Join us for a journey back in time to an age when pickup trucks were still real trucks—simple, practical workhorses.

We know this look back at the 1973 Ford F-100 is going to generate a wave of nostalgia for much of our audience. This was an age, many will say, when pickup trucks were still trucks. The F-100s of 1953 through 1983 were practical workhorses of reasonable size, not the giant four-door luxury cruisers on the market today. We can’t say the Detroit manufacturers were wrong in growing their pickups to their current tremendous size. After all, sales (and profits) soared as a result. Still, many of us continue to long for these simple, utilitarian pickups of yesteryear.

That said, we can see that in 1973, the F-100’s march into gentrification was already well underway. Ford introduced a larger, more comfortable cab that year, and there were three trim levels, from plain to fancy: Custom, Ranger, and Ranger XLT. A chrome front bumper and bright metal grille were standard on all models, while the Ranger XLT offered a sedan-like interior with carpeting and color-coordinated fabrics. Mechanical features included standard front disc brakes and Ford’s aggressively marketed Twin I-Beam front suspension, engineeered for a more car-like ride (see our feature here). Indeed, the F-Series tagline for ’73 was “works like a truck, rides like a car.” Video below.