This is an ongoing story about a 1950's travel trailer and our efforts to restore it back to using condition. It chronicles our purchase of a "Canned Ham" and our attempts to bring it back to using condition to simply enjoy and have fun with.  I am not a woodworker or craftsman but I am going to try and get through the restoration process with a minimum of frustration and angst.  I did enjoy doing the bright work on our 28' sailboat over the years but have never done a lot with my hands or tools. We do have a wonderful network of folks who are handy and who are craftsman including some folks that have done incredible restorations of these fun little trailers. 

My wife and I first became acquainted with the Canned Hams in the 70's when we bought a 50's Shasta that we used at San Onofre Surfing Beach and on a road trip to Washington State (during the Mt. Saint Helen's eruption.  We loved the wood and the utility of it and eventually sold it for more then we paid for after a number of years.

My wife was in Utah this year and called to say she had found a trailer in a vacant lot very similar to our old one.  Looked fairly clean and intact.  Here's a picture of where she found it as they were just driving by:

There she at...in a fellow's lot with shoe polish signs in the window

She sent me a phone picture and said they were asking $800.  I said offer five and see what they say.  Well they said yes to $500 and we were the new owners of (what they called) a 14' 1959 Shasta trailer.  Two new tires and a bearing repack and she towed it back  to our home on the eastern slope of the San Gabriel mountains.  We parked it out front of our house for easy access to work on it and started to inventory what we had to work with.  We bought a water/snow repellent cover as we live in an area that can get several feet of snow.  I also began to research what we had bought and how we were going to fix it up.

First thing I discovered when I checked the VIN number on the tongue was that this was no Shasta....it was a Catolac Deville that was made in El Monte, California.  If you believed the VIN number... it was made in 1952 but according to some folks who have worked on Deville's, they think the 1959 number might be accurate.   No matter to us but someday I would like to solve the mystery of when the trailer was actually built.  Here's a few more pictures from the Utah lot:

I told her to offer $500 cash and walk away if he didn't take it.   

He took it

The paint job looks in pretty good shape and the body has small dings but nothing major.  The interior looked pretty good at first glance.  More on that to follow.

I'll post more pictures of our initial findings and how things have evolved.

I'll leave you with a picture taken on our front porch here at our place.  We are already blessed to live in a beautiful surrounded by nature.

Our morning coffee view....