1930 Rugy owned by Reg Bent is a rare bird in Canada.

Second of three parts

In the first installment we learned how William Crapo Durant, rebounding from his second ouster as boss of General Motors in 1920, formed a new automotive empire – this time one bearing his own name.
Durant Motors, Inc. followed the GM example of offering something in every price range and also copied GM in creating a Canadian division. Durant Motors of Canada was incorporated in 1921 and soon began manufacturing low-priced Stars and medium-priced Durants for sale in the Dominion.
Back then Canadian tariffs were punitive on cars brought into the country, so most American manufacturers set up branch plants here. Durant’s was in a former munitions factory in Leaside, now part of Toronto.
But export duties to the rest of the British Commonwealth were equally stiff, so Leaside began manufacturing a line of cars and trucks for export only in 1923. The cars were to be part of the Star line, but the name Star was already registered in the Commonwealth by a firm in England. Rugby was the name of Durant’s truck line in North America and for export purposes Rugby now also became a car. But other than moving the steering wheel from left to right, they simply were rebadged Stars.
When production of Stars ended in 1928, the Rugby was then based on the Durant chassis.
The export business proved profitable for the Canadian operation, with more than 5,000 vehicles sent overseas by the end of 1926.
The car in the photograph is a rare bird indeed – the only known Rugby in this country. Originally exported to Argentina, this 1930 Model 407 Touring Car returned to Canada in 1981. Why it was brought back is not known, but owner Reg Bent, of Napanee, Ont., saw an ad for the car in Auto Trader and bought it in Toronto in 1987. He then began a frame-off restoration that was completed in 1994. It wasn’t always easy.
The block of the 200 cid 4-cylinder engine was cracked, but Reg managed to score a replacement from a woodshed not far from the garage that was doing the mechanical work.
When the car left Canada in 1930 it had wooden wheels and a rear spare. When it returned, it had poorly crafted fender wells and sidemounts with Pontiac wire wheels. Perhaps the same backyard mechanic also changed the mechanical brakes to jury-rigged hydraulics.
Reg bought a couple of Durant parts cars from Pittsburgh, scored a set of brand new 1931 front fenders from a man in Toronto and “here and there” managed to pick up correct wooden wheels and Rugby hubcaps.
The car was blue when Reg bought it, but he doesn’t believe that was the original colour. It’s now a pleasing chocolate brown. All the wood used to frame the body was replaced and when it came time to recover the seats, there were seven layers of leather on top of the originals, which were intact enough to use as a pattern. Top bows were restored and new canvas installed.

When Reg bought the Rugby he was just looking for a nice touring car from that era. “I don’t think it would have mattered if it had been a Chev, a Graham or a Reo,” he says. But he caught the Durant bug and now also owns a 1930 roadster that he found in British Columbia.

That car also was built in Canada, because as we’ll see in the next installment, the Leaside factory kept producing cars after Durant’s American business foundered in 1926.

Write to Glen at glenwoodcock@canoemail.com