Today, I drove to Springfield (45 miles west of Columbus, OH) early in the morning to go to the IH Nationals 2011 show while Panna went to a birthday party. I had a frustrating start on the day in the parking lot. I was inside the swap meet area before I realized I left the camera on the side step on the jeep! I ran back to get it before it would disappear. The second time, in the same place, I realized I forgot my extra camera batteries in the jeep. I had to enter the show three times!

Onward to the show. There was a large parts buying/swap area when you first walked in from the parking lot. Here was where you could find all kinds of parts for just about every car out there. About halfway through this area, I saw a blue King's Midget convertible micro car that is chain-driven by a rear motor and has a front trunk. These cars are about one-third to half the size of a VW beetle and were made in Athens, OH for about 20 years after WWII.

Next to it was a Simplex 125 motorcycle, made by said company in New Orleans, LA, making it the only motorcycle company in the Deep South. Since I don't know motorcycles, I will say that they were made between 1935 and the 1960s.

I finally got up to the IH exhibit area and looked at the scouts and other vehicles made by International Harvester. There were Scout 80/800/II models as well as panel trucks and pickups from various decades. The first is an 18-wheeler tractor.

This one is a Traveler, not a Scout II. While they look the same, there are a few visible differences just from the side. The Traveler has a 118-inch wheelbase, while the Scout II has a 100-inch wheelbase. The Traveler has a longer, but fiberglass top with a single-piece hatch gate in the rear. The Scout II has a shorter steel top and a separate lift-gate/tail-gate. Otherwise, the two models look identical, including the doors, front body, and the rear-opening hood (notice how it's hinged at the front). The second photo is of a Rallye Scout II for comparison.

Here is a nice-looking KB-Series pick up truck.

This is a Scout 80, probably a 1960-1961, maybe even an early 1962, which you can tell by the door sliding windows (notice a black strip running up and down in the middle of the window in line with the slant of the windshield). You didn't roll up or down these windows; they were slid up and down. Another feature is the vacuum-operated windshield wipers hung from the top of the windshield from rather at the bottom. Another feature making this an 80 rather than an 800 series is the front grille with IH in the middle. How I know is because my Dad had an 80 with a full top that ran to the rear (what you see is a half-cab with a bulkhead installed behind the seats to make a pick-up out of it). This versatile thing could be configured as a pick-up like this, an SUV with a full hard top, a panel truck with no windows in the full hard top, and even take the hard top and doors off, and lay the windshield down on the hood and strap it in place (which is what the little things on the top windshield frame and center of the hood are for) to make for an off-roading runabout. I had fun riding in Dad's 80 as a kid up to 9 years old.

The one my Dad had was like this.

Only it was this color with the white full hard top. It was strange to approach one of these and imagine what it was like getting into one as an adult instead of a child. They were a bit smaller than I remembered them to be!

This is a monster from the early 70s called the Travelall, weighing over 4,200 pounds dry. This was sold to families or owners who needed more room and more towing capacity provided by the 204-inch body sitting on a 119-inch wheelbase. This is a beautifully restored vehicle (as all the ones at the show were!). What's interesting is that GM didn't sell a 4-door equivalent until 1973. However, IH stopped making the Travelall in 1975.

This pick-up truck looks to be a C-Series model from the mi-1930s, according to the hood and grille design.

This pick-up truck, one of the last standards, is the Travellete, available in 2 or 4-wheel-drive, either a 2-door or 4-door crew cab.

Here is a beautifully-restored 1960s Travelall B-120!

This is an example of a Scout 800 convertible. Another difference between this and the 80 is the design of the dashboard.

The red pick-up appears to be a 1957 A-Series. "A" stood for Anniversary, the 50th anniversary of the company's truck production.

The next one here is another example of the C-Series from the mid-1930s set up with stake walls to extend the height of the bed.

I will share a couple of stories on the vehicle owners. One is a farming couple, a man who bought a Scout II for his wife in Austin and had it restored. She can drive anything on the farm, automatic or manual. THAT, I respect. I also thanked them for being farmers, one of the backbones of this country. Another is a man named Big Al, who is the original owner of an IH pickup bought in 1970. It looks like it came off the showroom floor that day! The story is that the man and his family traveled the country when it had a four-wheel camper on it. I wondered about the stories the pickup would tell if it could talk. I ran into the president of one of the scout owners' group back in Texas. We talked for maybe two minutes and then went on.

While I was there, I went to the booth for Super Scout Specialists, based in Springfield (where this show was being held), to pick up a few things like metal decals for the transmission and transfer case shifter handles for my Scout II, the owner's manual for the Scout, a book on the history of the Scout series, and an IH key fob for the Scout (as I have one for the Jeep and need to hide that one when I'm around Scout people - it's a Scout-vs-Jeep thing). They are nice people and are one of the top Scout/Light Line dealers I would recommend. I went to another booth, IH Only North and met Jeff Ismail, another dealer I would recommend buying parts from. I have bought parts from him for my Scout restoration.

Here are more photos.

Anybody remember seeing these as a kid?