10-4 Magazine April 2024

Troy’s Treasures: By Troy Miller With brash and intense paint jobs often screaming “look at me” and big rides rolling down the highway, it’s always a pleasure to see understated cool and simple styling taken to a striking effect. Though the bold and outsized styling of many working show trucks (and often the personalities of their owners) have their place, Barry Unruh (48) of Galva, Kansas, has been keeping it clean with the two-tone silver-and-grey 379 Peterbilt seen on these pages. A firm believer in work ethic and the blessings of family and friendship, Barry’s 379 is a testament to hard work. Coming from a trucking family, Barry’s father, Ellwyn Unruh, originally drove truck, which eventually led Barry to taking up the profession, as his father did. Often spending time riding with his father, he also learned to work on the trucks, helping his dad in the shop, as well. Barry’s first proper drive was in one of his father’s Internationals, after earning his CDL at 20 years old. First owning a 1995 Peterbilt for quite a few years, now with 28 years behind the wheel, Barry’s current ride is the 2002 379 Peterbilt seen here. This Peterbilt has been Barry’s ride for well over a decade, and it’s always been clean and well presented. That comes as little surprise considering I first met Barry in Tonkawa, Oklahoma, at the Busted Knuckle Truck Show, put on every September by our friends, the Wilkins family, of Wilkins Oklahoma Truck Supply. Laid back, but always shining, Barry and his Peterbilt have an understated and uncomplicated appeal. Featuring silver-on-chrome, minimal visible lighting, and restrained striping, the truck isn’t there to slap you in the face, but instead, to simply look right. Over the years, Barry has plied his skills as a driver pulling RGN, lowboy, stepdeck (including over-dimensional), dry van, and pneumatic tanker, as well as a host of agricultural trucking like bulk dairy and milk transport, grain, livestock transport, fertilizer, and occasional loads of propane and other compressed gasses. Moving what pays and keeps the truck busy, other transports have included stretch loads exceeding over 100-feet overall length, and super loads upwards of 20-feet wide. Primarily running local these days, Barry’s career has taken him all over the continental United States, especially points West. The truck is a 2002 Peterbilt 379 with an Ultracab and a 70-inch Unibilt 30 10-4 Magazine / April 2024 UNDERSTATED COOL