Coleman Green

A fine addition to the display

Last year at about this time we bought our tiny RV and brought it home. I remember, years ago, the very first time I brought our large Airstream to our home in Centralia. By the grace of some sort of crazy magic, I managed to back it into our driveway absolutely perfectly.

So perfectly that I never wanted to move it again. Knowing that the stars would never align in such a way again. That the next time, and every time to follow, it would end up cockeyed no matter how hard I tried. I’m just not a good trailer backer upper kind of guy.

But last year, when I bought our tiny little trailer I just parked the thing in the middle of our street, unhooked it from the truck, took it in hand and pushed it right up the driveway and into the garage. Muscle power.

Let me tell ya, it’s pretty easy to back this new trailer up when one just pushes it with his hands.

But I ask myself, why on god’s earth do we actually own this odd little relic?

Coleman Cooler

I mean, camping, sure, we have it for camping.

And there’s a lot of benefits to it for that. I can set it up in well under ten minutes, and that’s awesome. I’ve used a lot of RV’s in my life, including the 28 foot Airstream, the creme de la creme that I owned for a lot of years, but my favorite of all time was a simple, old, plain, pickup camper. Why? Because it was super easy to set up once one got to the campsite. Just like the tiny little 1959 Apache Chief we brought home last year.

That Airstream, hell, I had to have a checklist like an airplane pilot every time I wanted to move the thing. A pain in the ass. Which resulted in it being used a lot less than it should have been.

So yeah, we bought this little Apache Chief for camping.

But, it’s something more than that too.

I think.

Maybe we also bought it for display.

I mean, the thing is almost 70 years old now. And still like new. How many of these things, in this condition can possibly remain on the road today?

And hey, “Pop Up” trailers are a fairly large segment of the RV market today. Essentially that’s what this thing is, just a heck of a lot earlier in the evolution of the idea.

So, I think it is cool to have it out and about, for people to see.

And that’s sort of the deal I have with the State of Washington. A deal in spirit anyway.

State law says that the Apache is so old now that I never have to pay any taxes or licensing for it again. It’s free with its license plate from 1959.

But the State does that because it is assumed that I’ll display it. Show it off. Let people see it. The same deal with classic cars.

So yeah, the State and me, we’ve sort of got a deal. I’ve gotta make it look cool for people who might see it all set up out in the wild.

So, Mrs. Bailey and me, we’ve taken a couple baby steps towards that.

We made a sign, explaining what the hell it is, for anyone who might be interested. (Based on our interactions on our camping trips with it so far, some folks are indeed interested.)

And we’ve got some small items from about the same time period to use while out camping with it.

But today, at an antique festival in our little city, we hit the holy grail. A vintage, all steel exterior (no plastic bottom like on those ‘steel belted’ Coleman’s my family had when I was a kid) Coleman green cooler. In almost like new condition. (At least I assume the thing is about the same vintage as the trailer. It looks to be, and I gotta figure that’s the important thing.)

That cooler is going to look so awesome sitting there with our vintage trailer!

Now coolers have come a long way. I sure wouldn’t want to have to use this thing as a cooler, I don’t imagine the ice would last long at all, and there isn’t much room in it, but it looks super cool! And we’ve got one of those super fancy modern coolers that could hold ice in the fires of hell for our actual cooler use.

This baby’s all for lookin’ at.

But who knows, this might all be an addiction. Mrs. Bailey has decided that tomorrow she wants to drive up to the big city, because she’s found reproduction lawn chairs made to look as if they are from the 1950’s.

Oh, well, I guess we gotta do it.

But the good thing is, those reproduction lawn chairs she found are a great color match to our fine new cooler!