Re: [VAL] a winner~

["Fred Coldwell" <agrijeep@xxxxxxxxx>]

    Scott is on track.  It's serial number, if correct, reveals it to be 
a 1960 22' Custom trailer.  Many of the exterior and interior features 
are from 1959-1960: the street side galley end propane heater and its 
roof vent, the windows, the battery box up front, the air pressurized 
water system, the shallow "Islamic arch" wheel wells, etc.  The toilet 
looks like it has a black water tank but the shower drain is too low for 
a tank underneath, so I bet it just drains to the ground.

    The anomaly is the 13 panel vertical front and rear ends, which date 
from 1949 to 1953, and a few 1940s/1950s layout features, like having 
the rear curb side window provide light for the closet (its too far 
forward to be above the nightstand).

    Perhaps a large tree fell across the center of an early 1950s
trailer and the owners wanted it rebuilt at the factory, using the old
end caps but with most everything else new as of 1960?  Or did the 
buyers really, really like 13 panels and insist on paying to have that 
done two years after that feature was discontinued?  Or was this an old 
company trailer that was sold, gutted, and customized as part of the 
sale?

    Tracing its WBCCI number 2518 shows it was owned in 1960 by two 
ladies, Ruth Emmons of Sidney, Ohio and Nina Phillips of Lima, Ohio. 
Mother-daughter? Sisters? Or very close friends? ;)  I wonder if they 
worked at the Jackson Center factory, which is between their two home towns?

     I've seen a few "Custom" trailer before, but this one takes the 
prize.  It has more "customness" than any other Airstream I've seen.
If only it could talk....!


Fred Coldwell