American Towing and Recovery Institute onThe Go
American Towing and Recovery Institute onThe Go
Honoring Towing Pioneer Johnny Grant EP2
This is a replay, we are honoring Johnny by sharing his remarkable story
RIP Johnny Grant
What if you could step into the shoes of a towing industry pioneer? Get ready to hear from Johnny Grant, a retired veteran whose career in the towing industry spans over several decades. Starting from his work at a service station in 1955, Johnny operated a variety of wreckers such as the Manley mounted on a Jeep and the Holmes 525. You'll hear firsthand accounts of the challenges and techniques used in those early days, from V-bars and chains to more advanced methods. Johnny also shares his experiences at Morningside Motors and reflects on the industry's evolution before his military draft.
As Johnny takes us through his post-Army return in 1965, you'll discover how he transitioned from sanding trucks to a significant role in the advertising department following a tragic loss. Johnny's stories shine a light on the changing landscape of towing equipment and practices, including a resurgence in classic tow truck designs. Finally, we extend our heartfelt thanks to our loyal listeners and exceptional podcast team, acknowledging the collaborative spirit that fuels each episode. Join us for this nostalgic and informative journey through the rich history of the towing industry.
Welcome one and all to the American Towing and Recovery Institute podcast. This is your podcast to promote safety, education, positive public relations and networking within the professional and business-minded towing and recovery industry. This is your host, dj Harrington, better known as the Toe Doctor, and I'm honored to have as the other co-host of this special episode a 40-year towing industry veteran, the founder of American Towing and Recovery Institute, a trainer that has done more than almost 890 classes hands-on throughout the United States and Canada, and a real good friend of this podcast and a good friend of mine, the one and only Wes Wilburn. Wes, how are you today?
Speaker 2:DJ, considering the heat wave and everything else going on, I think I'm doing pretty decent. I hope you're doing good.
Speaker 1:I'm doing good. I'm learning how to drink Gatorade Right. By listening to you and this podcast, I learned that, stopping of getting overheating, instead of drinking the water or a Mountain Dew, I was better off getting Gatorade, so that's what I did yesterday. I had two Gatorades, so it was excellent.
Speaker 2:Well good, it's good to hear that you're staying hydrated. That's, of course, important for everybody.
Speaker 1:So we have that special guest today. Is that what you want to start with?
Speaker 2:Yeah, we have Johnny Grant back for a part two interview. We're excited about that. Without further ado, Johnny, would you mind kind of reintroducing yourself A little bit for the listeners that missed last week's episode. And I got a list of questions I want to ask you about.
Speaker 3:Okay, I'm Johnny Grant. I was retired From Miller Industries. I worked for Ernest Holmes Company For 20 years Before I went to work for Miller and I was in the private towing business since I was 15 years old, and that was 10 years before I went to work for Ernest Holmes, which was in 1965. I've been in the corn industry ever since, until I retired about four years ago. I've enjoyed every minute of it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's awesome, johnny, one of the things I talked about last week and I'll reiterate this week you're one of the very few individuals that actually have operated the tow truck in the commercial world and worked for a major manufacturer. And not only that working you know for what you've been through with homes and century and whatnot. Very few individuals in the world well, nobody in the world has that kind of experience of operating a wrecker, working furnished homes and all the other factory experience. I got so many questions. I want to ask you about your first day at home, but I want to start out with asking you about your first towing job. Where did you start? What kind of equipment did you use? Anything you want to share with us about, as you got involved first time in the towing industry?
Speaker 3:Well, the company I worked for was actually a service station and a garage.
Speaker 3:And they did everything except automatic transmissions. They did the engines and everything down to making the keys of the car. But they had three wreckers. They had a Manley which was mounted on a Jeep, a Willis Jeep, four-wheel drive, and they had a 525 Holmes on a 51 Chevrolet and then they had what they call a GI wrecker. It was an old military wrecker and I'm not sure I believe the truck was a Studebaker. I'm not sure I believe the truck was a Studebaker but it was actually a World War II better and it had the Traffic King record on it which was an eight-ton record.
Speaker 3:I started making them in 1940 and continued making them on up to 1953. It was not my favorite record to operate because it was complicated. 525 was real easy to operate. I loved that thing and 525 was a 12-ton. Naturally the first one I operated was a Manly because it was small and I was small, so it was. I don't actually remember the first car I went after was the 525. And back then they didn't have a tow sling, they had V-bars, they called it, and we picked the car up with chains and then the V-bars. He fastened them to the chains with a hook. It was not a real tight hookup. It swayed back and forth on him. He hit a very big bump where the tow bar'd fall off. He'd have to stop and you know, readjust it.
Speaker 3:I think the first car I pulled in was a 53 Ford and it had just broke down I don't know maybe the transmission to the 53 Ford.
Speaker 2:And what year was this that you went to work for these folks?
Speaker 3:1955.
Speaker 2:Okay, so that's an almost brand new car at that point.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it was. I was 15 years old when I started.
Speaker 2:So you worked there for a little while. How long did you work there for?
Speaker 3:I worked there until 1958, the first time Then I was offered a job with the people that had the 850. I took that opportunity and went to work for them and actually worked for them from 58 to 63, when I got drafted into the Army.
Speaker 2:So what was the name of that company?
Speaker 3:It was Morningside Motors All right, We'll come back.
Speaker 2:All right. Well, I've got questions about Morningside Motors and the Army. We'll take a quick break and come right on back.
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Speaker 1:You've been listening to the American Towing Recovery Institute podcast with Wes Wilburn, DJ Harrington and today's special guest, Johnny Grant. Every week, we bring you new and informative episodes. Make sure you download and listen. We are available on Spotify, iTunes, Pandora, Google Play, Stitcher, iHeartMedia, Amazon or wherever you get your podcasts. And this has been great with Johnny Grant. And just before the break, Wes was going to do a follow-up question, so, Wes, let me turn it over to you, buddy.
Speaker 2:Tell us about your towing experience with Morningside Motors.
Speaker 3:Okay, okay, they were one of the two. No, they were three heavy-duty tours in Chattanooga and they were one of them and they were the only ones that ever had an 850. They had several wreckers. They had anything from a homemade up to an 850. They had 650s. They had the first 750, which was a prototype, and it was designated a 700X. And then they had a 600 prototype that was called a 600X and it was actually like a military 600. It was a little bit heavier cable and a little bit heavier boom than a regular 600.
Speaker 3:600. But anyway, I got the benefit of driving those units, which were brand new stuff at that time, and it was quite an experience to be able to do that. They gave Morningside Motors quite a bit of experimental stuff to use so they could evaluate it and after anything broke on it they'd send several of the engineers over there to look at it and see what broke and what caused it to break. And then a lot of times they'd re-engineer that part and put that part on and see how it worked.
Speaker 3:And along the way I got to operate the first 295 truck hitch and we had more boom. I have an idea it was probably experimental when they got it and I used it several times. That was before they came out with expendable booms you know, on the 600 and 750.
Speaker 3:But the Admor was quite a piece of equipment. Quite a piece of equipment. It was awkward to get it installed and, you know, get it taken off, but it served the purpose. At that time we used it to pick a safe out of a second-story window. That's the only time I ever operated it.
Speaker 2:For the listeners that may not know, atom War was a mechanical jib piece that you would mount to the bed of a home unit to give you. What about 20 foot of reach? Something like that.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it had sections to it and I think the sections were about six feet each, so you could buy as many sections as you wanted to. So I think we had three sections in ours, but you could like the name of the thing was you could add more sections to it, but we had three in ours.
Speaker 2:Let's go back to that truck at the 295. About what year was that and what do you remember about using it the first time?
Speaker 3:and what do you remember about using it the first time? That was probably 19, I'm guessing 1958 or 59, because I said before I want to work for Holmes and they called for us to bring that thing over so they could take pictures for the parts manual and for the advertisement. And so I took it over there and they hooked it up to about an F-800 Ford truck and then got their picture taken and made their catalog sheet and all that. I think that's the only catalog sheet they ever found. I could be wrong, but they used that one for a lot of years.
Speaker 2:I think you're right, Johnny. I do believe you're right. I know it was a picture used when they introduced it. I can picture it in my mind right now on the brochure.
Speaker 3:I thought that was really discussed. You know that I'd made a picture for the brochure.
Speaker 2:Oh, I bet, I bet you knew that would be a big part of your life later on, huh.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah.
Speaker 2:So you said drafted by the Army in 63?.
Speaker 3:I got drafted into the Army in 1963.
Speaker 2:Yes, sir. First of all, thank you for serving. Did you do any recovery in Army operations or what did you do?
Speaker 3:I was in a maintenance outfit and I worked on a small arms and artillery as a repairman. But I did do one tow job that had a service and a back with the people that did the wrecker. The wrecker company fell under that and we were on a field problem in Germany and one of the trucks got stuck and the guy that was in charge of the wrecker didn't know how to operate the winch. So I volunteered a real simple job, you know, but that's the only time I touched a wrecker and all the time I've been there I see Again.
Speaker 2:Thank you for serving you. Come back home from the Army. What did you do at that?
Speaker 3:point. I went back to work for Morneside Motors, worked for, worked for them for about well. Actually it had changed hands into the Morningside Motors. This is A1 Motors. It was the original owner's uncle that took over the ownership of it and operated A1 Motors. He kept the 850 and the 750 and the 600 and sold all the rest of them. They had a 500 on a one-ton truck. That was the smallest one they had and they got rid of it. But I was always working for somebody else besides the manufacturer. I always had another job, you know part-time.
Speaker 2:All right, we'll come back to that. That's superior talent shortly after you went to work for Holmes, as you told us, yeah, yeah. So let me ask you this your first day at Holmes, what was your first day like? What was the first job they gave you to do there?
Speaker 3:Well, they hired me into working the paint shop. I was one of the sanders that sanded down the bodies. And that was my first day at work that was about my first day at work. That was about my first year at work was sanding bodies down, but they made you know they welded up their own records and bodies and they would not use Blondo in it.
Speaker 2:Right, johnny, why don't you hold that? Saw, we've got to take a commercial break. We'll come right on back, okay, okay, thank you, thank you.
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Speaker 1:You've been listening to the American Towing and Recovery Institute podcast. I want all the listeners to remember to like, review and share everywhere and share everywhere, and you always have the opportunity to call the podcast hotline 706-409-5603. If you'd like to hear more about people like Johnny Grant, you know, 82-year-old legend of the industry we that are in the industry have stood on his shoulder and that's the reason why he's a guest on this podcast. But we've had Tommy Luciano, Bill Georges, Brian Riker, Mike Frazier and so many more, all archived in the American Towing and Recovery Institute podcast. Remember, if you want somebody on the podcast, dial 706-409-5603. And before I break, Wes was just about to ask Johnny a little bit more about his career alright, so let's take a picture here.
Speaker 2:It's 1965. You just returned from the army. You're in good physical shape. I have to imagine with Shaq you've been in good physical shape your whole life as far as I've known ya, and you've been sanding trucks down for homes. Who doesn't use any bondos. I imagine they want to say it's perfect. At this point I've got to ask the question was there any personal protection? Did they give you a mask or anything? Was there a fan in the room or how was it? Describe the scene to us, johnny.
Speaker 3:Well, they had a brand-new tow booth that just installed the paint booth, I should say it had air blowing through it with fans and big filters that filtered out the you know the things that didn't want to get into the paint, and that was a new concept at that time.
Speaker 3:Right and so the painter actually was painting with the pans going, pulling the dust and stuff away from the body, the dust and stuff away from the body. But another thing I did was back in the 60s and before they used stripes on the tailgate. It was a pretty standard thing back then and they had four-inch stripes and you could pay a little bit extra and get stripes put on your record. And that was my job was to put the stripes on and I put the stripes on a mini record down there and that wasn't too bad. They had a pattern that you used and had magnets on it and you placed that pattern where you wanted it. Then you put the tape next to the pattern and as time went on that kind of went away. I can't remember seeing a bricker with stripes on the tailgate in a long time, but I always wanted to put them on.
Speaker 2:There's a few of them I've seen in the last few years that are coming back to those old Chevron stripes. But yeah, you're right, there was a time that was on the back of every tow truck. You're working at home and then somehow you move into the advertising department. Didn't you Tell us about how that worked?
Speaker 3:Well, what actually happened? One of the most well-liked guys in the whole place down there had worked in a shop and had worked on 850s and he got a chance to move into the sales department actually in parts, he used all the parts of everything and his name was Moe Sliger and one of the finest persons I ever met down there, and his uncle was the shop foreman and he pretty well ran the place. But anyway, to make a long story short, mo Slater and Bob Freeman, which was the sales manager, and a couple more guys, guys, I don't remember. One of them was Bob Freeman's brother-in-law and they went out to one of the airfields to fly.
Speaker 3:One of them had an airplane, I don't remember which one, but anyway they were taking turns riding the airplane and when it came Mo's turn, something happened to the plane when it was climbing and the throttle I think the throttle broke and anyway it just came plunging back down to the ground and Mo eventually died Mo and Frank Falk Freeman brother-in-law. But he killed Moe and they had to replace Moe and so they put it on the board. You know, anybody wanted to come in there and replace Moe and so I put in for it, and there's about 30 people applying for it, but anyway I wound up and got it, got that job, which was a big break for me.
Speaker 2:And what were your main duties for that job?
Speaker 3:Well, I went from the paint shop down to the demonstration building, the demonstration building. The demonstration building was when the customer came in we checked his truck in and when he left we checked it out and showed him how to use it. If he didn't know how and back then there were a lot of people who didn't know how to use it they were selling to service stations mostly. Of course now that's not the case. Back then they'd send their mechanic up there with the truck, get the record put on and we'd show the mechanic or whoever the person was that sent up with a record, and showed him how to use it if he wanted instructions. Most of them did want instructions, but every now and then you'd get somebody that knew what to do and didn't need them.
Speaker 3:But a lot of them needed instructions back then and we had a car that we keep available to pick up to another how to pick them up with the tow lane. And then, well, actually I'd take them. You know, if they wanted senior recovery, I'd show them some tips on recovery. Most of the records back then were either 440s or 500s, but we did, you know, we showed people how to use 850s and everything in between if they wanted them. So I'd try to give them a good demonstration and some of the tips that I'd learned along the way, and it was quite an interesting job, so back then somebody would show up with a one-time trial, and then what?
Speaker 2:a day or two later, was it that they would be driving home? How long did that process take?
Speaker 3:The one-time stuff. They could do them in a day. They'd get there at 7 o'clock in the morning and they'd leave at 5 o'clock most times and they could do. I've seen them do as many as eight records a day, but they got pretty proficient along the way, you know, and they got good on it. They couldn't do the painting job that fast.
Speaker 3:They'd paint a record a hair time but they'd paint it piece by piece and then they'd install it and the only thing they had to do was what they call touch up, where they'd use the mounting hardware you know it'd be just raw metal and to keep it from rusting they'd paint overall the raw surfaces and that was one of my first jobs was a touch up. They called it the touch up mat and they used the same paint that they painted the record with and that little can, that little paint brush. And go around all the raw bolts and nuts I did that for about a year. Go around all the raw bulk nuts I did that for about a year. You get to meet a lot of people that way and it's not a bad job. That was a real interesting job to get to meet the people, the customers.
Speaker 2:So after that, what did you move to? Was that when you moved into the advertising situation?
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:A lot of the great home dads from the 60s and 70s feature Johnny. One of them in particular, advertised in the Home 600, shows him bringing a car straight up a cliff. The picture's iconic and it's in the World telling the recovery history of the World Book and also out there all over the place. I want to talk about some of that rigging you did and whatnot right after the break. Can you hang around for one more break with us, Johnny?
Speaker 3:Sure.
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Speaker 1:We want to thank all of our listeners. You've been listening to the American Towing and Recovery Institute podcast with Wes Wilburn, dj Harrington and our special guest today, johnny Grant. By all means, folks, we can't thank you enough for continuing listening and sharing it with your friends. Without further ado, let me pass it over to Wes Wilburn for his final questions with our dear friend, johnny Grant.
Speaker 2:So what I was saying as we went into the break is there's some iconic pictures Johnny's been responsible for, and Johnny tell us about your transport multi-advertising crew and how they worked and all that you want to share with us.
Speaker 3:Okay, want to share with us. Okay, that picture you're referring to was pulling a four-door automobile right straight up the cliff. I'll have to tell you the rest of the story.
Speaker 3:The first one I did was a Falcon, but I had used the J-hook to hook onto the Falcon and you could see it in the picture. That's the way we did it. You know, away from the factory, jerry Holmes saw that and he said he said no, we're going to have to reshoot that. In all honesty, you're not supposed to use the tow hook for recovery work. That's not the purpose of it, although it's pretty handy to get to some things. But anyway, that's the reason we reshocked it with the Oldsmobile and the right kind of hookup.
Speaker 2:The way Johnny had it rigged when it cleared the cliff wall. He had two lines rigged, one of them off the tree, and he was going to have the whole unit rotate around to the back of the truck. I mean, if you study that rigging, it was just masterful. Yes, that's the word. Masterful. It was excellent, johnny is what I'm trying to say. What's some of your other memories of working with the advertising firm? Were they employees at home? Was it an outside agency?
Speaker 3:No, it was an outside agency. They'd make an all-night job out of it. They must have been getting paid by the hour, but they'd start out probably 9, 10 o'clock in the morning and would place it where they wanted, and then they never could get the right angle of the sun until about going home time. Then they'd get it, but they'd make a day out of it. They were an interesting bunch of people.
Speaker 2:You stayed with Holmes until they sold the Dover and then give us a quick rundown of how you got from there to Miller, if you don't mind.
Speaker 3:Okay, I was the last person to leave Holmes. They kept me down there just to show the property to people that were interested in buying it, and so that was my main purpose. Holmes had turned into Chattanooga Equipment, which was like a distributorship, but it was owned by Holmes Company, and I stayed there until they sold Chattanooga Equipment to Bob Krauts out of Nashville. They had offered me a job with Century, which had just been sold to Miller.
Speaker 3:And of course I knew a bunch of the people up there that had already gone to work up there Left Holmes on a Friday and went to work for Miller or Century on a Monday, so I was not out of work at all. Things were different up there the procedures and all that and I had to learn some new things, but it was some really good people up there. Still are some really good people up there. There still are some really good people up there, absolutely. They've lost some people to COVID this last year and they've lost some good people with health issues in the past, but there's still a lot of good people up there.
Speaker 2:I agree with that, Johnny. I can't thank you enough for being here and sharing your information with us, and we can't thank you enough for being here today, and I do appreciate you. I want to thank all the regular listeners. Please keep liking and sharing and writing a review for us. We appreciate all those things. Help get the word out about the podcast DJ Chuck. Sharing and writing a review for us. We appreciate all those things. Help get us get the word out about the podcast DJ Chuck. April. Everybody did a great job, as always. Kim Wesley, the whole staff has been very helpful with things. So I'm just thankful. And until next time, listeners, we'll, we'll talk to you next week.