Motion Pictures The Long Long Trailer - How did they do it?

Hello all! New to the HAMB, came over from the Garage Journal.

Hopefully my first (real) post here presents an interesting question.

I have loved the movie "The Long Long Trailer" since I saw it the first time.

What I am wondering is how did they tow that trailer with a car? (two different cars if you want to get technical) I was used to seeing trucks and SUVs towing travel trailers, not cars.

What kind of modifications would have to be made?

 

I think- back then- cars is what you used. Pickups were very low geared and small cabs. They were used for work. Traveling was done by car. Now, that is a huge trailer and may be a bit big for a car...but you gotta remember the cars had big V8's...but manual drum brakes

 

Looks like a set of wheels under the tongue?

 

First there is a tow dolly under the hitch so the only thing the Merc was doing was just the pulling.

Second, its called "MOVIE MAGIC" as the trailer was just an empty shell and movies are never shot in sequence anyway so after the still shots were done and the interior was done on a stage, it was gutted for the travel scenes

 

The car was a Merc not a Caddy & if you watch the movie you see the dual tires under the front to handle the weight. The Merc was just a pull push rig.

 

I'm not sure I understand what you're asking.

If you mean, how did they make a physical connection, almost all cars up until the late 70s or early 80s had full ladder frames, not all that different from the pickup trucks of the day. All you needed was a hitch- between the heavy frame and battleship-thick bumpers, there was plenty to bolt to.

And more than a few companies made hitches- one company even made bolt-on, off-the-shelf tow hitches for my '66 Toronado, and I had to remove a tow hitch from a '77 Corvette once, in order to drop the gas tank.

If you mean, how did the car manage to pull it, again remember that most medium and full-sized cars of the day had big engines. 396, 400, 427, 429, 454, 455, 460 even 472s and 500s. My Toro's '68 455 was rated at the brochure at 385 HP and 510 ft/lb.

If you mean weight distribution, that would depend on the car and trailer. Depending on how the trailer was loaded, even something that big could have a minimal amount of tongue weight. And even if not, again, the aftermarket of the day was full of "load leveler" shocks (either air shocks or coilover) as well as airbags that went inside the coil springs, "helper" leaves that added onto leaf spring packs, and so on. Find an old JCWhitney from the late sixties- they used to have twenty pages of that kind of thing.

Doc.

 

I don't remember any "Cad" pulling the trailer. I saw the movie when it originally came out and a couple of times since. As I remember it, the tow car was a '53 Mercury with an automatic transmission. This is what makes the OP's question relevant. "Big V8"? I don't think 255 cid qualifies. Having had Ford flatheads since the mid '50's, I always questioned Lucy and Desi's choice of a tow car. I do remember that they were featured in the original introduction of the 4 passenger Thunderbird in 1958; maybe it was a sponsorship thing. I would have insisted on a Lincoln, however.

 

There's a 2 wheel dolly under the tongue taking the weight The trailer had surge brakes if I remember right and its about a 27 footer campers are bigger than that today!

 

and a lot of two lane, curvy roads. Plenty of towns to crawl thru and stop signs and traffic lights. No high speed interstates.

And We old guys remember traveling along and having to pass the geezers towing the campers. On two lane roads. They are in no hurry and going 25mph. We gotta get past them, wait for a dotted line and clear lane and go for it.

 

Jeez, does no one remember the period from the 1950s through the early '80s??? Cars were the predominate travel trailer puller! Big Imperials, Chryslers, Cadillacs, and Lincolns. Lots and lots of full-sized sedans and wagons from nearly every manufacturer! Plus, highway speeds were generally slower in most parts of the country. You could easily tow a 22' travel trailer with a '64 Chevelle, or a '58 BelAir, or a '55 Ford. Most of the travel trailers then were single-axle rigs (some with brakes, some without!) that towed very easily. A Hudson guy I know has pictures of his '53 Hornet coupe with a 308 Six and HydroMatic, with a 25' travel trailer in tow, and the pics are from 1957. My Grandfather towed a 12' U-Haul trailer cross-country with his entire family (nine people) in a 1937 Terraplane...in 1947. His car had the 212 slasher-oiled flathead Six in it!

And, keep in mind, today's biggest and most ginormous RVs practically require a 3/4-ton or one-ton (some heavier!) truck or an SUV, because virtually NO car is made these days that can tow more than 1500# or so!

The larger (up to 26' or so) frame-pull/tag trailer RVs can be pulled with a modern 1/2-ton pickup these days with ease...meaning nearly ANY previously-described '50s through early '80s CAR can pull one, as long as the proper hitch and cooling is present.

If you wanted to tow an RV back in the day, ideally, you'd had a station wagon, or perhaps a Travelall, Suburban, or a Jeep Wagoneer. Pickups generally had the slide-in overhead campers...used to see them ALL the time in the Sixties and early Seventies!

 

In 1957, My parents pulled a 42 foot house trailer from Michigan to Florida. The tow vehicle was a 1956 Chrysler Windsor with a huge trailer hitch and helper springs. No interstates, and the mountain stories were told for years, but they made it and lived in that trailer for several years.
One more thing, they left in Jan. with snow on the ground.

 

Heck , all I want to do someday is tow a teardrop trailer behind my shoebox ... what a waste , I guess !

 

It's been a bit since Ive caught this on TCM, but I do remember a scene where Desi brought the Merc (the car generally accepted, there is also a Lincoln in some scenes) over to a shop to get it set up to tow the trailer. They welded on a hitch, sold him the dolly, got the trailer brakes set up, and then the mechanic rode home with him to teach him how to drive it, TRAILER BRAKES FIRST!

Anyone who hasnt seen it, its a fun movie and worth a couple hours.

 

The whole point of this is that they did it with a stock '53 Mercury convertible with an automatic no less. That's a 255 cid flathead. Chryslers, Cadillacs. etc. etc. don't come into play here. I guess you would have have to have seen the original movie to appreciate this post.

 

I also think that was why the Lincoln was subbed in a few scenes, to make use of the heavier car/drivetrain.

 

When this movie came out, all of the people my parents knew could relate to this. We were pipeliners and lived in trailer homes year round. Of course we didn't pull with the cars, but with the welding rigs. Usually a Ford 1 ton or a Dodge power wagon. We moved all over the USA and Canada living in one of these things, 8 ft wide and 32 ft long. Five in my family, more in others. I went to nine different schools when I was in the fourth grade. A hard life? You bet, but I had good experiences and lived all over the country.

 

I've seen the movie several times, thanks. And, notice I said in addition to Cadillacs and Chryslers "lots and lots of full-size sedans and wagons from nearly every manufacturer..." and described several instances with cars more in size with the Merc in the movie.

Read the whole post instead of homing in on two or three words.

 

got to remember back in the old days you had a lot more room to stop since there wasn't many cars on the road, and the ones that were didn't stop for shit either.

going out today thinking "well Ricky and Lucy did it" with the same rig would probably get you in trouble quick.

 

You can pull a huge trailer with a little car, stopping them is another story! I worked for a local RV dealership when I was about 19 years old and delivered a lot of used trailers to people. Some of the units had to be delivered to a camp ground that was all single lane roads and huge hills. The largest trailer I had to set there was a 40' POS. By the way, the tow vechicle I used was a 1986 S-10 long bed 4x4 with a 2.8 V-6. I didn't get anywhere fast but 4-wheel low would drag those beasts up some pretty big hills! The owner had a big diesel dually but it never left the garage unless he was driving and he only worked 1 day a week!

 

This is one of my favorite movies! The trailer was a 40' New Moon, the car was a '53 Merc Monterey conv. except for the mountain scenes where a '53 Lincoln Capri conv. was used. The mountain scenes were filmed at Whitney Portals, just west of Lone Pine, CA.

O.K., this is where I'll be accused of serious B.S.:

I know the guy that owns the trailer. This is the story he tells: the trailer was stored on the DesiLu lot for several years but was towed to E. Oregon in '69 and used as living quarters for Lee Marvin during the shooting of Paint Your Wagon. The trailer is still there. My friend bought the property several years ago and inherited the trailer. Over the years it has had one side opened up and a room attached. It hasn't been lived in for years and is in pretty rough shape. My friend is in the process of selling the property now.

Here's the funny part - he's never seen the movie!

I haven't been to the property so can't verify the story, I only know this guy to be truthful, he's a car guy, owns a very cool '40 Ford coupe and a '34 Vicky.

 

My folks lived in mobile homes in the mid 50s till the early 60s traveling from freeway construction jobs around California. They towed thier 38 foot mobile home with a 54 Mercury monterey 2 door ht (originally automatic, later changed to a 3 speed stick). One time IIRC towing from southern Cal north the merc was overheating so dad put a hitch on his 31 model A coupe with a '57 283 & a pickup 4 speed, (with the original rear end!) and pulled the trailer over the grapevine! No BS, I have seen 8mm movies of this combo going down the freeway and still photos of the car and trailer at the Gorman service station. The car has holes under the rear of the body where the hitch was bolted to it but the front of the hitch was welded to the center of the rear crossmember. I swear this is true and correct!

 

Hey, haven't y'all seen the bolt-on/clamp-on trailer hitches on old cars in junkyards? Believe me, if you could get a ball to fit, they'd hook most anything in the line of a trailer behind even a 6cylinder Chevy or Studebaker or flathead six Mopar and drag it across the coun try.

 

Last summer I passed a guy on the NYS Thruway pulling a double-axle Airstream behind his very stock-appearing '55 Ford 2-door sedan. And yes, I've seen just clamp-on balls on bumpers of all kinds of old cars.

I've pulled 7500 lbs behind a 1/2 ton Suburban with just a stock 350 for power - getting it going isn't a big deal. Stopping it is. Hills can be tough. I had someone tell me they once towed a great big dump truck 2 or 3 miles to the scrapyard with a 4-cyl front wheel drive 80s Plymouth of some sort. Must not have been any hills for that one.

 

Check out this "long, long trailer" trailer

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nxx4ijz3aig

 

I went to that movie with my folks when it first came out. I was six at the time. Great comedy that doesn't very often get matched anymore.

 

From your title at first I thought you were going to ask how they kept Ricky from killing Lucy in the movie?

 

You mean Nicky and Casey

 

the Southwind RV i own weighs about 7 tons and has a Chevy 454 and TH500 trans. no overdrive, no diesel, no two-speed rear axle. in essence, it's a 14,000 pound Impala that's 33 feet long. really, it's a fullsize car engine, nothing more, coupled to a normal automatic three speed. like almost every car from the 60's.... just ginormous!

 

yep. they switched between a Mercury and Lincoln for pulling up the mountain scenes. Unlike Ford and Merc, Lincoln had an OHV beginning in 1952 (not a FLATHEAD). Used a GM Hydramatic transmission. Ford and Merc didn't have the OHV until 1954. believe Canada was still using flathead in 1954.

 

From the Vintage pics mega-thread