Coachbult.com - Swift Body & Equipment



Swift Body & Equipment - Swift Body Co. Inc. - 1915-1960s -Saginaw, Michigan - 1960s-1970s - Sandusky, Michigan

Swift Body & Equipment Co – Saginaw, Michigan – 1938 Silver Book stand-up delivery bodies

Both Saginaw and Sandusky are located 55 miles from each other on Michigan Rte 46, probably the same firm as they both made forward control vans and truck bodies.

I've seen a 1962 Swift-Ford step-van made by Swift Body Co. of Saginaw, Michigan.

xxxxxx

Swift Body Co. Inc of Saginaw/Sandusky, Michigan (since 1915)

ad 1963 GMC Truck Equipment Catalog pp70

Swift Aluminum Alloy forward control and route delivery van bodies. Swift used both Ford and GMC drivetrains.

Regards Swift Body Company:

My grandfather Henry Swift started the company supposedly making horse drawn wagons and my father Stanley H. Swift ran it after my grandfathers death in the forties until 1970 or so. For a while it was called Swift All Steel Body Company then later Swift Body Company. They made a variety of custom truck bodies for the military, post office, railroad express agency and others as well as the occasional riot van, semi trailer and custom motor home. I don't any material at hand tonight but can access some if I dig around. The Saginaw and Sandusky operations are the same company. I have a
clipping from the Saginaw News that says he was the largest custom body company in the world at the time, I think in the 50s. The company started in Saginaw and later moved to Sandusky. Supposedly the Saginaw plant was the site of the original Duryea motor works. I found your site looking to see if I could find a surviving example of one of his vehicles for purchase. Let me know if you want some more information. I will try to dig it up. Do you know how I could locate a Swift truck for sale? I'm guessing they made a few thousand, there must be a few out there somewhere!

Michael Swift

For more information please read:

G.N. Georgano & G. Marshall Naul - The Complete Encyclopedia of Commercial Vehicles

Albert Mroz - Illustrated Encyclopedia of American Trucks & Commercial Vehicles

Denis Miller - The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Trucks and Buses

Tad Burness - American Truck Spotter's Guide, 1920-1970

Tad Burness - American Truck & Bus Spotter's Guide, 1920-1985

Robert M Roll - American trucking: A seventy-five year odyssey

David Jacobs - American Trucks: A photographic essay of American Trucks and Trucking

David Jacobs - American Trucks: More Colour Photographs of Truck & Trucking

John Gunnell - American Work Trucks: A Pictorial History of Commercial Trucks 1900-1994

George W. Green - Special-Use Vehicles: An Illustrated History of Unconventional Cars and Trucks