Backwoods Beauty #14224

The Story

Here sits yet another vintage Ford F-1 model pickup truck from the 1950s. Once they were everywhere during their work lives and today, they’re in nearly every junkyard too. This one sits partly under the trees in the Georgia outback with plenty of permanently retired brethren around it. Like tombstones in a graveyard row, they line the dirt road through the overgrown scrub of an old-time junkyard. That’s the best kind, of course.

Belonging at one time to a country radio station, this one was painted to attract attention having a red body with yellow fenders all around. You can see a little bit of their advertising with a western boot on the door. Living in partial shade, the glass has a heavy cover of lichen that’s completely opaque. This truck is totally blinded. Rust pokes through the paint and lichen layers. As a shooter, the door hanging open was great for compositional purposes.

I let the short arc of fresh greenery growing in front of the pickup truck be the center of the composition. The bright green of newer leaves was a good contrast against the red, not to mention some ironic contrast of new against the faded and decaying Ford. No doubt, it’s good to have a foil to use as a photographer. Even an old Ford truck like this can use a little dressing up to look its portrait best.

I really enjoy these old Ford  F-models and they usually turn up in any vintage junkyard. If I had the time and the ability to wrench one of them, I would, and I’d certainly drive it often. Why drive one of these old soul wagons? Just because, and to me, it would be like the Pharoah going down the Nile while out driving down some old two-lane blacktop road.

Here’s another similar Ford truck in better shape sitting out behind a barn in Virginia called Tumbleweed #14461. I don’t think it will happen for either, but the blue truck from VA stands a better chance of being restored than the red one shown here.

If you like vehicular junk with character, you can also see my entire collection of vintage pickup trucks in the Junkyard Pickup Trucks gallery.

Location: a junkyard in rural Bartow County, Georgia backwoods.