studebaker was not so different from a Ford F-150. Two headlights. Grill for the radiator. Brakes. Accelerator. Six cylinders, water-cooled.

It neither had air-conditioning nor automatic transmission. But by mid-century, most of the practical engineering problems of modern automotive technology had been worked out.

So, a man coming into town today, driving a truck right off the dealer’s lot, would recognize its key features and be able to operate the old truck without problem. (Assuming he’d learned how to drive a manual transmission.)

So much has changed, but nothing has changed. We have a lot more technology. Much of it is a nuisance.

Conclusion of Gray’s “Elegy in a Country Churchyard” (written without laptop):

And thou, who mindful of the unhonour’d Dead

Dost in these Notes thy artless Tale relate

By Night & lonely contemplation led

To linger in the gloomy Walks of Fate

Hark how the sacred Calm, that broods around

Bids ev’ry fierce tumultous Passion ease

In still small Accents whisp’ring from the Ground

A grateful Earnest of eternal Peace

No more with Reason & thyself at strife;

Give anxious Cares & endless Wishes room

But thro’ the cool sequester’d Vale of Life

Pursue the silent Tenour of thy Doom.

Reprinted with permission from Bonner & Partners.

Reflections on an Early 1950s Studebaker Truck

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