Gary Winebrenner, 79, had something he wanted to do while his health still allowed. He wanted to take his wife Esther Knapp for a ride in a very special car. He accomplished that in late September, just about six months after a doctor told him to get his affairs in order. Winebrenner is now on borrowed time, as the saying goes, but Esther’s ride in his replica 1901 Oldsmobile is off his bucket list.
Winebrenner explained that he saw a picture in a magazine about four years ago of the replica, made with a wood body and a metal frame, just like the original. He had been building Model T race cars with Dennis Powers of Ogden. Powers drove a Model T Winebrenner helped build in a 500-mile race in Montana. “That’s what made me think to do it,” he said.
He has no special training in fabrication, but in the years he worked as a hired man on a farm, he learned all the skills he needed. He didn’t work solo on the project. Keith Conroy and Larry Monthei helped him weld. Bob Owens helped, too.
The plans Winebrenner had for the ’01 Olds called for a frame of 1” X 1” steel. “That didn’t look stable enough to me, so I made my own specs,” he said.
He used 1″ X 2″ steel for the frame, a golf cart axle lengthened out to 29 inches for the front axle, heavy duty utility tires from a yard cart, and a Kawasaki 14-hp lawnmower engine. The car is chain driven, with a trans axle from a lawnmower to drive it. “That’s the way the original ’01 was, with chain drive,” Winebrenner said.
The car has tiller steering like a boat. It has one forward speed and reverse.
Winebrenner had built the frame and the axles two years ago, but got distracted from the project. Last March, while wintering in Texas, he was diagnosed with stage 4 cancer in his liver and pancreas. The doctor’s prognosis was six months. He came back to Iowa and did a three-week course of chemotherapy. “It didn’t do anything. They told me to go home and get my affairs in order,” he said. “So, to give me something to think about, I finished this car. I knew nobody else would.”
And that’s when he went to work on the wood body. The car has a wood bench seat, which isn’t comfortable, but according to Winebrenner, it’s what cars used to have. As fall approached Winebrenner lost his strength and his pain increased. He persevered until the car was finished.
Aside from headlights and taillights, which he added “to get along with the law,” the car is very similar to the original. He took Knapp out for a ride around their Jefferson neighborhood Sept. 30. “That was one thing I wanted to get done, to take Esther for a ride,” he said. “The only problem I had was I got passed by three turtles. I didn’t build it for speed,” he said, still able to tell a joke.
“It was neat. You sit and think this is how they used to get around all the time,” Knapp said. “He was like a kid in a candy store. For him to take me for a ride was worth everything.”
One of Winebrenners earlier plans was to have the car in the Bell Tower Festival parade. If he’s unable, his sons Larry and Kary have been recruited to do that. It won’t be the first Winebrenner replica in a festival parade. Years ago, Knapp rode in a replica Model A Ford Gary had built of parts.
Knapp said her husband hopes people will take notice of his accomplishment in finishing the ’01 Olds. “He wants people to see what you can do when you aren’t supposed to be able to,” she said.
The couple has gone to Texas for another winter. The future is uncertain.
