Thursday, March 12, 2015

one of two known 1926 Model TT Ford Motor Home





Ford Motor Co. records indicate that only six modified chassis, such as the one used to construct this motor home, were ever built.

The framing of the superstructure was made from new Model T Ford automobile frame rails, bolted and riveted together. The rear porch pillars were driveshaft tubes from one-ton Model TT Ford trucks.

The modification of the chassis included but was not limited to a second independent non-powered axle used to create tandem rear wheels and an overall extension of the chassis by more than eight feet. The body of the motor home is thought to be a third party addition to the chassis and was not constructed by Ford.

Rhene Miller grew up on a dairy farm in Pennsylvania and made her first public appearance at the age of three when she was featured in her father's traveling medicine show. She studied music in New York City and became a "one-girl band" with the Barnum and Bailey Circus. Her life story is interesting and in a book you can read on Google

 During the Great Depression, her circus closed and she and her husband, Charles Meyer, drove their circus carriage into Smackover in 1929. This 1926-27 Ford T-Model vehicle, the forerunner of the modern-day motor home, served as living quarters to Rhene for the next fifty-five years.

In the late 1990's the motor home was removed from its swampy parking space and placed on exhibit at the Arkansas Museum of Natural Resources in Smackover.

Found on http://www.brhoward.com/model_t_motor_home.html  with more images and info from
http://www.amnr.org/goat.htm , https://www.flickr.com/photos/jannikonmcneil/4833845324/in/photostream/  , http://www.arkansas.com/cities/smackover , http://kbeau.blogspot.com/2009/04/goat-lady.html

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