My grandfather told of going after a herd of horses when he was a teenager, he was born in 1898. He rode with his uncle from Rotan, Texas up into New Mexico in a model T. There were not many roads as such, just wagon trails, and the trip up the caprock onto the high plains was made several times as the carburetor would run out of gas on the steep incline as the fuel tank was in front of the windshield and gravity fed. The steep angle prevented the gas reaching the carburetor until someone advisied them to back up the hill. They had as many as a dozen flats a day, which they repaired on the spot, and muddy roads were a problem that was solved occasionally by picking the stuck car up and setting it out of the ruts. Once the engine got to knocking really bad, so they drained the oil in a bucket then turned the car on it's side, removed the pan, filed the rod caps (he called this "tightening the boxings"), then set it upright and poured the oil back in. They generally slept wherever night caught them, but sometimes were invited to spend the night in a barn. Hospitality dictated that they be invited for meals everywhere they stopped and was rarely turned down, wouldn't have been polite to refuse. The trip up took more than two weeks, the trip home took less as the horses would follow an old mare with a bell on wherever she was led and they didn't have to follow roads or wagon trails going home.
