Flxible ’52

Why this one?

In 2013, we set about looking for an older vintage trailer to restore. I was inspired by Spartans, Airstreams…even the astounding Holiday House that the team at Flyte Camp put together. For me, there is something magical about vehicles that move us in space and in time. Before spot welding and metal adhesives, there was aluminum curving and slicing around a frame, held in place by perfect lines of hand-bucked rivets. I also love trains, from the modern 200mph+ coaches (that seem standard everywhere but here) to the wood paneled Pullman cars of the gilded age. I could ride for days on a train, drunk on the rhythm of the tracks and the landscape unfurling outside.

And then one day I discovered the Flxible bus. It was all of the above and it had a functional air scoop on top. Even the windows along the sides lean forward as if to say, “let’s go.” It was as though a grade schooler had drawn the ultimate streamline, hot-rod, space age bus of the future. Only it was real. And for sale.

Our Flxible was originally delivered to Parrish Stage Lines of Silver City, New Mexico at the end of September, 1952. About 20 years later, the bus was converted into a motorhome. It appeared to be the work of a professional conversion shop, though no records survive with the bus. Flxible ’52 moved to Southern California at that time, and spent the next 40 years in and around Joshua Tree.