Drives with Dad

Donald D. Erwin, my father, purchased his first vehicle at the age of fourteen (Pictured above). In 1948, at fifteen, he drove it across the country along Route 66, from  Madera, California to Wichita, Kansas. His parents, Kansas refugees of the Dust Bowl, commonly known as "Okies," had sold off their small dairy farm in the Central Valley of California and were returning to Kansas. 

His father tried to get him to sell his car, prior to the move, but he was determined not to let go of it. His Dad relented and let him take it back to Kansas. He drove the 1930 Ford Model A Sport Coupe all the way behind his parents. The trip took six days driving at his father's self-imposed top speed of 35 miles per hour. 

In 2021, Donald Erwin, my father, acquired a similar 1930 Ford Model A. This time a Roadster.

In the Spring of 2023, at the age of ninety, he took a similar trip from the site of his family's old dairy farm in Madera, California to their farm near Neodesha, Kansas,  in the Southeastern part of the state.