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Lower Similkameen home to many classic and old car enthusiasts

Cawston’s Ken Helm leads the pack with his vast collection of old and unusual automobiles
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Dodge Brothers offered such things as brass water pumps and electric starter - generators to their 1914 touring car. The electric starter was an innovation that “emancipated” the female drivers of the day.

Keremeos’ Kars Under the “K” event will be bringing hundreds of car enthusiasts to the Lower Similkameen this weekend, adding to the growing number of like minded individuals already in the valley.

Probably one of the best known - and most knowledgeable - old car buffs is Ken Helm of Cawston. Helm is known far and wide in North American  antique car circles for his vast collection of vehicles, collected in a nostalgic setting that evokes images of the travelling countryside of  a long distant past.

Helms’ current project is a 1916 Dodge Brothers touring car.

“The Dodge Brothers started out building bicycles in Canada,” Helm begins. “They eventually bought a machine shop in Detroit and started making Oldsmobile parts, until the Olds factory burned down.”

The brothers then entered into a partnership with Henry Ford’s company, gaining seats on the board of directors until parting company in a buy out and starting their own motor car business in 1914, armed with 45 million dollars in start up capital - a  tidy sum for 1914.

The Dodge currently being put together in Helms’ garage represented the company’s first effort on their own.

The Dodge brothers teamed up with the Budd Body Company to create the first all steel car. Up to that point, vehicle bodies were a combination of metal and wood, which weren’t as durable.

“Their original order was 5,000,” (chassis) Helm related, “their second was 50,000.”

Helm picked up his Dodge in two main pieces, some of it coming from Tappen, B.C., and some from Riverside, WA.

“The engine had sat unused for 60 years, and took six weeks to get apart,” Helm said, describing the difficulty in getting the long seized parts free.

Dodge utilized a brass waterpump in the vehicle, as well as providing a magneto ignition with a combination starter / generator.

“This car represented the emancipation of women as drivers,” Helm said, “as it was no longer necessary to crank the vehicle by hand to get it started.”

Dodge was also inventive with respect to the material used for the wheels, providing steel wheels at a time when wooden spoke wheels were the mainstay. The car also used Firestone’s  new “non skid” tires - the words “non skid” raised on the tire to form the treads. Two sets of mechanical brakes stopped the car - from the rear only, as front brakes weren’t yet considered necessary.

Helm had hoped to have the Dodge ready for the Kars event, but now figures that to be unlikely. He hasn’t decided which car he’ll enter yet, but those attending can rest assured there will be something of interest from the Helm collection on display.

Kars Under the “K” takes place on Sunday, July 31 at Memorial Park in Keremeos.