Shakers and Speed Wagons

"The Hancock Shakers were quick to recognize the distinct advantages of the automobile for both business and pleasure," reads a plaque inside the brick garage at Hancock Shaker Village.

The Shakers, a sober and celibate religious sect that once numbered some 6000 souls, understood the value of hard work, as a tour of their once-vibrant community near Pittsfield, Massachusetts attests.

But would you want to hang out with the Shakers on a Saturday night? I'll leave that for you to decide, but I sure would have liked to take a ride in their old REO Speed Wagon.

Records and Rides

Don't break out your old 45 RPM recording of "Take It on the Run" just yet. We're not talking about the 1980s American rock band here. Long before REO Speedwagon hit the top of the music charts with "Hi Infidelity" (a most un-Shakerlike name for an album), there was a motorized truck called the REO Speed Wagon. The "REO" represented the initials of Ransom Eli Olds, the son of an Ohio blacksmith who founded the REO Motor Car Company. For modern motorists, the Oldsmobile line is probably more familiar.

The 1923 REO T-6 sedan (above) isn't a truck, of course, but it was marketed to a person called "the business farmer". Clearly, the hard-working and self-sufficient Shakers fit the bill. The inventors of devices ranging from the clothespin to the circular saw, the Shakers tilled fields, raised livestock, and labored in workshops. Even today, Shaker furniture is valued for is simple lines and sturdy construction. Modern automakers may advertise supersized pickups as the right ride for manly men, but the REO sedan was good enough for the farmers and artisans of Hancock Shaker Village.

"The Shakers," the plaque in the brick garage explains, "were partial to REOs as they were utilitarian – a good durable car available at a fair price". Although the Shaker sisters and brethren also favored automobiles from Hudson and Nash, they liked the REO best because of its ability to "accommodate" many passengers. The Shakers didn't hold onto a car that was past its prime, however. Unlike the Amish, another hard-working and simple-living religious sect, the Shakers "embraced technological change." Every few years, they would trade-in older model cars "to maximize trade-in value and avail themselves of the latest advances in automotive engineering."

The Shakers may not have travelled far for fun on a Saturday night, but one thing is for certain. As the car company of Ransom Olds advertised, "You can do it with a REO".