Aerosmith’s Original Van from the 70’s Restored!

It’s rock and roll history on American Pickers tonight on The History Channel at 8pm. We finally get to see the original Aerosmith van “restored” after finding it in a Massachusetts field.

Being a big gearhead that loves old rusty metal I was really intrigued by this story. My wife can attest that I have dragged home old rusty cars, Jeeps and trucks and let them sit for months….sometimes years before I get them restored or sell them to another sucker to get them off my hands. I love the idea of resurrecting something that was just left in a field to rot away. You know what they say, “One man’s junk is another man’s treasure”. That’s the entire idea behind the show, “American Pickers”.

So how did the finding of Aerosmith’s original van come about?

The 1964 International Harvester Metro was found on the property of a Chesterfield, Massachusetts resident who had lived on the property since 2005. The owner, Phil, pulled the decrepit van up from beneath the dirt with his son, and it had remained untouched on a car trailer ever since.

https://www.history.com/news/american-pickers-aerosmith-van

Mike and Frank from American Pickers were called in to check out the van and try to figure out if it was a van that was used by the band in their early days or was it just a van owned by a huge Aerosmith fan. After some research and confirmation from a couple members of the band it was confirmed that this was in fact the old van that the budding band drove to gigs in the early 70’s. Once the band started to make it big the van was disposed of and hadn’t been seen in 40 years or more.

On tonight’s episode of “American Pickers” Mike and Frank unveil the restored 1964 International Harvester to Aerosmith and the world. I’ve seen pictures of it and it looks pretty amazing. Just saving the original Aerosmith artwork on the side of the van was quite impressive.