A “motorless lizzie” visited the state on this day in 1927. The lizzie was a motorless car, that is, an old wreck of an automobile lacking an engine. Beneath the hood, the car had instead a shelf with three small suitcases. The pilots of the motorless vehicle were Frank J. Elliot and George A. Scott of Vancouver. They began their four thousand-mile tour across the country on August 22nd from Halifax, Nova Scotia.

The pair made their way by bumming tows from “more highy powered vehicles.” The lizzie, or “the spirit of the red nose” as the pilots called her, featured a painted sign proclaiming her absence of an engine. The car visited Grand Forks on September 12th, but stayed only long enough to bum a ride from another North Dakota vehicle.

Source:
Fargo Forum and Daily Tribune (Morning ed.). September 13, 1927: p. 2.

-Jayme L. Job

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