Allstate – Steel Box

Allstate – Steel Box
The third generation Allstate trailer debuted in the 1961 Sears catalog with a wood box, the steel box had replaced it by the Fall 1967 Sears catalog. This generation used a totally different tongue arrangement, using simple flat stock bent in two places. It also sported a different suspension system consisting of twin leaf-spring assemblies. The bottom leaves extended much farther out than the others, and bore L-brackets to which the axle of the wheel was attached. Like the other trailers, the cargo load was 500#. The trailer was now made “near Des Moines, Iowa” and sold for $89.95 from the factory. I have learned that this factory was the Ideal Manufacturing Company, based in Oscaloosa, Iowa. In the 1980s, this company was absorbed into Superior Industries International, now based in Van Nuys, California, but this was long after Ideal stopped making trailers. In the Fall 1967 catalog it sold for $96.95, with an optional metal top selling for $41.95. The Spring 1968 catalog carried the same information. In the Fall catalog of that year, the price is increased to $109.95, with the optional top selling for $44.95. In the 1972 Spring catalog, the price of the trailer jumped to $154.95. The optional top was no longer available. The body was painted “cinnamon brown” instead of white, and it bore a new stock number. In the Spring and Fall 1973 Catalogs, the price was $159.95, and in the Spring and Fall 1974 catalogs it was $164.95. But in the Spring 1975 issue, the price soared to $224.95. That price remained in effect until the Fall 1975 catalog, the last catalog to list the single-wheel trailer. Some of the model numbers for this style of trailer are 287.61830; 287.61530; 287.61961 and 287-61660. Sears also sold this same trailer with two wheels and possibly even a double swivel wheel, but it is unknown if this last example is a special order or custom built job. (Written and research provided by John LaTorre – A Short History of Allstate Single-Wheel Trailers)