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A Brief, But Interesting, History.
 

Before we answer the short question with a long answer, we need to get the issue of pronunciation squared away. It is neither "to," "too," "two," nor "tow" as in tow truck. Towe rhythms with "plow" which rhythms with "cow." Think of a farm - "how now brown cow" or sow or plow. The "e" was recently added to the family name in an effort to increase the possibility of correct pronunciation. Probably it was not successful. 

Edward Towe is from America's Heartland. He was raised among plows and cows in Iowa and used profits from those endeavors plus some used car sales to finance his schooling as a draftsman, and ultimately his banking career. Edward concluded that standing behind a teller's cage and taking people's money had many advantages over standing behind a plow or playing midwife to a cow. So in 1950, Edward bought a small bank in a 
 

small town in South Dakota, and soon bought another, and yet another. Edward had a knack for the business of banking and was soon a successful banker. By 1970, Edward Towe owned or controlled 13 local banks spread among small towns in Montana, and South Dakota. Remembering his roots, the basis of the economy in the heartland, and realizing that he could hire others to do the farming and plowing, Edward also made substantial investments in ranching and farming properties.

 

Soon after the banks provided substantial profits, Edward began collecting, preserving, and sometimes restoring cars as if there were no tomorrow. Edward's strong preference is for automobiles manufactured by Henry Ford's Ford Motor Company. Although he focused his collecting efforts on Fords, he would infrequently acquire a Cadillac or Chevrolet just so he could demonstrate why Henry Ford made a superior automobile.

The collection soon grew so large that Edward Towe needed help to maintain it, thus he established a maintenance and restoration shop. While he prefers to preserve automobiles, some of the most unique examples collected had spent a year or two too many in the fields exposed to the weather. These vehicles had to be restored in order

to be preserved. Lewis Rector, a car mechanic / restorer, from the San Francisco Bay Area moved to Montana to head up Edward Towe's restoration shop.

Edward bought some of his Fords in South America from three purchasing trips. While he had most Fords shipped home, he'd always select a neat phaeton or two for him and his party to drive back home. He claims that it is pure fun to drive a 50-year old year car through South America, Central America and Mexico. So much fun that this four-score and more Ford car guy plans another such trip in the next year or two.

 

By the mid-80's, Edward's collection included over 240 cars, which made it the world's largest and most complete Ford collection. This collection was exhibited by two Museums; one the Towe Ford Museum in Deer Lodge, Montana and the second, the Towe Ford Museum here in Sacramento, California.

In the early 80's while Edward Towe was fine-tuning his collection, a group of Sacramento's collector car enthusiasts established the California Vehicle Foundation (CVF) as a not-for-profit, tax-exempt legal entity to establish and operate an automotive museum. Talk about pie-in-the-sky. They had a vision and a car or two, but no museum campus, no significant collection and no funding.

 

But these local car enthusiasts were committed and persistent. By 1986 they had arranged for Edward Towe to exhibit most of his automobiles here in Sacramento, received a grant from the Ford Motor Company of $100,000 for start-up funds, persuaded the Hadley Motor Transport to move the cars from Montana to Sacramento, and convinced the City of Sacramento to provide a Museum building.

Thus the Museum opened in May 1987. The local CVF officials were so thankful that Edward Towe agreed to exhibit his cars in their Museum that they named the Museum in his honor. And that's why we are named "The Towe Auto Museum."