- [Dustin] Names, pretty important!
I mean, after all, everybody has one.
But have you ever really stopped to consider,
why we call things by the names that we do?
Why is the hamburger called a hamburger
when there's no ham in it?
Or why is it that when you have more
than one mouse they're called mice,
but when we have more than one moose,
they're not called mise.
I may not be an English major,
but there's one particular name
that's always made me wonder a bit how it came to be.
Was it the Joe Diffie song from the early 90s
or does it stem far beyond that?
I don't know that, but what I do know is
I'm Dustin, from custom offseason.
You guys can find me @dusty.com on
Instagram and today's video.
We're locking in the four low to find out the history
of trucks and find out just why
they're referred to as pickups.
Let's get it.
If you're a truck guy or gal, just like we are here
at custom offseason and welcome.
Thanks for stopping by and checking out the channel.
We truly hope that you enjoy the content you find.
Also, if this is your first time here
we have this whole website, you can check out as well.
It's called customoffsets.com.
Surprise, surprise.
- What the f***.
- [Dustin] Not only do we have all sorts
of awesome stuff like blogs and other helpful tools,
but we also have a massive collection of aftermarket trucks
on all sorts of wheels, tires, and suspension setups.
So you can check out what fits your truck
and see real world examples of what guys are running.
It's pretty neat if you ask me.
Before, we can get to the bottom
of exactly why trucks are called pickup trucks.
We have to jump head first into our history books and find
out just where the pickup truck was first dreamed up.
The year is 1896. The first Olympic games
of the modern day are being held in Athens, Greece.
John and Mary are the single most popular names at the time.
And people still dressed like this,
while some were busy preparing for the discus
throw at the Olympic games, a guy by the name
of Gottlieb Daimler was busy slaving away in his garage.
See, Golly, thought that there had to be a better
way to transport goods around town than,
with a horse and buggy how right you were Gottlieb.
Thus, the very first pickup truck was born,
effectively known as simply engine number 42 Daimler
invented a horseless wagon that had
a four horsepower engine that was
two cylinders and a displacement of just over one liters.
Yes, it was the size of your Mountain Dew bottle
on the inside of the engine Daimler claimed
that his horseless carriage could carry up to 3,300 pounds.
But many people at the time actually felt
that the claim was maybe a little bit bold
still had it not been for good old Gottlieb here.
The pickup truck of today may never have existed.
Well, while Gotty may have been the first.
It didn't take too long for others to jump
on board.
Soon after several other automotive companies
including Autocar, REO, Auto Wagon
and King, all began producing pickup style utility trucks.
This continued into the late 1910s when Chevy also jumped
on board and began producing their early pickup trucks.
These Chevy pickup trucks were nothing
like the trucks of today, however,
and were actually just a current time Chevy car
with the rear of the cabin cutoff.
Best part about these early pickups was
that they were actually made for the type
of guy who loved to get his hands dirty.
No, it's not what you're thinking here.
They weren't just made for work.
When you bought a 1918 Chevy pickup truck,
you actually had to install the bed on your own.
Can you imagine driving down to your local Chevy dealer
picking up a brand new 2221 Silverado
and having to install the bed at home in your garage
or worse yet, probably your driveway back then? Wild.
Fast forward to 1929 and Chrysler came out swinging.
We're talking harder than Mayweather
in the Paul Mayweather fight last week.
Chrysler saw what was going on in the truck market,
and the growing demand for automobiles that had
functional cargo space on them.
Consumers wanted a vehicle that was built to
handle hauling heavier loads and transporting cargo.
So they made exactly that, in 1928 Chrysler began production
on the first real world, half ton pickup truck
the Dodge Merchant Express, cool looking little trucks.
This Merchant Express would be the first truck,
specifically designed to haul heavier loads and
was the first true half ton truck to be produced ever, ever.
It featured two big round headlights
on the front of the hood, a split steel bar, front bumper
and even at a spare tire mounted right
on the driver's side behind the front fender well.
Well, it was, it was actually kind of neat.
Believe it or not.
As the 1930s came at brought big changes
for the automotive industry as a whole.
Suddenly, companies like Toyota had began
importing vehicles into the United States.
This led to a major shift in consumer demand
in the car market subsequently also affecting the trucks
of the thirties as well, demand in the thirties called
for cars to be lower and sleeker and more stylish
and comfortable. And wow, this was great for cars.
It meant that manufacturers had to rethink how
they designed their pickup trucks.
They couldn't just like hack the back of the frame off,
and slap a pickup bed on there and call it a truck.
They actually had to go back to the drawing board
and engineer an actual function built purposeful truck.
It's important to note here when looking at the history
of the pickup truck, that there seems to be a dead zone
in the history book between the late thirties
and the mid forties, and this isn't by accident.
In case you forgot from your high school history
class that you slept through, this would be the time where
the entire world was in turmoil, fighting the great battles
of the one and only World War II.
Wait a second.
Can it be the one and only world greatest World
War, if there was two of them? Whatever.
Regardless of what was going on before the war
there's one thing that's inherently clear during this time
pretty much every automotive manufacturer
halted production of their vehicles.
And instead focused on producing goods necessary
for the war, companies like Ford
and GM actually stopped production lines and instead
began producing planes for the armed allied forces.
The American automotive manufacturers built tons
of other things during the war like tanks,
radar units, artillery, guns, and even some munition.
Just imagine you're going to work on a Monday.
Everything's fine. You're bolting up six cylinders
in the GM pickup trucks, life is great.
Come into work on Tuesday
and bam you're mounting barrels on f****** tanks.
Pretty crazy also a little bit of a wild time to be alive.
It is what it is.
After the war in 1945 companies had
a bit of ground to make up for this reason.
We really didn't see any movement until about 1947.
When American automotive manufacturers began to ramp
up their truck production efforts, once again.
One of the first to strike while the iron was hot,
was surprise, surprise Dodge but they weren't
alone this time.
By 1948 both general motors and Ford had also jumped
on board with an all new, all awesome,
redesigned pickup truck, Dodge had its B series truck
with its squished nose and bubbly little hood,
GM introduced the model ER pickup truck,
which was the first three quarter ton truck on the market.
And Ford released the very first
of it's now like 160 new generation F series pickups.
As we got into the sixties trucks
developed even further and companies
like Dotson and Toyota introduced small frame pickups
and essentially created the mini truck market
that we know today.
As the years went on pickups got better, faster,
stronger, and more luxurious.
But with all that being said,
why do we call them pickup trucks?
Why don't we just call them trucks?
Despite being around for over a hundred years
there seems to still be a bit of misunderstanding,
when it comes to the actual naming of pickups.
From the early days, trucks were dubbed pickups
because they were simply designed to get this, just pick
up heavy loads and transport them to the next destination.
It's really that simple guys.
Another interesting note to understand is
that most trucks today are designated as half ton trucks,
three quarter ton trucks or one ton trucks.
This actually stems from the very first pickup trucks
which were rated to haul half ton
or a thousand pounds of cargo in the bed.
This is obviously a far cry from the 2200 pounds
that a brand new 2021 Silverado 1500 is rated for.
Regardless of which brand you like best.
It's pretty wild to hear the crazy stories
that made the pickup trucks of today.
What's your favorite pickup truck from the past?
Drop a comment down below and let me know.
I'll be personally reading through all the comments
and I look forward to hearing
from each and every one of you, also if you haven't yet
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guys could want with that I'm done with the custom offsets.
And we'll see you guys on the next one.