Carla Clark | For The Republic Larry Morlock and his 1928 Model A Ford Tudor, shown in this photograph taken at his home Tuesday, August 15, 2023.
While some sacrifice an occasional weekend to fix a vehicle, Larry Morlock has been “intermittently” working on antique cars for almost 70 years.
The efforts of the 85-year-old Cummins, Inc. retiree were honored during the Model A Restorers Club National Meet and Show. Morlock’s 1929 Model A Ford Tudor, which he calls his “Junkyard ‘A’,” received a near perfect score during the event that ran July 30-Aug. 4 north of Cincinnati.
When asked what a relative meant when she said Morlock ‘intermittently’ works on his Tudor, he replied “it is one of those things where you start doing something, quit for years and years, but eventually get back to it,” he said with a laugh.
After moving to Columbus in the 1960s, the Woodland Place resident initially kept busy working with the Columbus Area Chamber of Commerce and with a service club. After he retired from Cummins in 2008, Morlock had developed other hobbies that better held his interest.
He owned, piloted and worked on airplanes for decades. Since 1998, Morlock had flown over 800 people in the local Experimental Aircraft Association Chapter 729’s Young Eagles Flights program.
But eventually, he always returns to his beloved Model A cars.
How it started
To understand Morlock’s passion for Model A Fords built between 1928-1931, you have to go back to the late 1940s as he was being raised on a Posey County farm in southwest Indiana. His neighbor was one of 5 million people worldwide who owned a Model A, widely considered Henry and Edsel Ford’s upgrade to the Model T built between 1909 and 1927, Morlock said.
“I was about 8 or 10 at the time, and I just loved the sound of it,” Morlock said about the neighbor’s car. “A big appeal is that you can fix them yourself. The other thing is that it’s an old antique car that is affordable.”
It was also a neighbor in rural Posey County who owned an airplane that sparked his interest in aviation, he said.
When new, prices ranged from $385 for a roadster to $1,400 for the top-of-the-line town car. But to keep that in perspective, that’s $6,882 for the roadster and $25,027 for the town car when adjusted for inflation.
While attending high school, Morlock purchased a 1929 Model A Ford roadster for $40 in March 1955. Two months later, he decided to cut the top off the car to make it a convertible, he said.
As he was going through a junk yard in July 1955, he saw another Model A with a better body and frame. So Morlock traded in his old car, as well as paid $5 to obtain the Tudor. He would return to the junk yard the next month to obtain parts from his old car so his Junkyard ‘A’ would have the best from both vehicles, Morlock said.
Getting parts is no trouble, he said. There are enough Model A’s still in operation today that at least a half-dozen U.S. companies deal in parts for the antique vehicles, Morlock said. They are also available for purchase at swap meets, he said.
Journeys
Road trips became one of the greatest thrills Morlock enjoyed after joining the Columbus Region of Model A Restorers Club in 1980. Today, the club has more than 100 families from Bartholomew and surrounding counties, he said.
In 1983, Morlock set aside his plans to restore his Tudor and purchased a 1930 Model A Coupe. Most club members want to take their antique cars out on long road trips, and Morlock has enjoyed a number of journeys in the coupe accompanied by his wife of 55 years, Lois. The couple went to several destinations including Colorado, Nova Scotia and the Black Hills of South Dakota.
“On the road, it can get up to 65 mph, but we drive them at 45 mph,” Morlock said. “We can drive these on two-lane roads, but we don’t get on interstates.”
But the passage of time is often not kind. A minor crash of his 1992 Stolp V-Star airplane at the Columbus Municipal Airport in April 2014, as well as his advancing age, eventually led to his inability to get insurance as a pilot. He fixed the plane and gave it to the Young Eagles Flight program. He then sold two other aircraft that he owned. The following year, Lois Morlock died at age 77.
Larry Morlock has two adult children, Chris and Abigail, who live close enough to frequently visit. He also retains the desire to keep busy with challenging tasks, which he believes maintains both physical and mental fitness. Among his activities was the construction of a Model A Ford powered Pietenpol airplane in 2018.
In 2019, he parked his Model A Coupe in a Sandcreek Township garage and finally resumed work on his Junkyard ‘A’.
For the next three years, Morlock put in an extensive amount of work that began with taking his antique car apart piece-by-piece. After ensuring that every part was in good or excellent condition, he put the Tudor back together, making sure he was following the club’s standard, Morlock said.
“The standard is how the car looked when it came out of the factory,” Morlock said. “Everything had to be completely original, in addition to being in good running condition. But it was easy to follow the rules because I built the car from the ground up.”
The only reason Morlock did not get a perfect score is because the number on the engine was different from the number on his car, he said.
But the Cummins retiree also won another award during the event north of Cincinnati. He was recognized for being the oldest man to drive himself to the event in a Model “A.”
While being recognized for that distinctions might leave some men with mixed feelings, Morlock seems to savor the honor.
”Oh, I was proud of that,” he said. “I’m glad I’m still active at my age. It’s a pleasure.”
