A Look Back -- Jerry Person

Jerry Person

This week I thought we would look at the “Dodge boys.”

No, we’re not going back to the old west for our story, and no, Dodge

isn’t their name, but it is what these two men sold.

Our first Dodge man is Roy D. Bryant and as we go along you’ll see how

the lives of these two men interact.

On a June day in 1906, a son was born to Charles and Mary Bryant near

the Red River town of Marietta in Oklahoma.

He was the oldest of nine Bryant children. His father Charles was a

blacksmith and worked very hard to keep his family clothed and fed.

Roy received his early education at Fort Townson, Oklahoma, in one of

those one-room schools. When he completed eighth-grade, Roy left school

to get work and help out with family expenses.

When he turned 21, he married his sweetheart Katie Bollen. He then

went to work at several oil companies around Oklahoma’s oil fields for

the next four years.

When he was 25 he started selling cars for a local car dealer, which

he did for the next 10 years.

In 1941 the family moved to San Diego where he worked for the Pacific

Crane and Rigging Co., camouflaging aircraft factories for the war.

Two years later he relocated to Hermosa Beach as a rigger. But it was

in late 1945 that the Bryant family moved to Huntington Beach to live.

That same year he opened a Dodge Plymouth agency at 311 Walnut Ave.

By 1951 the Bryant Motor Co. relocated to 401 Main St. where Jax

bicycles is today.

Life was good for Roy and Katie and their three children -- Roy Jr.,

William and Frances.

Roy had joined the Huntington Beach Elks lodge, the Huntington Beach

Lions Club and served as a director of our Chamber of Commerce.

On March 1, 1957 Roy sold his Dodge agency to Sam Magill, our second

Dodge man.

Samuel Alexander Magill was a born and bred Southerner, born in

Atlanta, GA in 1901.

He received his formal learning in the Georgia schools before he

enrolled at Georgia Tech where he received a degree in textile

engineering.

This was not surprising because his father owned a hosiery mill in

Atlanta.

Sam studied chemistry at the University of Tennessee at Knoxville and

got his second degree.

After World War II ended, Sam went to work as an engineer for the

Chevrolet Motor Company in 1919. After several years with General Motors,

Sam was made a district manager and worked at several company locations

in Idaho, Montana and Wyoming.

In 1929 he came to California to become a sales manager for George

Hoover Chevrolet in Long Beach. By 1941 Sam and his wife Florence came to

Huntington Beach where Sam became general manager for Otto Culbertson

Chevrolet agency at 302 Pacific Coast Highway.

In 1951 Sam retired from the car agency and in 1952 he and Florence

and their daughter Louise traveled around the world and lived in Europe

for two years.

Sam and family returned to California where he bought out Roy Bryant

in 1957 and Sam began selling Dodge and Simca automobiles.

While Sam was selling cars Roy Bryant was not sitting back and taking

it easy.

Roy and Katie attempted to travel to New York for a Lions convention.

But as their plane began to taxi on the runway its engine faltered and

the plane returned to its starting point. After a while it began to taxi

again, and then again. Its engine faltered a second time. Roy grabbed

Katie’s arm and off the plane they went. They went instead to the

Colorado River.

Sam and the rest of the auto dealers in Huntington Beach banded

together when the city, instead of helping its own, bought two new police

cars from another city.

But time passed and tempers cooled.

Sam was a member of our Rotary Club and the Balboa Bay Club in Newport

Beach. He an his family continued to live in Long Beach and Sam traveled

to and from the city to the north each day.

But the good life began to take its toll on Sam and his health began

to decline.

The Chrysler Corporation canceled both his franchises and Sam closed

down his car agency on April 29, 1959 after a credit company removed the

cars from his showroom.

On May 11, 1959 Sam Magill passed away.

Bryant still owned this now empty garage building. But not for very

long.

For, in October 1959, Tovatt’s Hardware purchased the building for its

hardware store.

Roy and Katie remained in Huntington Beach where they lived at910

Acacia Ave.

Until, in September 1959, he traveled to Oregon and so loved the

countryside that he bought 32 acres for $26,500 near Blodgett. This

included a home with five bedrooms and several barns on the property.

He even purchased 15 white-faced Hereford for his ranch.

On Oct. 1, 1959 Roy resigned from our City Council and moved up north

to Oregon to live after having lived in Huntington Beach for 14 years.

I wish Sam were still around with that Dodge agency because in August

of 1957 he was offering a 1946 Ford V-8 Tudor coupe for sale at $95.00

then I would have some wheels to travel around ol’ Huntington Beach.

But now as the sun slowly sinks into the west, our “Dodge boys” have

ridden off into the sunset -- in a new Dodge of course.

* JERRY PERSON is a local historian and longtime Huntington Beach

resident. If you have ideas for future columns, write him at P.O. Box

7182, Huntington Beach, CA 92615.