by Winnie Hsiu
October 12, 2010 11:36 AM
Many people use car storage and truck storage in the winter. Others use vehicle storage to hold their motorcycles, snowmobiles, all-terrain vehicles, or bicycles. Many also rely on toy storage during the winter, for items such as plastic ride-on toys, tricycles, and wagons. But Judy Foster and Fred Keller of Wasilla, Alaska, must be the first couple ever to need storage for a toy the size of a truck -- a giant Radio Flyer. The couple constructed their giant wagon, which may be the only one in the world like it, out of an old pickup truck.
As the base of the giant Flyer, Foster and Keller used a 1976 Mazda B1600 pickup truck, an inheritance from Foster’s late father. Foster especially wanted to find a way to use the truck that would honor the memory of her father. So she and Keller worked on the truck for 11 months, eventually producing a Radio Flyer that can do something that, probably, no other normal-sized Radio Flyer can do -- reach speeds of up to 60 miles per hour on the highway.
Foster and Keller made sure that their converted Flyer was licensed for road travel, so they regularly do take it out on the highway. It’s just like driving a convertible -- well, one with an eight-foot handle (in case they run into any giants who can pull it) extending over the hood. Although the couple had to get creative about some of the Flyer’s parts, using hubcaps and detergent bottles to make rims, for example, one part of the Flyer, the steering wheel, came from an original Radio Flyer wagon.
The Flyer is not the only replica of its kind, but it probably is the only one made from a Mazda pickup. The couple originally got the idea after they saw another large Radio Flyer mounted on a hot rod at an Oregon car show in 2009.
The giant Flyer isn’t suitable for Alaska roads in the wintertime, unfortunately, so the couple have decided to protect it by putting it into toy storage -- giant toy storage, that is -- until spring.
Sources used:
Bolden, Michael. “Couple converts pickup into wagon.” The Washington Post blog. Oct. 12, 2010.
Hartenstein, Meena. “Couple creates biggest little red wagon ever, turns truck into monster-size childhood toy.” The New York Daily News. Oct. 12, 2010.
POV. “Childhood dreams: have you fulfilled any later in life?” CBC News (Canada). Oct. 12, 2010.
Thiessen, Mark. “Alaska couple converts pickup into Radio Flyer car.” Associated Press. Oct. 12, 2010.