An Iowa couple has sold ice cream out of a 1967 Ford truck for 38 years
Kate and Bob Shaw watched the gang, ready patiently subsequent to their 1967 Ford F-250.
Their previous truck, parked inside strolling distance of West Okoboji Lake, on Iowa’s Little Millers Bay, sparked a flurry of exercise in mid-September, as a gentle stream of smiling adults approached and walked away with free frozen treats and dessert at a desk dinner. It occurred. Not a child in sight. Mere adults, many speak about childhood days spent chasing ice cream vans down the road.
This truck spends its days and evenings touring to lakefront resorts and seashores within the northwest nook of the Hoke State. The distant location makes it faster to journey to Sioux Falls, South Dakota than Des Moines to achieve the attractive hamlet similar to Traverse Metropolis, Michigan.
As instances change, and traditions come and go, the Shaw household stays behind the wheel of their previous ice cream truck, which was inbuilt Michigan and different states in its day. This truck has bought ice cream its whole life. First as No. 32 within the Pied Piper truck fleet in New Jersey, after which, when a truck driver purchased the red-and-white Ford and introduced it again to Iowa as a present for his spouse in Spirit Lake as a result of he thought it wanted to do one thing, Kate Shaw mentioned.
Everybody on the town cherished the ice cream truck when it began, Bob Shaw mentioned.
“We chased him,” he mentioned. “However she solely ran the shop for a month or two. Years later, I began my very own paint retailer and this woman got here in to purchase paint and I mentioned, ‘What occurred to your ice cream truck?’ She mentioned: That is the proper factor on your spouse and youngsters.
One factor led to a different, and Bob Shaw took the ice cream truck dwelling to his spouse on their 18th marriage ceremony anniversary: Could 30, 1985. (The truck’s mannequin yr is the yr the 2 had been married in Neptune, Iowa, in St. Joseph.) The church, constructed on farmland donated by Kate’s great-grandfather.)
“That truck was parked within the alley subsequent to the Catholic church, the place it had been for 4 or 5 years, and timber had been rising round it,” Bob Shaw mentioned. “We opened the freezer door and it was clear and sanitized. We charged the battery, began the truck and drove off. We had been within the ice cream enterprise.”
Kate Shaw added: “And we’ll be doing this for 38 years. If we will do that for one more two years, we’ll be 80.”
75 cents then, $5 now
Dad and mom of six youngsters, 4 of whom bought ice cream, bear in mind these early days fondly. They met strangers who would develop into buddies. A selfmade Krazy Equipment ice cream sandwich, which incorporates a vanilla sq. between two Rice Krispie treats, bought for 75 cents in 1985. It now prices $5.
“For our fiftieth marriage ceremony anniversary, Bob requested me what I wished to do,” Kate Shaw mentioned. “I mentioned I wished to drive the truck throughout the state and provides away free ice cream.”
So, after the summer time season was over, they stopped gross sales on Labor Day 2017 and drove throughout the state for 2 weeks making a gift of Blue Bunny ice cream giveaways. The couple spent the nights with household and buddies. They spent days visiting soccer video games, police stations, highway development crews, nursing properties and services that assist folks with particular wants. The cease on the Amish faculty was unforgettable.
“The children had been barefoot,” Bob mentioned. “The trainer requested if they may say a prayer for us.
“Being from Pennsylvania, I all the time say that native-born Iowans do not know how good they’re. And this entire journey exemplifies that. We had cameras on the truck. At some point my son will gather them.”
Nostalgia fuels our lives
Matt Anderson, curator of transportation on the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, acknowledges how vehicles can outline the moments of our lives.
“Autos are bodily hyperlinks to our private previous. We become older, the world round us modifications, however that previous automobile or truck nonetheless seems to be the identical,” he mentioned. “Get behind the wheel and every part is precisely as you bear in mind it. It is highly effective, and it may be very emotional too, relying on the reminiscences created with the automobile.”
The Shaw youngsters are all grown up now. They do not trip the ice cream truck anymore. They dwell in Iowa. Las vigas; Portland, Oregon, Canada. A belief delivers the truck to any little one who returns to the Lake Okoboji space to dwell. However Kate and Bob Shaw mentioned they do not know if that can occur.
So they may cherish these subsequent two years greater than ever, with the busiest time working from late June to mid-August. Meaning working seven days per week, Bob Shaw mentioned.
The truck is in nice situation. Bob Shaw paid for the whole restoration about 35 years in the past, with your complete truck stripped to the body and disassembled.
“I cried,” Kate Shaw mentioned. “The truck was torn up. It was simply mendacity all over the place.”
Their buddy Ray Tucker, a retired mechanic, retains the truck working, she mentioned.
They even visited Joan Byrd, the ice cream truck proprietor who got here up with the concept to place Kate Shaw behind the wheel, at a care facility in close by Estherville, Iowa, final summer time to present her some ice cream and take a photograph. As a result of Bob and Kate Shaw mentioned life is about giving again and spreading pleasure.
Candy begin
That is the story of a pair who met in Le Mars, Iowa, the worldwide headquarters of Blue Bunny Ice Cream.
Bob was promoting chocolate bars to boost cash for the Fellowship of Christian Athletes when he met Kate, the “cute financial institution teller on the drive-thru window.” He had moved to Iowa from New Fort, Pennsylvania, in 1963 to play middle for the Westmar School Eagles soccer staff. He stayed busy instructing college students and driving the bus for public faculty as properly.
The couple dated, married, and raised a household. They adopted their first little one, slightly boy named Hudson, when he was 17 days previous. They’d go on to have 5 extra youngsters.
In 1972, Bob obtained tv and newspaper consideration when he started teaching the Vikings soccer staff at Wesley Excessive College in Corwith, Iowa. He mentioned they had been having fun with the longest shedding streak within the state on the time.
“We gained our first soccer sport and we could not imagine it,” Bob mentioned. “I mentioned I did not know a lot about these youngsters however they’re farm youngsters. They’re large and robust and we will win soccer video games. Apparently, nobody knew something about soccer. Each manure spreader, tractor and machine.” The home was within the car parking zone. College for coaching. These youngsters had been away from their father to follow soccer. They had been good youngsters.”
Finally, Bob and Kate Shaw moved 86 miles west of Corwith to Spirit Lake, a resort city, the place they spent most of their lives collectively.
Bob ran a store offering paint, framing, glass and locksmith providers for 32 years earlier than retiring to work the ice cream truck full time, spending evenings making reminiscences with Kate.
And with pleasure comes tragedy
To today, Kate Shaw talks about her 4 demons and her angels. A mom of six buried two younger youngsters.
Docs informed the Shaw household to organize to lose their daughter Angie at a younger age as a result of she had a uncommon genetic dysfunction that causes bodily, cognitive and different medical challenges referred to as Cornelia de Lange syndrome. She died on the age of 5. Their wholesome son, Hudson, died unexpectedly at age 3, when Angie was about 9 months previous, after contracting a viral an infection that lodged in his coronary heart, Bob Shaw mentioned.
“It was onerous to do away with the couple,” he mentioned. “You both flip to medicine, alcohol or God. We received fortunate and turned to God.”
Grateful for the previous, and searching ahead to the longer term
They take a look at their lives, their youngsters, and the folks they’ve met.
However now, they each solely drive the truck across the Iowa Nice Lakes area in northwest Iowa, however largely within the standard Okoboji space. They began accepting bank cards three years in the past. From 2 to 4:30 p.m., youngsters ages 8 to 14 assist with ice cream gross sales and discover ways to run a enterprise. On the finish of the day, it is simply Bob and Kate Shaw driving the truck from 6:30 p.m. till darkish.
“A truck is only a truck,” mentioned Jonathan Klinger, a board member of the Automotive Restoration Program at McPherson School in McPherson, Kan. “We, as people, ascribe worth to it and provides it that means.” “This ice cream truck is the centerpiece of years and a long time of joyful reminiscences.”
Enterprise homeowners have been changing Ford autos for greater than a century, serving as the premise for every part from ambulances to fireplace vans. Ted Ryan, Ford’s director of archives and heritage model supervisor, mentioned the corporate can not verify what number of vans had been transformed to promote ice cream, however Good Humor’s fleet numbers had been within the hundreds within the Nineteen Sixties.
Shaws’ ice cream truck has been put away for the season as of late.
The Shaws focuses their power on internet hosting international alternate college students, and this yr a younger lady from Italy attends Spirit Lake Excessive. Different visiting college students had been from Germany, Switzerland, France, Australia and China. The daughter of an alternate pupil of 33 years is coming to stick with the Shaw household subsequent yr as a part of a college challenge to work in a group and be taught English. You’ll work in Okoboji however not within the ice cream truck.
Seeing the world, celebrating life, and honoring loss is important to Kate and Bob Shaw.
Final weekend, the Shaw household held a particular social gathering for his or her daughter Angie’s fiftieth birthday. Households from South Dakota, Minnesota, Missouri and Nebraska attended to be taught what it is prefer to have a baby with Cornelia de Lange Syndrome.
However with loss comes reflection.
Many credit score him with their previous truck.
“It was an ideal factor for my spouse and children whereas I used to be at work,” Bob Shaw mentioned. “Then once I retired, it grew to become the spotlight of our summers. It introduced a lot pleasure and happiness to everybody and particularly to us. Kate and I’ve a lot enjoyable collectively. We by no means know the place we’ll find yourself or who we will see.”
Editor’s Notice: Phoebe Wall Howard caught up with Kate and Bob Shaw in the course of the annual Okoboji Writers’ Convention in Iowa in mid-September.
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Contact Phoebe Wall Howard: 313-618-1034 or phoward@freepress.com. Observe her on the positioning previously generally known as Twitter @phoebesaid.
