American Bantam M100 Trailers

45auto · Post by **45auto** » Thu Feb 21, 2019 7:48 pm

I have come across a listing for 24 American Bantam M100 trailers from a 1958 Spot Bid DOD Surplus Sale. I did not know American Bantam made M100 trailers. They are all marked as being M100's with a 1952 date on them. There are also Dundar Kapple M100s listed, so I would think the bean counters were writing down what they were seeing on the data plates. However, I have found some mistakes in these sales announcements.

My question--Does any know or have seen where American Bantam made M100 trailers In 1952 or later?

RonD2 · Post by **RonD2** » Thu Feb 21, 2019 10:23 pm

Hi Harold,
I'm too young to have known or seen

, but I'm fortunate to have an autographed copy of the definitive book Warbaby, The True Story of the Original Jeep, by William Spear. Besides the controversy over the Jeep, it's a pretty fine history of the American Bantam Car Company.

https://warbaby.wmspear.com/

Although I'm still studying the book, on page 312 (Chapter 28, Epilogues) it says (if I can quote it without getting phone calls from lawyers) that post WW2, "Bantam went on to make over 100,000 trailers for the jeeps they had created, many of which are still in active private service today."

Unfortunately, no direct reference to M100 that I can find so far, but still reading. There is mention that Bantam was given a contract for a one-ton jeep trailer, but nothing further. Interesting, one-ton trailer behind a quarter-ton jeep.

Post by **wesk** » Thu Feb 21, 2019 11:50 pm

Harold, I reviewed my M100 trailer data base and saw no Bantams. Just Dunbar-Kappel, Strick & Jacques Power Saw. Perhaps they have several Bantam T3C's or military Bantam T3's they are confusing with the M100.

45auto · Post by **45auto** » Fri Feb 22, 2019 12:38 am

I was thinking the same thing, however, the few WWII Bantam trailers I have in the database have 7 digit registration numbers, the "1952" Bantam trailers have 8 digits.

Thinking that they may be Dunbar trailers, I checked the serial number and the Bantam trailers have 5 digits serial numbers and the Dunbar trailers have 6 digits serial numbers. Also, the registration numbers for the Dunbar trailers listed are 8 digits and in the same format, but are much lower than the Bantam trailers.

Something isn't adding up!! I also looked at the Strick trailers and it doesn't fit there either. The Jacques Power Saw trailers I have are all 1951s and the registration numbers are well before the Bantams.

I have good data on these trailers, however, I'm not so sure what they are!

Post by **wesk** » Fri Feb 22, 2019 10:42 am

Harold, I would suspect you are looking at a batch of rebuilt (at a military depot) trailers that have had their data plates switched around at the depot. Perhaps the depot only had new Bantam plates on their spares shelf the day those went out the door.

45auto · Post by **45auto** » Fri Feb 22, 2019 8:26 pm

Wes,
I believe you are correct or some form of correct. I went back and linked the Bantam serial numbers with the Dunbar serial numbers and it filled in a gap within the Dunbar serial numbers. What was throwing me off, Dunbar used at least 6 different ways to serial number their trailers. These fell about in the middle and was within the 1952 year. The military registration number was in line with the couple others that were in the database. All the other manufactures were either much later or the registration number was not within the same sequence.

I'm going to keep these under the Dunbar Kapple database with a note they were listed as American Bantam. I included the bid date along with the bid invitation number with each trailer where I can go back and look at the "hard copy" if needed.

If anybody comes up with other supporting data--Please share!!