Senator George Norris, the consumer

LINCOLN, Neb. - A blog post from the Nebraska State Historical Society this week, told the story of a side of McCook’s George Norris that we seldom hear about. It seems that the Senator, praised by no less than Franklin Roosevelt as “the very perfect, gentle knight of American progressive ideals,” could run out of patience like the rest of us.

In an unearthed November 1919 letter described by the blog post as “snarky,” the Senator expressed his disappointment in a vehicle, a product of the Overland Automobile Company (later to become “Willys” of jeep fame), purchased from a Washington, D.C. auto dealer and did so in regal fashion.

“Gentlemen: I have been very much interested in the extensive advertising campaign that you have been making of your new Overland Four, and I desire to suggest to you that in connection with this car which your advertising says has made such a record, that you advertise the car you sold me three or four years ago …

“It has run about three thousand miles. It has hardly been off the pavement – but you would not need to say all this in the advertisement. You might say it has made its record over some rough roads, without saying anything about the fact that it has not been taken out of the District with one or two exceptions. The facts are, I have always been afraid to take it very far from home for fear I could not get back with it. A careful estimate of the expense I have been to for repairs, will show that it has cost just about a dollar a mile. The mileage of course, is small for the length of time I have had it, but this is explained by the fact that it has been in the repair shop most of the time.

“In fact, I have had it nearly all rebuilt. It is a better car now than it was when I bought it, because while you represented to me that it had only run one hundred and seventy miles when I bought it, it would be easy to demonstrate that it had run a great many more than that and was practically worn out when you sold it to me for a new car but now, since it is rebuilt, I have hopes that it will eventually be of some service to me.

“In a condensed way, we could put all this on a bulletin board and hang it on the car, and put my car right by the side of the one you are now advertising in your showrooms. The facts are, my car looks better than the one you have there. It is a fine looker. It has never been used enough to wear off the gloss.

“At the present time, it is not running. In a moment of enthusiasm, I induced my neighbor to come over this morning and help push it down the hill, with the hope that it would start by the time we got to the bottom. In this we failed, and it is standing now at the foot of the hill, so if you exhibited it you would have to go to the expense of getting a truck to haul it to your place of business. I will be glad to cooperate with you in any advertising plan that you may suggest in regard to my car, providing you confine yourselves within reasonable limits, to the truth. Very truly yours, G. W. Norris.”