Dodge Legends: The Trucks

Walter P. Chrysler Museum Features
Power, Speed and Innovation With
Dodge Legends: The Trucks

The exhibition offers a perspective of many aspects of Dodge lore and legend:

• John and Horace Dodge began their careers as automotive parts suppliers, helping launch both Oldsmobile and Ford. The Dodges introduced their first vehicles in 1914. Personally tested by the Dodges, their products were advertised as "dependable." Dodge owners boasted of "dependability" and put a new word into common use.
• A bighorn ram was among the animals sculptor Avard Fairbanks proposed for a Dodge symbol in 1932. Selling the idea to a dubious Walter P. Chrysler and corporate executives Fairbanks explained the animal was "king of the trail," adding "Besides, if you saw one on the trail in front of you, you'd think—'Dodge!'" Chrysler immediately agreed, "That's it! The Dodge gets the ram!" And it did, beginning with the 1933 models. In 1981 the ram moved beyond a symbol as Dodge Ram became the formal name for the company's full-size trucks.
• Dodge began promoting its trucks as "Job-Rated"—designed for specific service demands—in 1939. Customers met the theme with immediate and favorable response and, after more than six decades, it's still synonymous with Dodge Trucks. Truck collectors refer to the 1939—1947 Dodge models as the "Job-Rated Trucks."
• The Dodge Brothers' special relationship with the military began in 1915 when the Army ordered touring vehicles that proved rugged enough for Army use. Entering World War I, the U.S. took thousands of Dodge vehicles into France as staff cars, trucks and ambulances. During World War II, Dodge built nearly 400,000 trucks that saw service worldwide, as well as tens of thousands of aircraft, marine and industrial engines.
• Of the nearly 400,000 trucks that Dodge built during World War II, more than 255,000 were 3/4 ton 4 x 4 military trucks with a reputation for extraordinary durability. Dodge engineers used the truck, post-war, as the basis for its powerful, versatile Power Wagon models. So successful was the Power Wagon that it remained in domestic production until 1968; it was built for export for four more years.
• In 1939 Dodge was the first truck maker to design and build its own diesel engines for heavy duty trucks. But it wasn't until 1989 that Dodge introduced a diesel pickup, trumping the competition with a 6-cylinder 5.9L turbo-diesel manufactured by Cummins Diesel. The Ram diesel used a turbocharged direct injection engine that delivered 160 hp and 400 lbs.-ft of torque, surpassing many V-8s. The partnership was so successful that more than a million Ram Trucks wore the Cummins side badge by May 2003.