My name is Henry T, and I was born in 1915. My latest owner loved me very much, but had to sell because he needed money for medical expenses. A new home was sought so an ad was placed in the newspaper, and soon, a man came to take a look at me. He walked around and around, stopped to look under my hood, then conferred with Ben, my current owner. They nodded and a deal was struck.

Ben put me back in the barn and I sat there for a few days. Saturday came, and there were sounds outside the barn door. Ben opened the doors up suddenly, and brilliant sunshine flowed in. A rental car dolly was right outside, attached to a large white van. On the side of the van it read "PCPA Theatrefest — Alan Hancock College".

Ben patted me a few times and after handing the stranger my keys and paperwork, turned suddenly and went back inside his house. Several men loaded me onto the car dolly, strapped me down, and we were off.

We arrived in Santa Maria an hour later and I was unloaded outside of a small warehouse, then wheeled inside. The men were excited and asked if they could see me run. Paul, my caretaker, started looking under my hood, spraying things under there which felt cool, and sitting inside on the driver’s seat. He got me started after releasing the clutch and moving a few gears.

After a while, they all left and closed the door. In the dark, I could see that I was surrounded by racks of costumes and boxes of shoes, and a few pieces of flat wood that resembled trees I wondered what it all meant. I looked over at a counter and saw a manual. It read "Reproduction of a 1915 Model T Owner’s Manual".

In the weeks that followed I was driven around the parking lot and then over to a green and grassy field. Someone took a lot of photographs with actors sitting inside of me, dressed in period costume. I learned that I was to star in a play called Ragtime. It was a bit nerve wracking, because I didn’t really know what a play was. My caretaker, Paul, made a wheeled dolly and then I was attached to that. I didn’t use my wheels to move around, and instead, was wheeled around like royalty. I was polished and shined until my dark blue paint sparkled.

Days later they took me over to a large building which they referred to as a theatre. Inside, I was placed on a large wooden area and I could see many rows of seats in front of it. Apparently, people usually sit in these seats and watch things that are going on in the area of this stage, where I sat. During the weeks that followed, people sat in me, sang in me, sang around me and even danced beside me. A lot of the time they were also sad, then happy, then angry again. Eventually, everyone was excited because "Opening Night" had arrived.

People were nervous and when the music began, the curtains opened. Ragtime was my first play and I loved it. A young man, Coalhouse was his name, bought me in the play and this gave him a great sense of pride and satisfaction. He took his girl for a ride and then some racist firemen wrecked me because Coalhouse was an African American and "didn’t deserve to own such a fine car". This incident made Coalhouse bitter and angry and in the end, led to his death.

When the show ended each night I took a curtain call. This made me almost as happy as when Ben had owned me.

After a few weeks they loaded me back onto the dolly and we drove about 40 miles down to a little Danish town called Solvang, where I was unloaded into an outdoor theatre. That was a little eerie at night because when all was dark and everyone had gone home, the bats would fly in and out of the rafters, and the pigeons would make haunting noises as they woke from sleep.

We played a few more weeks in Solvang and then I was taken back to Santa Maria and put into storage. There was a fun evening where I sat out front of a fundraising event and where people could look at me as they went in. An online auction was held after that and I was sold to a deli owner who would now take me to another home.

My caretaker Paul gave me one last wipe with a soft cloth after he showed me to my new owner, and as saw me being loaded onto a car dolly and then driven away, he turned and went back into the warehouse which had been my temporary home.

Later, as I sat in a luxurious garage at my new home, and after my new owner gave me another wipe with a soft cloth, turned for a last look, then shut off the light and closed the door, I knew I was loved once again. I guess it’s not a bad life - living almost a hundred years and still getting around pretty good, and being loved many times over.

I think that my maker, Henry Ford, had only love in mind as I rolled off the assembly line. That, and fulfilling the American Dream, just like Coalhouse in Ragtime. 

By Susan Hart