A single axel truck, gas at that. They were more than one in my town.

Two of my uncles had such trucks. One made a living at it, kept a pretty new truck and hauled livestock, grain, whatever. The other had a small diversified farm and pretty much stuck to hauling cattle.

Do they even make straight trucks anymore? 1936 - Dad was driving Bernard Wirkus's truck from Arkansas to Iowa with a load of lumber. He came over a hill near Atlantic and ran into another truck that had slid on the ice. The load came forward and smashed the cab. Wirkus had put his feet up on the dash to brace himself and really messed up his back. Dad was cut and bruised quite badly. They spent the night in the hospital. In the morning, Dad went to look at what was left of the truck. A guy standing there explained to him that two men had died in that truck yesterday. I have a picture of the truck somewhere. On another note, I have a toy stake truck - 1954 or 1955 IH that I've had since then - missing the stakes, though.

All, they do make straight trucks. Jodi Witzers hauling a load of lime rock.

How about non-dump trucks?

I grew up in a small blue collar town where many of the small dairy farmers owned dump trucks that they used to haul gravel May thru October and plow snow on town or state contracts November thru April. That was back when towns would harvest gravel from stream beds during low water periods. They can't do that anymore, as it causes silt that impacts the Atlantic Salmon that have been attempted to be reintroduced in many New England river systems.

IIRC, a lot of those small dairy farmers also drove school bus routes and did other odd jobs to put make ends meet.

I'd sell all of mine if I could. Unfortunately, I need them in order to sell product. I'm glad that I don't have to actually make a living off of them.

Dad did it with a single axel dump truck, backhoe and bulldozer growing up.

We did allot of work with that equipment.

Drive my wife crazy when we're out driving around and I point out a driveway, foundation, or pond that we dug.

Sorta wish I'd gone that direction for my career too. But the recessions hurt and when times were good we were sun up until sun down.

-Jake

Started my trucking career on a 10 wheeler, corn beans ,bulk fertilizer and anything else I could get to haul

Anyone test their box by hauling water before trying to haul flax?

That's what rags and a flathead screwdriver are for, at least for wheat. Flax might require better solutions.

End dump shown in the picture is pulling a pup trailer, so not a true straight truck. You can see the tongue and safety cable angling from behind the left rear dual. Increases the payload about 80%. I am sure the operator is savvy enough to take advantage of every option available. Unit looks like a nice, well cared for setup.

John, a friend wallpapered overheard bins in his corncrib to hold flax.

When I
Was a kid the man who lived and owned my farm hauled everyone’s cattle
And pigs to market no dot refs or cdl he had a nice truck and worked it hard
He also
Did custom
Square baling terracing with a terrace plow
He worked real hard and was proud of the fact he bought 1200 acres without going to the bank
I farm 600 acres of that not the best farms but they were cheap
And profitable for him
As there was no intrest payment

They used to haul a detailing crew to the field, and wait all day till quitting time.

I've got a couple of customers that haul in two axle trucks, and my son runs one for local distribution. Long haul goes on the semi. No sense running 46K gross when you can run 90K.

Sure the make straight trucks.
Single axles too, but mostly diesel.
Fuel/propane for home delivery, refrigerated for store deliveries,
roll backs, wreckers.....even single or tandem dumps but they mostly go to township
plow use.


As Dutch says, why haul half a load.

Gas is a deal breaker.
Run a big block gutless POS getting 5mpg, grossing 25,000#,
or a 14 litre diesel getting 5 or 6mpg, grossing 73,280#.

Here ya go

Very rural Utah water tank truck

Keeps the 'stock tanks full

That is a serious water wagon!

My dad used to drive part time for a guy named Fred Ford. Fred had a straight truck that could be used to haul cattle, pigs or sheep. Once in a while dad would take us with him to go to Des Moines and we hauled bagged feed from a mill in Des Moines back to Winterset. Another guy in town named Shorty Thompson had a fleet of dump trucks, water haulers and cattle trucks. His cattle trucks were always at the Madison County sale barn every Tuesday. Shorty might of been 4'8" but he had his own little kingdom.

It wasn't hard to find someone who could haul pigs, cattle or sheep back in those days. 99% of them were straight trucks. Many farmers had sides on their pickups that could haul one or two cows and 6 or 8 sheep or pigs. I think the side boards were made by a company named Omaha as I recall. I haven't seen one of those for years. That was back when an average farm was 80 acres and they had 3 or 4 kids who got on a school bus every day.

kwg

That would be Omaha Standard pickup livestock side racks.

kwg

One of the old straight cattle truck guys would run an ad in the county paper every year.

"Wanted: Riders to the Sydney, IA Rodeo Aug 11-12"

He would put a few lawn chairs and straw bales in the bed and haul people 70 miles to the rodeo. Kind of a primitive party bus?

"Rance" was the truckers name and as he became old he was famous for bashing into loading chutes and barn doors as he backed up to load.
It got so when he came in our driveway he would get out and my Dad would put the truck up to the barn.

30 years after he passed I was backing my cattle chute up to an alleyway to work some cattle. I bumped it pretty good and heard one of the guys holler, "Come on back Rance!"

You could spot a pick up that had hauled a few cows from a mile away.