For those of you who don't peruse "Barths for Sale" topics:
"What year did Barth become Barth RSV?"
1995, after the infamous Bill Prinz took over with his plan to bring the company into the modern era.
See rv-news.com/sept1996/cvrstry.htm -it is interesting reading, including: "Yes," Prinz said, "we are willing to do anything a customer may want. If it can be done on wheels, we can do it."
I'll give Prinz his due: he built my 1996 coach exactly to my specs, including our self-designed odd-ball paint scheme, and built a great coach "just like the old ones".
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"You are what you drive" - Clint Eastwood

How did Barth get its name? Google turned up all sorts of "Barth"; people, places, and even a neurological disorder, "Barth Syndrom".

I have Barth syndrome!

There was the guy named Barth you see. Somehow, (nobody who knows wants to tell us) he got into the mobile home biz. I talked to him once and he told me that the company he worked for, Continental, built the first 50 footer mobile home. He then decided he wanted to go into the travel trailer biz and started a company called B Line,

B Line Travel Trailer



He applied for a received a patent for the type of frame construction we enjoy on our coaches and started making travel trailers. This was the mid to late 60's





In 1968 the Barth family sold out to a guy named Mike Umbaugh and he took it all the way to the mid 90's where it went into receivership and the plug was finally pulled by Spartan chassis in 1998 who was the major creditor at the time.

Now this information has been gathered from many sources, none of which are from the people who really know the history. But those folks even though I am sure look at the site daily do not wish to join us. pity

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[This message has been edited by davebowers (edited March 30, 2005).]

Those wrap-around corner windows gave me Barth lust way back then. Had to settle for a Shasta.

quote:

Originally posted by garryp:
I have Barth syndrome!

garryp: we all must

Dave: nice post, very mysterious! What caused the Leatherman bunch to get cold feet after all the RV magazine promo-spin regarding the rebirth of Barth?

don

Dog, when you consider, (in my opinion) Leatherman's idea in the marketing of these coaches was to just tell the Barth Rangers and they would go out and sell them and he would build them from the down payments. Kind of like an RV ponsi scheme. He didn't go for slideouts and he was going to have a pricepoint in the $300K range. duh! Then the dot com bubble burst plus no one...that is no one showed any interest or cared what he was doing and he went from one day talking like Donald Trump to not returning phone calls. He gave all the Barth paperwork to Lee Merriman. Lee has the build files on every coach after 1990 or so. Plus other various spare parts etc.

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[This message has been edited by davebowers (edited March 30, 2005).]

Interesting. It makes me even more proud and determined to take good care of my Regal. I'm actually the forth owner, but fortunatly, all of them kept good records. I even have the original title, bill of sale, and a partial set of the blueline drawings.
I got sort of tickled going through the past maintainance and repair invoices. Each new owner would spend a chunk of change on her the first year, put a few thousand on the odometer, then pretty much let her sit idle for a long period.
Besides Ron,(gotta love that ron!)I think the original owner was the only guy to really enjoy her. He bought her new in 1984 and sold @ 48,000 miles in 1998. She has 64Kmi on her now.
What would 65 grand worth of 1984 USDs translate into today? Duh? Who's the financial whiz kid on the block?
dog:-)

PS: Like I told my property appraiser, you can't count the (bleep*) depreciation when I'm spending on the upkeep!

*darn :-) sorry

[This message has been edited by davebowers (edited March 30, 2005).]

[This message has been edited by dogill (edited March 31, 2005).]