FORT WAYNE, Ind. (ADAMS) – 44 years after the last International Scout went down the assembly line a new generation will be unveiled today.
Scout Motors, Inc., a subsidiary of Volkswagen and longtime supporter of Harvester Homecoming, will reveal their new Scout EV with the help of some Fort Wayne experts.
Scout Motors released the following:
Fort Wayne, the birthplace of the International Harvester Scout, will be represented with the big reveal.
The Oct. 24 event will be held 44 years and three days after the last International Scout went down the assembly line along New Haven Avenue on Oct. 21, 1980.
Harvester Homecoming founder Ryan DuVall and former Fort Wayne Truck Works employees Richard Hatch (longtime head of styling), Dave Dickmeyer (a longtime clay modeling stylist), and Phil Coonrod (former Scout plant worker, longtime IH parts distributor and owner of the first Scout ever built), are being brought in by Scout Motors for the event. The company is also transporting the first Scout as well as DuVall’s 1976 Scout Traveler to Nashville, Tennessee for the events.
Scout Motors has also discussed bringing the prototypes of the new EV Scout to Fort Wayne in the near future to introduce it to the community that forged its history.
Scout Motors has supported Harvester Homecoming since it and CEO Scott Keogh (who was VW’s CEO of American operations at the time) first visited its festival in Fort Wayne in August of 2022 – weeks ahead of the new company being publicly launched. Harvester Homecoming has hosted officials from Scout Motors many times, DuVall, Hatch and Dickmeyer were interviewed on camera over the summer to serve as educational marketing pieces by the company.
Harvester Homecoming also presented Keogh with a brick pulled from the original Scout plant in Fort Wayne that was delivered to Keogh at the groundbreaking for the new Scout plant under construction in Blythewood, S.C.
DuVall said Harvester Homecoming and he, personally, is honored to be a part of this historic event.
“We are so proud that this new company is so dedicated to respecting the heritage of the Scout and is so interested in being a part of this community – and for supporting our endeavors — from afar,” DuVall said. “I am anxious to see this new incarnation and have high hopes that it pays homage to the Summit City by being the best in its class.”
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