“It’s what non-car people don’t get. They see all cars as just tons of wires, glass, metal, rubber. That’s all they see. People like you and I know, we have an unshakable belief that cars are living entities. You can develop a relationship with your car. And that’s what non-car people don’t get.”
Jeremy Clarkson, broadcaster and auto enthusiast
Mark Freimiller has found his own, horsepower-driven slice of heaven, right in his own backyard.
For the past 25 years, Freimiller, owner and proprietor of Model T Haven, has turned old piles of banged up, rusted junk of all shapes and sizes into driveable, occasionally pristine, pieces of automotive history.
“I love what I do,” he said. “I love vintage cars.”
His passion started as a youngster, growing up in Pennsylvania. Too broke to buy a car of his own, Freimiller instead would buy parts of broken down cars, assemble them into a working vehicle, then trade it off for something newer.
“I liked playing around like that,” he said.
Fast forward to 1993.
Having moved to Kansas, where Freimiller was plant manager of the old PC Boards plant in Chanute, he soon found himself in search of a job when the plant closed.
“When that job ended, I knew I loved the area and wanted to stay here,” he recalled.
He took a leap of faith, carved out a spot in his garage south of Gas and started working on Model Ts. Model T Haven was born.
“I found a way to make a living,” he said. “I never realized it would grow like this.”
He started out working solely with old Model T or Model A Fords — “I didn’t know there were any other kinds,” he joked — but eventually included all other makes and models of vintage cars, as demand increased. (He estimates the other models take up about 25 percent of his workload.)
His garage was soon expanded, to more than triple its original size, with a vast work area capable of holding three or four cars simultaneously as well as piles of vehicle components, a paint booth and spacious office area. He soon will add a machine shop to the facility, adding a much-needed ability to fabricate hard-to-find parts.
Next door are two large storage buildings, holding the vehicles he has since restored and put on the shopping block.
Out back are acres of pasture filled with rows of vintage vehicles, which provide many of the parts Freimiller uses on his restoration.
Model T Haven started as a one-man operation, and slowly but steadily grew to its current five-man staff.
“The first guy I hired to cut grass, and he ended up working for me full time in here,” Freimiller said. “I didn’t want to rush things, so I grew slowly. First and foremost, I want to take care of my customers.”
FREIMILLER deals with buyers and sellers around the world. This year alone, he’s sent two containers filled with cars and parts to China, one to England and another to the Netherlands. He has another about ready for shipping to Australia.
Meanwhile, Freimiller is on the road almost every week, in search of older, worn-down vehicles, or their components.
For example, he’ll be in Nebraska next week to pick up a Model A Ford truck cab, a Model T coupe body, a 1951 Chevy pickup and two piles of what used to be Chevrolets.
“With the price he gave me, I know I can build up the Model A and get my money back,” Freimiller said, “and then I’ll make money on the others.”
While Freimiller rarely does full, top-to-bottom restorations — the gleaming, freshly painted beauties you see at car shows — he refurbishes each vehicle to the point it will appeal to collectors or car enthusiasts to finish the job.
“If you sell a car that looks like this,” he said, pointing to a rusted vehicle shell, “people will ask, ‘What am I really buying?’ If I can get it to a point it looks like a decent car, then people will see what they’re buying.”
And making his customers happy is his lifeblood.
“Reputation is everything,” Freimiller said. “Most of my customers are thousands of miles away. You want to trust who you’re dealing with.”
SUCH EXCHANGES are pivotal to Model T Haven’s sustainability.
“It’s all a gamble,” Freimiller said. “Every day I have to ask myself, ‘Is the public going to want something like this?’”
Tucked inside Freimiller’s paint booth is a 1940 Lincoln Continental hard-top, a rarity because only 53 such vehicles were manufactured.
“It’s a once-in-a-lifetime car, even though it’s not a real valuable car,” Freimiller explained. “But it needs to get into the hands of somebody who would appreciate it.”
He bought it from a seller who had kept the car parked in a garage for years. Its V-12 motor still runs, barely.
Freimiller has another car in the works, a 1911 Cadillac Demi Tonneau, which he bought from a seller out of California. The Cadillac had been sitting in his yard for more than a decade, and it looked it.
Spare parts are lying in his workshop; the frame is being sandblasted and repainted in Iola; the rest of the body is being built in California.
Freimiller estimates he’ll pay $50,000 to get the car restored, “but this is a $100,000 car when it’s done. You can spent $50,000 to get $100,000, but it’s still a risk.”
He has another vehicle he spent about $45,000 to restore, “but it’s still a $25,000 car. I’m just learning through the years. You obviously need more wins than losses.”
Sitting conspicuously in the corner of his workshop is a 1947 Chevrolet Sedan, with its extended cab. “With windows, it’d be a station wagon,” Freimiller said. “Somebody started rebuilding it but never finished. I’m trying to get it to a point it looks like a complete car.”
Freimiller figures he’ll lose money on this deal.
“I paid too much for it at the start, and I thought it was in better shape than it was, but I gave my word I’d buy it, so I went ahead and bought it.”
Exchanges like that are sobering.
That’s why, regardless of how successful he’s been in the past, Freimiller still finds himself uneasy about the future.
“That’s the hardest part,” he said, “laying in bed at night and hoping God can keep things going.”
ABOUT TWO years ago, Freimiller’s path crossed with Steve Carpenter, a retired woodshop teacher from Yates Center High School.
Freimiller was in need of another hand around the shop, “and figured after teaching 31 years, I knew a thing or two about woodworking,” Carpenter said.
“Thank God I found him,” Freimiller said. “He’s great.”
Carpenter’s current project entails rebuilding a wooden cab from a 1918 Model T pickup chassis.
The wood comes from Sycamore trees, grown and milled in Allen County, giving the vehicle added flair certain to appeal to gearheads and historians alike.
Carpenter is meticulously recreating every curve from the original contours, with a few minor alterations to make the cab a bit more spacious. Drivers, after all are a bit heftier today than they were a century ago, “and it’s a really small cab,” Freimiller said.
The trump exemplifies the beauty of the cars of yesteryear, he notes.
“The older the better,” he said. “Cars of that vintage have personality and character. That was when you had this engineer thinking here was one way to build a car, and this other engineer was thinking of something else entirely. Cars of today are almost interchangeable.”
FREIMILLER credits the Internet having played a large part in his success.
“It used to be you put something for sale online, and it’d take a month,” he said. “Now, I can put something online today, and it might sell today.”
That’s pivotal, because 99 percent of Freimiller’s clientele lives in states, countries or continents away.
“I’ve probably only sold one or two cars locally,” he noted.
Even so, Freimiller remains involved in the community.
He is an active member of the Iola Kiwanis Club, and frequently opens his Model T Haven shop to visitors, from various hot rod clubs or Model T owners.
PERHAPS one of the greatest curiosities about Model T Haven’s growth is that it bucked economic trends across the country.
Freimiller was at his busiest when the country was in the midst of the Great Recession.
Wouldn’t antique cars be among the first cutbacks for families trimming their budgets?
Not necessarily; in fact, it’s just the opposite, Freimiller contends.
“What we found was people were looking for other places to spend their money,” he said, “and vintage automobiles are a tremendous investment — if you play your cards right.”
It’s another gambling analogy for which Freimiller is eager to share.
With his passion for history mixed with equal parts in artistry and engineering, Fremiller’s Model T Haven continues to deal a winning hand.
