Old Photo-Highwheeler

[Herb Iffrig]

Another high wheeler with a unique canopy.

[Dallas Landers]

Nice Herb! Love your old photos.

[Mark Gregush]

Phone line crew. (?) Notice two of the guys are wearing climbing spurs.

[HornsRus]

looks like ihc.charlry

[Rich Eagle]

I think Charley's right. Zimmerman came to my mind but not a match. IHC used several different front designs and this is certainly one of them. I suspect those are E&J lights too. I hope what looks like a brace on the leg of the fellow at right isn't from kick-starting.
You find the best photos Herb.
Rich

[Herb Iffrig]

I was thinking IHC too. I wasn't going to say that as I am not familiar with the hood on them being that deep, but I don't know everything about them.

[Duey_C]

My power/light pole outside has hundreds of climbing spur marks. I haven't climbed the pole but I've been up a tree with my spurs.
Unique feeling!
The guy on the ground leaves his belt on. Bet he uses the ladder as his pantlegs aren't rumpled from the straps.
Excellent photo Herb!

[Wayne Sheldon]

Sure do look like pole spurs to me! Tree spurs have longer spurs to cut through the tree's bark and find something solid enough to hold a man's weight. I have my dad's old set of pole spurs out in the garage. He was really good on them. Could go up and down a pole like a squirrel. I used them a few times, but never often enough to get my balance quite right (harder than it looks!). I also still have both his and my belts. I used to climb a lot of towers (dad did also). Needed the belt for those. Towers we serviced ranged from little piddly thirty footers up to way over two hundred feet! I also still have the gym pole. Lifting ten foot sections up to over a hundred feet in the air and assembling a tower ten feet at a time is just plain HARD work!

I agree the vehicle looks like an IHC. A longer wheelbase, so likely not a really early one. But that front style ended about 1911. I can't help but wonder if that fancy top is to protect workers sitting in the truck if the guy topside drops his wrench? (I also still have a few hard hats!)

Neat stuff! Thanks to Herb for sharing the photo, and all for comments.

[Dallas Landers]

I climbed the pole with the yard light on it 20 years ago when we moved here. Never tried that before then and havnt since! Never thought about checking for rot in the pole till I was near the top at about 20 ft. It was wobbling all over and me trying to reach the bulb, it dawned on me .
How old is this spindley little pole and there is no chance to jump free strapped to the dang thing with the leather belt around it. I finished the job and returned my buddys belt and spurs and decided to never borrow them again!

[Wayne Sheldon]

Dallas L, I know what you mean about feeling uneasy on that little pole. I always thought it was funny that of the many dozens of different towers I climbed over thirty years, and some of those towers I must have climbed over a hundred times. One of the towers I climbed probably more than any other one, was somewhat over a hundred feet near the top, and I would often have to lean way out to reach the antennas that needed adjusting or repair. I would often need to reach farther than my belt would allow, so I would reach out unbelted! (Don't tell OSHA although there really isn't much they can do about it now!)
So what was the most scared I ever felt on a tower? Some stupid little piddly thirty footer improperly installed on a hillside so that the sliding hillside pushed the tower over about twenty degrees. Someone before we were called in had tied a rope from the top of the tower to a nearby tree, but the rope didn't look very good. I had to climb to the top to repair a failed antenna. The tower bowed and twisted due to the improper installation and stresses of leaning over, the rope stretched, the joints of the tower groaned. I was only thirty feet off the ground, but felt so unstable!

[Philip Lawrence]

Most definitely an International. The wheels,hood and spark and gas levers under the steering wheel are the dead giveaways. My former father-in-law owned a 1910 IHC highwheeler very similar to the one in the photo, it is still in the family. He bought it from the original owner who was an old Norwegian farmer. My father-in-law knew of the car all his life having grown up on a neighboring farm.
He told me the story that how the old farmer would very diligently oil and grease everything on the International, make sure the gas tank was full and that everything was in good working order before going into town in it. He also said if the old farmer was in a hurry to get to town he would hitch the team of horses to the wagon and go into town with the wagon because that was faster!
Just as a side note the farmer also was the original owner of a 1912 Henderson 4 cylinder motorcycle that my father-in-law purchased with the IHC. That was back in the late 1950's when you could still find that kind of stuff in barns.