July 1999
July 11
Ed. thanks for the color photos. They are outstanding and are the first color photos that we have received of the Parade of Progress in the 50's. Sometime in the future I would like to take the photo of all the Paraders that is in front of the Futurliner and the one with all the Paraders in their suits and identify as many as possible. I was wondering if you could take that on. I have a list of some of the Paraders and their addresses and maybe with that help you can identify everyone. Let me know.
July 11
Bruce Berghoff the author of "The GM Motorama-Dream Cars of The 50's" was here during one of our work sessions. He also was an employee of H.B. Stubbs the builder of all the exhibits in each of the Futurliners. He left a series of notes that I am coping to J.M. Smith and others. I am going to ask JMS to have Cara to follow up on all these items. If any of the other people that I have copied have information pertaining to these people or subject matter let John or myself know. The following is Bruce's notes:
CROSSROADS EXHIBIT - (Now at the Chicago Museum of Science and Industry)
+ Sound system designer (early 50's) was Bart Blett (817) 338-2853
+ Sound system builder (late 50's) Bruce Berghoff (H.B. Stubbs Co.)
+ Exhibit construction drawings should be still available from GM Design staff (Larry Erickson at the Tech. Center might be of assistance!). (I will follow up on the GM Design staff people)
GENERAL PHOTOS - Anne DeCamillo (Corp. sales staff-director of shows-Ren. Cen.) should have a loose leaf photo file (saved from Lon Weithley and Bob Roberts files) with selected shots on the tour.
(I will followup and get the GM contacts here.)
EXHIBIT MECHANISM DESIGNERS/BUILDERS
+ Nelson Phillips (former head of GM engineering staff show section-now retired in Warren or Novi area).
(Does any one know how to contact this Mr. Phillips?)
+ Bud Shosey-former assistant to Phillips. (location unknown)
(Again does anyone know how to contact Mr. Shosey?)
PURCHASER/SELLER OF MOST OF FUTURLINER FLEET AROUND 1959
Richard Knapp then President of "Anchor of Michigan" Div. of O'Neill Enterprises of Cleveland. As I (Bruce) recall Dick said he paid approx. $300 each for close to 10 Futurliners. Dick lived in W. Bloomfield until the 1970's running Anchor Motor Freight of Michigan (Chevrolet Haul away nationally). Dick would be about 73 years old and is probably in the Cleveland or Florida area. He might be reached through O'Neil Enterprises in Cleveland. (Again any leads would be helpful.)
We have some information here that needs tracked down so any other leads on these people let us know.
July 29
John, had an excellent visit with a member of the GM Parade of Progress. He was on the Parade of Progress the last year from January 1956 until the close of the program. Douglas and his wife Irene spent 5 hours with us today. Douglas was able to detail a lot of information that continues to fill in the gaps of history that we are putting together. I would highly suggest that Cara spend some time with Douglas. He has some excellent slides and he has put them on a video for me. After I review the video I will send it to you and then you can forward it to Cara. With the static display that Cara is working on for the museum I would suggest that a repeating video be put together on the Parade of Progress. Douglas has all the equipment to do this and this is really his suggestion. This is something that Cara could work on. So please pass this on to Cara as she does not have an e-mail yet.
Now I am going to list a review of some of the facts about the Parade of Progress as Douglas related to me.One Futurliner was used strictly as an office. The doors were raised and the stage lowered and then walls were rolled out by hand on each side about 2'. The walls were rolled out much like a modern motor home except they were not motorized.
This office Futurliner Douglas has been able to point out in photos that he brought. It was used by the people in charge of the Parade of Progress.
Also the office kept statistics of the number of people that attended the show. Paraders were stationed at each entrance with hand counters. Another person was send around each hour and collected the counters and replaced them with a new counter. They kept records of attendance for each hour. This was done every hour of every show.
All the Futurliners had power steering pump problems.
Coming down a mountain the brakes on one of the Futurliners failed and crashed into the rear of the next Futurliner. This 2nd Futurliner was considered totaled and taken out of service. Since it was near the end of the program, it was not replaced.
The Michigan State Police were given two Futurliners. One good operational Futurliner which was set up as a Michigan State Police "Safety Liner" and a 2nd (the crashed one) Futurliner to serve as spare parts. Both later ended in Chicago (Bortz Auto Collection, Highland Park, IL).
GM's "Previews of Progress" was a show put on by GM and running at the same time. Although it was similar in content, it consisted of two men in a station wagon that went around to junior and high schools putting on science demonstrations. To become qualified to be a lecturer on the Previews of Progress you had to apprentice at the Parade of Progress.
It took the entire crew to put up the tent and it took a 1/2 day. It was a lot of physical labor.
Douglas was one of the science lecturers.
Douglas believes that there was a 2nd tent because it sustained a lot of wear and tear.
Once the tent was up a special constructed trailer was pulled up. The entire side dropped down to form a stage and the top raised up to form a roof. This was not a Futurliner.
In traveling they were instructed to maintain 300' separation to prevent accidents. They also all had radio receivers and the lead vehicle and tail vehicle had two transmitters.
The Futurliners carried the nicknames "Red Elephants".
The paint color they refereed to as a Cadillac red.
Douglas had a deck of playing cards that were given out that had a Futurliner and a modern sketch of the Parade of Progress. Now you collectors go out and find a couple of decks.
Old Scout ( the 1902 Olds on the Parade of Progress) has disappeared according to Douglas. Does anyone know of its whereabouts?
Douglas took all of his slides and turned them into a video presentation. He did an excellent job and is willing to help us to do the same for the Museum. He has all the equipment.
On a personal note, Douglas is married to Irene (Macy). Irene believes that she went to high school with Bruce Berghoff. Irene graduated from Coley High School in 1948 with Bruce. We will check this out.
Douglas left us some copies of photos that he took during the "Parade". We will add this to our collection.
