Edison and Ford set off from Pittsburgh to camp
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
They were the titans of industry, science and politics, capable of doing nearly anything they wanted. And what they wanted, exactly 100 years ago,was to come to Pittsburgh fora camping trip.
Calling themselves the “Four Vagabonds,” Henry Ford, Thomas Edison, Harvey Firestone and naturalist John Burroughs met up in Downtown Pittsburgh on Aug. 18, with a “coterie of reporters swarming about” in the lobby of the Fort Pitt Hotel, where Edison and Burroughs had stayed the night before. (Reporters were eager to know whether Edison was working on an answer to the German U-Boats plaguing the U.S. in World War I — he told them the “Huns” were “boneheads” who required no fancy technology.)
The Vagabonds had turned their camping trips into an annual event — first in the Florida Everglades in 1914 and finally in New England in 1924. They attracted breathless Pittsburgh media attention at the time, with front page headlines such as “Electricity Wizard Edison Arrives in City” and simply “Edison and Ford Are Coming to Pittsburg.”
Bill Ramsey, a Model T enthusiast living in Bruceton Mills, W.Va., has long been fascinated with the history of the Vagabonds, since seeing a plaque commemorating their visit at the Summit Inn in Farmington, where he sometimes eats lunch. In his role as president of the Mason Dixon T chapter of the Model T Ford Club International, he decided to plan a 100th anniversary commemorative Model T tour, in which he and 26 other Model T owners would drive their vehicles along part of the route taken by Edison and Ford.
“These were the famous guys of the time,” he said. “This was just a really interesting thing that they did.”
Traveling in a pack of six cars, which included a cook, photographers and a personalized tent for each of them, the Vagabonds first made camp at what was then known as Miller’s Woods, now the Westmoreland Mall in Hempfield, and entertained themselves with a rifle-shooting contest. The Pittsburgh Daily Post ran the headline “Ford Chops Wood; Edison Lights Camp,” noting that this was the first time that the Greensburg area had seen electric lights used at a campsite.
The group ran into trouble in Connellsville the next day, when a fan blade went through the radiator of one of the Model T’s, said Dr. Ramsey, who has researched the trip extensively. The garage owner in Connellsville informed them that they would have to order a part from Pittsburgh, and Ford took matters into his own hands, tinkering with the car and fixing it himself.
The stop — and poor weather — delayed the group, so that rather than making it to their camping destination for the night, they instead stayed at the Summit Inn, then known as the Summit Hotel.
Hijinks appropriate to a buddy comedy of the day ensued as the men amused themselves — with newspaper reporters there to report it. Ford placed a cigar on top of a 6-foot-tall fireplace mantel and dared Edison to kick it off. He managed to do it three times in a row, while Ford managed once. Burroughs, according to the Pittsburgh Daily Post, “pleaded that he was too tired to try the kick.”
They then turned to a stair-jumping contest. Ford was able to jump the flight of 10 steps from the lobby to the second floor “in two hops,” according to the newspaper, while Edison took three. Poor Burroughs “lost his balance and was saved from falling by other guests.”
Their night at the Summit Inn was also depicted in a 2014 Travel Channel show, “Mysteries at the Hotel.”
At a recent planning meeting at the Summit Inn, “We were looking at the same steps, the same mantel where they had done these cigar tricks,” said Stacey Magda of the Laurel Highlands Visitors Bureau. “It’s a really amazing feeling to be continuing the legacy of this important story.”
Their visit to the hotel is also commemorated with the original register of them signing in, as well as banquet rooms named after them and markings on the rooms where they stayed.
“They must have really enjoyed their time at the Summit Inn — not only did they stay and write about it, but they also came back to stay at the Summit Inn in 1921,” said Ms. Magda, noting that on that subsequent trip, they brought President Warren Harding with them.
They also used the topography of the Summit Inn for practical purposes.
“They tested cars on that hill there,” said Donna Holdorf, executive director of the National Road Heritage Corridor. “That was a great place for Mr. Firestone to checkhis tires on Ford’s car.”
They stayed at the Summit Inn the night of Aug. 20, the same night that the Model T club stayed there as they began their seven-day journey. Model T’s have a maximum speed of about 40 miles per hour but ride more comfortably at 30 to 35, said Dr. Ramsey, and the group retraced the Vagabonds’ journey on the National Road through Springs and Grantsville before heading south to Oakland, Md., near Deep Creek Lake. They then followed the Vagabonds’ journey into West Virginia, passing through Lead Mine and Elkins.
“The Vagabond trip was really the beginning of what we now call the RV industry,” said Dr. Ramsey. “In the 1920s, people did not get in their car and go camping — it was not done. This was really the beginning of people getting on the road.”