Our Touring Past

Eicke and Provis.

Fullarton Road. Parkside. South Australia ( click on address for approximate location.)

This advertisement offering a folding type caravan trailer for hire was found in 'The Advertiser' (Adelaide) for 17-12-1930.
They have a particularly significant place in early Aussie caravan history it seems. The image quality is pretty poor but only the whole page can be downloaded from Trove and as the advert is only a single column width it is almost illegible when cropped so I enlarged the clearer on screen image and photographed it to get a reasonable image.

George

Hi George.
What a great bit of detective work, the very early caravan builders are so hard to find information on. I suppose that Eicke & Provis or any other early caravan builders only really had a "local" client base so they didnt need to advertise or may not have had the money to advertise as well.

Eicke and Provis also feature in Episode 1 of the South Australian Caravan Industry Video on Youtube below.

A great story produced by the ABC on Hans Heysen, who used an Eicke and Provis caravan in the 1930's to travel to remote areas around the Flinders Ranges and paint.
There are also several photos of the restored Eicke and Provis caravan which is still owned by the Heysen family.

Hans Heysen Story Here

Some time back I ran across the following item on Trove, it adds a personal touch to this lovely preserved van. From the photos some new curtains might be in order, it looks a little bare these days.

I've removed other 'Gossip' from this item and added a bit of colour. From The Mail (Adelaide) 19 December, 1931.
I wonder if 'Deirdre' ever actually saw the van to describe it as a 'luxurious affair'?

George

I was contacted by Toby several months ago, who was after information on a vintage caravan that he had. This wasnt that exciting as I get enquiries like this all the time. But what did get me interested was when he mentioned that the caravan was purchased new by his Great Grandfather in 1930, and that his dad thought seemed to recall that it was an Pike and Provis. After working out that it was a folding caravan I assumed it would be an Eicke and Provis.

So not having seen one in the flesh before, and with a trip to Adelaide planned, I took the opportunity to arrange with the Hans Heysen House to come and have a look at there original but restored Eicke and Provis that they have, which was originally used by Hans Heysen on his many painting trips to the outback.


A shot of the draw bar of the Eicke and Provis.


Showing the chassis and suspension. Note the reused vintage car front axle.


The caravan in the folden down position ready for travel.



I also just wanted to thank the ladies that were working at Hans Heysen's House "The Cedars" on the day I visited, and that were so patient with me and very helpful with the following information.





Hans Heysen's Eicke and Provis collapsible caravan.

While doing a bit of research through some archives on another vintage caravan topic, I came across this image that is listed as taken in the 1930's of a home made trailer/caravan.
I had a quick look at the image as it wasnt what I was after, then after a couple of minutes it dawned on me that this was an Eicke and Provis caravan. If you have a look at the folded up version above, the two are just about identical, as well as the photo was taken in South Australia, the home state of Eicke and Provis.
Image from the South Australian Library collection.

1935 article from the Adelaide Advertiser, its a bit hard to see but there are two Eicke and Provis caravans in the photo.

We have recently purchased an Eicke and Provis caravan from Adelaide, and as usual I got stuck into researching the history of this maker.
Interesting that I discovered that there isnt a lot about the builders Eicke and Provis other than they were mechanics/boilermakers in Adelaide.

So after rereading the history in these pages I came across the following sentence that led me to a wealth of information.



It seems as though the Heysen caravan was built for him by a gentleman by the name of William Ashley Norman, a solicitor from Adelaide.


Here is part of the Patent document submitted by Norman in 1930.


Oh and here is a picture of our Eicke and Provis caravan, looks a bit different to the one above? Well there's more to come.

gday richard
geez you keep coming up with some interesting finds !!! looking forward to following this one .very interesting !!!

Now that I have you interested lets go back to what we know.

The Hans Heysen "Eicke and Provis" caravan with photos showing how its erected.

I borrowed the photos from the camper trailer website here.
www.campertrailers.org/heysens_camper.htm