Owner-operator Greg Crispell pulls a step deck mostly within New York State and surrounding areas with this custom 1984 Peterbilt 359, originally a short-hood daycab he bought at age 21 and put to work.
The Dryden, New York-based independent hauls a lot of landscaping-related commodities -- various stone products -- and apples and other agricultural commodities on occasion in the fall. This truck and Crispell's work itself builds on the legacy of his father, also a working owner-operator of a 359. The elder Crispell's 1986 model he “bought the same year I was born,” Greg said. “I grew up around that truck,” and always aspired to own one much the same -- the veritable Platonic ideal of a truck in his mind.
The elder Crispell’s rig was a stock 250-inch wheelbase when he bought it, where it remains today, pulling the owner’s dump trailer full of agricultural commodities, mostly.
Greg’s taken his own 1984 359 a shot further, having added the flattop sleeper and extending the wheelbase to 280 inches, modifying the front to an extended hood, painting and making many other custom touches throughout, much of the work done himself.
Greg Crispell's put a couple years of metal-fab education in high school to work, too, designing first an aluminum -- then stainless steel -- visor and other bright parts around the rig with a distinctive bead roll that’s caught the eyes of other owner-operators around the nation.
Detail of the visor on Crispell's 359
The growing notoriety of his work is no doubt part of the reason he got the invite to Peterbilt's 2023 Pride & Class parade and truck show for employees of the Peterbilt factory in Denton, Texas, where Overdrive caught up with the owner this past October.
