American Sign Museum Purchases Vintage Sign Truck

A dozen years ago, in the museum’s infancy, I traveled to California to visit signshops and sign-supply distributors. My mission was spreading the sign-museum gospel. I stopped at Quiel Brothers Signs (San Bernardino), which had connections with the earliest McDonald’s signs. The patriarch, Ray Quiel, graciously showed me around. The first McDonald’s sign had been preserved and still stood down the road.

At some point, we passed through a shop garage. Over in the corner, I saw a vintage flatbed truck with a hand-crank crane. I gasped, “Whoa!” and summoned up my courage to ask Ray, “What are you going to do with that old truck?” He replied, “I bought that some time ago, and we restored it and used it in parades, etc., but it’s been sitting for awhile. Maybe I’ll donate it to the museum someday.”

Fast forward to late 2012. I received a call from Ray’s son, Gary, who asked if I was interested in a 1948 Dodge truck with a 1949 Garland crane mounted on it. He was surprised when I regaled my visit with his dad. I obviously answered yes. I’d get back with him, and we’d talk out the details. Nearly two years later, that truck arrived at the museum on June 24, but what an ordeal it involved. I decided to concentrate on first getting it running, and then contacting shippers who could handle the 22-ft.-long truck.

Paul Greenfield, a friend of Museum Board member Dydia DeLyser, who lives in greater Los Angeles, would get the truck running. Paul made the 120-mile roundtrip commute several times, and was able to get it running, but he couldn’t find anyone to work on the brakes. The bleeder pin on one of the rear brakes was frozen. After much discussion, we decided to ship the truck without brakes, and rely on the emergency brake.

Next, we needed a shipper. Museum friend Bruce Suba (Suba Neon, Scotts Valley, CA) jumped on it, making the necessary calls. He finally found a shipper who would do it for $3,000. But that was back in the September “off-season,” when the trucks weren’t busy. The shipper now wanted $5,300.

Bruce envisioned having the truck shrink-wrapped for the journey. He found a company that would do it for “between $450 and $525.” Though Bruce had provided specs and the description, when they finally saw it, they wanted $1,500. We negotiated $1,200. Counting Paul’s time, we were well over the $7,000 mark in costs to get the truck to Cincinnati.

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I was going to be out of town June 19-22 for the Shipshewana Walldog meet in northern Indiana (see page 64). We all agreed the truck would arrive on Monday, June 23. That didn’t happen. The trucker wanted to “stop and see some family,” so he wouldn’t be here until after 5 pm the next day, which was exactly when I was hosting a judging for our CoSign project.

It was going to be no slam-dunk to get the truck off the trailer: First, it was shrink-wrapped, and we’d have to cut away the wrapping. Second, the cab was stuffed with a 3-ft., Suba-created crackle tube as well as a vintage architectural model of a San Francisco pier, with miniature neon, donated by Bill Concannon (Aargon Neon, Crockett, CA). These would need to be carefully removed. And finally, Gary Quiel had warned me the truck was having a little trouble starting. Then there were the brakes . . . or lack thereof.

As you may have seen already on Facebook, in the end, the truck did arrive at the delayed appointed time of 2:00 pm, and we did get the truck off the carrier and safely into the garage in the museum’s Annex. That is, thanks to Sean Druley, the guy who built all the storefronts and displays at the museum, as well as Todd Ulrich, our “go-to” guys for all things mechanical and anything involving rigging and/or inkjet printing, who dropped what they were doing and beat it over to the museum to de-wrap the truck.

The brave Mr. Ulrich backed the truck down off the carrier with nothing but an emergency brake. Was it worth all the hassle, negotiations and waiting? You betcha!

Again, a big thanks out to Gary Quiel and the Quiel family: Todd, Bruce and Sean.