The Old Rabbiter and the Unic (Update: now in Reno, Texas?)

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This is a story from the time when restoring was something quite different from nowadays. Ivan Taylor was kind enough to dig up the story from his memory  and the photos form his archive.

"I was told by an old rabbiter that he remembered an early Unic car being driven over a bank around 1930 and had willow trees planted around it in order to stabilize the bank because of flooding. When the river flooded it covered most of it up. The river then changed its coarse and the area became grazing land. When we went there to look for it we found the rear corner of the car sticking out of the ground. The question was how much of it was underneath the ground, and the only way to find out  was to dig. The site was on a large back country farm around 130 mile 2 hour trip from where we lived and it took a lot of trips to eventual recover the whole car. Our children were young then and along with two of my friends and their families we made picnic days of it, and the children swam in the river.  We found that it was complete except for the radiator and the engine cover, even the acetylene headlamps were still on it.However we had a major problem the tree roots had grown all through the body and chassis. The body was removed in pieces, and despite winches etc  it wouldn't budge.so some of the bolts holding the axles, gearbox, engine and the differential had to be gas cut. We also had a problem with rising water levels as we dug and a de-watering pump had to be used, but eventually it was all removed piece by piece over a period of around 6 months.There was still the original oil in the engine and gearbox. This car was basically the same as the 1914 Unic which I owned and rallied at that time and one of my friends who helped was gathering bits for his 1910 Unic so we divided it all up between us. The aluminum castings of the engine and gearbox were badly corroded and of no use,  but all the internals were good as being actually driven over the bank everything had been well covered in oil.The chassis became the basis of another restoration, but the body was only useful for patterns. The Differential came in handy when I had problems with my own diff. The engine parts were all used in my friends car.This was all over 35 years ago, my 1914 car finally found its way to the U.S.A. and the other one is still motoring here in New Zealand. 

Editor: anybody who knows what came of the 1914 Unic that went to the USA? 

Ivan Taylor added:  
" A local member has just contacted me as a result of the article, and told me that he saw what he thought was my 1914 Unic on display about 15 years ago in Harrars museum in Reno so maybe that is where it is, or maybe was at that time. The engine block on it was badly cracked and despite several unsuccessful attempts to repair it we decided to sell it. It was not drivable unless a new engine or block could be found. We had motored it doing several thousand miles all over N.Z for 15 years and our four 4 children grew up in it. I sold it to a dealer who said that he was purchasing cars in New Zealand for a newly established Japanese motor museum, but I found out later that he actually sold it along with several other local veteran cars to an American buyer for a great deal more than he paid us."

Ivan D. Taylor, New Zealand.

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