Free Wheelin' - 7 minute version

Free Wheelin’ was made for the BFGoodrich Company. It was shot during the Summer of 1976.
BFGoodrich was a major sponsor of the “Van In” event at Bowling Green, Kentucky. They produced this film to promote their involvement with this hot market of that era. This clip is excerpted from the 7 minute version of the film that Goodrich had made for theatrical distribution. The film was shot in 16mm but was blown-up to 35mm for release as a short, or trailer, in movie theaters across the USA.
This film had same fancy (expensive) opticals or special effects; splits screens and wipes. Visual trick that today can be done digitally on editing programs on your phone, but back in the film era a time consuming and expensive undertaking. So this film had some budget!
Cleveland’s then largest advertising agency, Griswold-Eshelman had the BFGoodrich account at the time. And Mel Horace was the Agency Producer on the project. Mel was briefly a Cinecraft employee when Cinecraft bought General Pictures. He then moved on to Griswold-Eshelman and was a frequent Cinecraft client.
Over 6,000 vans showed up at this 1976 event in Bowling Green, KY called the National Truck-In or the 1976 Nationals and event operated by the National Street Van Association or NSVA. Corporate sponsorship, besides BFGoodrich, included Ford and Chevrolet.
The Van phenomenon began to cool in the late 1970’s. But there is still a Nationals event every summer.
Now go find your tie-died shirt.