Jeff Ogden's 1937 Chevy 1/2-Ton Pickup Truck

16 March 2007
# 1883

From Jeff :

           Here is my 1937 Chevy 1/2-ton pickup truck. It has a 1957 235 hooked to the original driveline for now and will have a S10 5 speed and rearend sometimes in the future.

           The original owner was Fedders Supply in Franklin, Ohio and my great Uncle bought it sometime in the early '50s to use on his farm. My Uncle drove it on the road until 1958 when the brakes went out. Then he just used it around the farm and ran into stuff to stop. Than he let the block freeze up. So then it went into the woods.

           He gave it to my Dad in 1970, who put a motor in it but did not do anything else to it. My Dad gave it to me and I tore it apart to restore in 1976. I did not get back on the road until 2000. Here's a view of the interior.

           Recently, I bought a reproduction 1937 sales book off eBay. It's a interesting little book as it shows models I never knew existed. It seems to show more for the 1.5-ton trucks than anything else but I am glad I bought it. I was hoping to see if there were any pics of a factory 1/2-ton flatbeds to see if the side racks I have that came from mine were original GM. I also wanted info on the auxiliary rear springs like mine has, but it only had info for those parts on the 1.5-truck. I did not know a 1.5-ton pickup and Canopy Express were made and one would be neat to have -- but they all probably got beat to death.

           I have a mysterious '55 to '62 235 or 261 water pump I am trying to identify. I took this pump off a '47 to '53 Chevy 1.5-ton truck in a junkyard over ten years ago and it looks to be a factory shortened pump. I need to install it in my '37 since the shortened pump with the too small pulley broke and went into the radiator. The pump in question has a real shallow pulley that is about the same size as the crank pulley. I think I can find someone locally to rebuild it. Or if I can't, I need to find the original application so I can use it for a core and get the same pump.

Jeff Ogden
Bolter # 3145
Dayton, Ohio