This a very different “Featured Car” article. Usually suck posts deal with rare muscle cars, customs or terrific concept cars. Today, we take you back to the late 1930’s for a “Glamping” (Glamorous Camping) experience.
It was 1929 and Arthur Sherman of Detroit, MI had an unpleasant camping experience. Not one to give up, he soon built a prototype camping trailer. His children referred to his innovative prototype creation as “the covered wagon” after the prairie wagons of old.
He displayed his creation at the 1930 Detroit Auto Show. Within a year the Covered Wagon Company was established and 117 trailers were sold!
By 1936, the Company moved to Mount Clemens, MI and became the nation’s largest manufacturer of travel trailers. It is estimated that 15,000 trailers were eventually built at a typical sales price of $395.
This restored 1937 model features an industry first, electric trailer brakes as standard equipment.
How does a well to do family pull their new travel trailer? With a 1939 Packard V-12 coupe with rumble seat! The Packard displayed with the travel trailer in the Gilmore Museum is a 68,000 original mile was the very first off the assembly line in 1939. It features optional dual side-mount spare tires, rumble seat, driving lights, radio and luggage rack. Only 12 such cars were built at a price of $4,140.
