• This truck has had a bigger part of promoting the history of Trucking in BC than any truck in the museum.

•  This truck and it’s owner Andy Craig were the first truck to drive over the new Coquihalla highway.

• Upon retiring from the trucking industry Andy restored this truck, a twin to his original truck.

• Together they drove around the province promoting a book he had written on the trucking industry in BC.”100 years on Trucking in British Columbia” by Andy Craig (Hancock House, 1977).

• Andy starting trucking driving1929 with a Model TT Ford dump truck owned by his Father.

• Inland Motor Freight was started in 1937 with a Andy and a couple of associates to run freight from Vancouver to Penticton.

• His Book accurately describes the very tough driving conditions of that era: “Washboard, slides, gumbo, and narrow twisting up and down, in and out, on rutted, rotten, dirty roads…

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• This truck was built in 1936, 26 after the company the company started making trucks.

• Originally the company started making Beds as the Marion Iron and Brass Bed company in 1898.

• In 1911 George Harwood and Charles Barley changed the name to Harwood-Barley Manufacturing, then 1915 to the “Indiana Truck Company.

• They produced class “B” Liberty trucks for World War I.

• 1920 they changed the name to the Indiana Truck Corporation and within 5 years had 14 depots nationwide.

• Acquired by Brockway in 1927 and then by the White Corporation in 1932, becoming the Indiana Motors Corporation.

• Published in 1913, a list of “39 Reasons Why You Should Sell Indiana Trucks.” was circulated among sales agencies and the public to push the virtues of the Indiana trucks.

From the 1913 Sales booklet:

• Number 3: Because Indiana Motor Trucks are more dependable than horses and sure in the extreme heat of summer or in the snow and ice of winter”

• Number 17: Because there have been only two advances made in the delivery of merchandise, namely, from the time of oxen, then to the horse, now to the Indiana Trucks, while other systems of manufacturing, sales, and what not have entirely changed”

• The booklet also pushed safety among the new breed of daredevils….the Motorists. “On an even stretch of pavement the temptation is strong to ‘get there.’ TIME is a less important factor than SAFETY, to yourself, pedestrians, and the truck”

• The 1918 line of Indiana Trucks included 4 trucks from 1 ton to 5 ton all with Worm drive, a type of modern differential as opposed to the typical Chain drive of the era.

• A big promotional push by Indiana Trucks was showing photos of fleets of trucks owned and used by various companies, organizations,  governments and even foreign countries and listing them in their sales literature.

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1936 INDIANA 2 Ton

The Museum’s 1936 Indiana has probably done more to promote the trucking industry than any other vehicle in the collection.