Unsung Heroes: Vintage Garbage & Sanitation Trucks

"QUANTUM SHOT" #647
Link - article by Simon Rose and Avi Abrams

Fighting the Second Law of Thermodynamics: of Increasing Entropy, and Increasing Trash

We've seen ugly, belching Steam-powered Tractors and Steam Buses and Trucks... Today we'll look at the unsung heroes of trash removal - fascinating vintage garbage trucks and lorries, some of them more elegant and sparkling clean than most vehicles on the road:

(images credit: Joe Ross, Michel Ferro)

Interestingly enough, there is a whole slice of vintage collecting culture on the web about these vehicles (see for example this Flickr group and this site). Vintage Commercial and Municipal Vehicles are hard to find in general, and the ones in any good condition are particularly elusive (they usually see a lot of use and little interest in preserving). But garbage trucks are vastly more susceptible to, well... elements, and so would be the hardest to find.

Massive 1958 Pak-Mor Lo Boye unit pulled by a 1958 Ford C-850:

(image via)

Scammell Scarab Corporation of London refuse lorry: the cutest of all! -

(images via 1, 2,3)

Soon after the invention of motorized transport and the appearance the earliest automobiles, the first garbage trucks arrived. There were initially plenty of open top dump trucks, but these weren’t ideal for hauling garbage since they usually attracted flies, insects, vermin and of course did nothing to contain the atrocious smell. In the 1920’s, closed body vehicles were brought in to handle trash collection in major towns and cities around the world. Here are some great examples of garbage trucks from years gone by.

(images credit: Norman Reynolds)

Here is one of the oldest in existence, plus... it's a hot rod / custom! -

(images via 1, 2)

Leach's Garbage Getter built from 1932 to 1949:

(image via)

These two are from France in the mid 1930’s:

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The truck shown below left was manufactured by Detroit’s Garwood Industries in the late thirties. The Heil Company’s vehicles were collecting solid waste in a number of US cities at that time too. These models date from the thirties and forties (below right):

(images via 1, 2)

Here are some more examples from the same era:

(images via 1, 2, 3)

Post-war KUKA Type 210 semi-trailer showing crew seating:

(image credit: Michel Ferro)

Keeping Richmond, Virginia clean in 1950 - and a few more classics from the fifties:

(images via 1, 2, 3, 4)

These two vehicles would have been seen on the streets of Manchester in the UK around the same time:

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FBU 227K is a 1972 TBN Pakamatic beautifully restored by the City of Bradford:

(image via)

This truck from New York collected trash for much of the year, but was also used in winter as a snowplow:

(image via Mark B. Simiele Collection, HanksTruckPictures)

The Gar Wood T-100 series was produced only between 1965 and 1969 - the most efficient bulk loader in the world at the time:

(image via)

This truck would have been seen around the streets of New York in the 1960’s: raw, brute power... -

(image via)

KUKA truck Type 215 from Augsburg, Germany (cut-away view):

(image Michael Ferro, via)

German garbage trucks seem to have the coolest and most elegant design of them all - this is MAN TGA Low-Entry truck from 2008:

(images via)

Chrome-covered, "pimped-out" garbage trucks in Japan? But of course! -

(Nissan Diesel Condor Garbage Truck)

Pink garbage trucks, painted with flowers and playing icecream-truck music? Also in Japan:

(images via)

And finally, after a look at the garbage trucks of the past, how about this one, which we may yet see keeping our cities clean one day in the future: