Al Rose, Trailer King

[48Rob]

Anybody here recall the discussion here or on the other boards about Al Rose, the L.A. trailer dealer in the 50's?


Rob

[teardrop_focus]

Rob, being fresh to the boards I do not. But since mid-century-anything interests me I had to look.

Google search "Al Rose - trailer king" results items 1 through 20 indicate nothing...

Result #21 netted this pic:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/kristiw/2155626113/

I stopped there then accidentally closed the browser page. Thank you.

[kartvines]

In fact Al Rose started out selling Spartans, and from there he become the exclusive distributor of my trailer the Crown, I have so data on when he was selling Crowns but I would have to search my database to locate it. Let me know.

Many Crown's came with his tags saying made Exclusively for Al Rose. The Trailer King

[48Rob]

Thank you guys!

Guess I need to look through more search pages...

I recall several discussions regarding Crown trailers too, thanks.

There was a thread about the business, and an interview with Al or an employee, but I don't remember where.
May have been my old MSN board, I searched all the posts we were able to save, but no luck.

Rob

[Juneaudave]

Maybe this...http://www.tincantourists.com/wiki/doku.php?id=aljoa

[48Rob]

Thanks Dave!

Rob

[robfisher]

This is from memory from prior research, all if which is put away in about 12 boxes stored among 50 other boxes(the result of moving three times and living in a teardrop for 3 months while waiting for my house.)

Al Rose WAS the trailer king of So-Cal. He was selling so many trailers through the 50's he couldn't get enough of them. It appears that one of his solutions may have been to set up or help set up factories to produce trailers. There was a lot of reading in between the lines to come up with this theory and that's all it is, but it makes sense to the evidence. Several trailer names share the exact same floor plans and building techniques; trailers which he sold. Aljo and RobinHood are prime examples. He didn't start Aljo but seems to have copied them with RobinHood.

If somebody doesn't come forth with info the best place to piece the story together is probably the RV Museum in Elkhart, IN. They have copies of all the trade journals and let me set there in the library and read them all.

Now that we are back in a home for the long run I'll find those boxes. Several tiimes the last few weeks I've wanted something out of them.

[48Rob]

Thanks Rob, for the info!

I'll forward your message along with the others, to the couple seeking the info.
I'm also keeping all the posts in my message archive to try to build up a decent file.
This question seems to pop up every couple years.

I appreciate all the help!

48Rob

[len19070]

If somebody doesn't come forth with info the best place to piece the story together is probably the RV Museum in Elkhart, IN. They have copies of all the trade journals and let me set there in the library and read them all. .

The RV museum is where I started looking.

Couldn't find a thing.

Happy Trails

Len

[robfisher]

Found just a couple of AL Rose ads in my file. In 1954 Trailer Topics trade journal Al was calling himself the Trailer King.

Trail-R-News seemed to be his journal of choice. I remember seeing info about him in several of those through the 40's and 50's. In Oct 1946 he is advertising that he is the National Distributor for Radco. He shows up again in Jan 1947 as ND for Radco and Robin Hood. He was in El Monte, CA.

Again from memory I think Al was instrumental in putting together Trailer Village at the Southern California Sportsman Show in Gilmore Stadium in Los Angeles. That was big show with all the trailers and the ski jumper stuntman. I know it was April 11-20 but can't remember if it was '48 or '49. Oh! where is my stuff and where is my memory???

Just found something I was looking for. The book Trailer Travel by Burkhart, Noyes and Arieff has a chapter on the various shows. It's kind of mish-mashed together showing pictures from several different shows through the 30's-50's and hard to tell which show is which. They site a Delmar Watson who would be fun to talk with and also any of the three of them. Craig Dorsey and George Wilkerson are also great sources.