1949 Studebaker Truck - No Faker, Studebaker

Dwight does auto body and paint work for a living. The average person might think Dwight's color choice was an easy decision. In reality, that wasn't the case. Dwight sprayed everything from orange, to red, to green on beat-up Studebaker fenders before he arrived at the brilliant pearl blue finish that graces his truck today. If you'd like to use this blue on your truck, it's a PPG fleet color, paint code number 190107, with PPG DBC 2042 clear on top.

Before Dwight painted the Stude, he had to unwind years and years of rust and abuse. Of course, when you pull a truck out of a field, you may have to repair a few bullet holes. After Dwight got the cab and front end ready for paint, his next move was to prepare the bed. Unlike 1852 Studebaker wheelbarrows, the '49's bed is steel. This, along with the absence of running boards, is where Studebakers got the jump on trucks of their day. Dwight shaved the stake holes and frenched the antenna for his Pioneer sound system with MP3 player into the front passenger-side stake hole. He cut out the Stude's steel bed floor. Then Dwight laid in a sheet of steel, welded it in and shot the bed with blue-tinted spray-in bedliner.

Dwight's '49 Studebaker pickup is as sweet as they come. In the eyes of many people, these trucks are in a category all their own. Think about it, how many trucks can you name that look like they came from the factory with a chopped top and a lowered stance? In the first three months Dwight's Studebaker was running, he put over 7,000 miles on it. Dwight says, "The fun thing about building the old girl is always having someone check her out, admire her, or just plain shoot the bull."

Hey, who knows, maybe someday a guy will walk up to Dwight and say, "Yep, 155 years ago my great great grandfather Jacob Studebaker opened up the world's first Studebaker dealership right here in St. Joe."