Editor’s Choice: By Daniel J. Linss When you find two 1980 trucks with sequential VIN numbers and both have super low mileage, you want to learnmore. But,whileresearchingthese trucks, along with the two men who now own them, the guy who ordered them, and the company he still works for, I found a lot of history worth preserving. The trucks are now owned by Lee Kinzer and Dave Marciel, both from the Sacramento area of California, and bothhaveinterestingstoriestotell. The trucks were ordered by a gentleman named Jim Staas, who has worked for an outfit called Siller Bros. out of Yuba City, CA for his entire adult life – over 67 years – and both Jim and Siller Bros. have stories worth telling, as well. Andy and Chuck Siller, two of six brothers and six sisters, dropped out of high school to start logging in 1947 andSillerBros.wasborn. In1958,they incorporated, and their brother Neil joinedthefun. Atthattime,Andyand Chuck each owned 40% of the company and Neil, who brought his trucks to the operation, owned the remaining 20%. This company is still active today, butalothaschanged. Startingoutasa logging operation, they also had several mills over the years and, at one point, owned20,000acresoftimber. Later, they got into farming (rice, walnuts, almonds, peaches, and prunes), owning and managing as much as 10,000 acres of farmland, and even started an aviation division with helicopters and Sky Cranes when environmentalists began forcing logging companies to “not disturb” the land they were logging. While still in college, Jim Staas (now 85) joined the company in 1958, working out in the logging fields, as a tail hooker under the shuttle in the day, and driving a water truck off highway atnight. Aftergraduating,thebrothers signed off on his commercial license, and he began driving a log truck. The first new truck Siller Bros. ever bought was a 1955 Kenworth, and theystillownittoday. Thecompany bought their first new Peterbilt log truck in 1961 for Jim, and after that, they only bought Peterbilts (Jim got a new one everytwoyears). In1976,theymade Jim the Truck Boss, and then at some point he became Operations Manager, which is still his title today. Talking to Jim, who has a wealth of knowledge and is still sharp as a tack, wasawesome. And,ifhedoesn’tknow the answer to your question, he has logs and journals he can go through to get it. Jim still lives on the same property in Marysville,CAwherehewasborn. The house he was born in and grew up in was builtin1903. Hehadtotearitdowna few years ago and build a new house, because termites had taken over the old place. Bornin1940andstartingatSiller Bros. when he was 18 years old, besides a stint in the military, Jim has spent his entireadultlifeatSillerBros. These days, he still goes in the office every day for a few hours to make sure things are going smoothly, but most of his focus now is on putting together the history of the company he gave his life to. These sequentially numbered 1980 Peterbilt 353s were ordered by Jim as glider kits at the end of 1979, picked up from the factory in Newark, CA in January 1980, then hauled back to Yuba City. The353modelwasintroducedin 1973 as a construction-oriented variant of the model 359, eventually replacing the model 341 and heavy duty versions ofthemodel351. WhentheNewark assembly plant closed in 1986, that same year, the company revised their entire vocational lineup and one of these changes was replacing the model 353 with the model 357. Longtime mechanic Vern Paquette (who was with the company for 57 years before retiring and then passing away) was tasked with installing the drivetrains inthesematchingtrucks. Detroitswere popular then, so both trucks got 318-hp 8V-71s, 5+4 two-stick transmissions, andheavydutyrears. Bothhadbutterfly hoods and were painted in the Siller colors (red and Croyden Cream), and both were fitted with custom built 4,000-gallonwatertanks. Buthereis where things got interesting. Due to several factors including a divorce in the family, an economic downturn, and pressure to unionize the company, co-founder and brother Chuck SillerseparatedfromSillerBros. These new 1980 Peterbilt 353s, along with much of the fleet, were put into a nearby barn on brother Neil’s ranch, where they sat side by side for years and were not used. Mostofthefleetwasslowlyput back into service over the next few years as the economy improved, but these two 1980 Peterbilt 353s were kept in the barn. Infact,oneofthemwasneverput into service, and the other did not start getting used until October of 1997. 20 10-4 Magazine / February 2026 PRESERVING HISTORY
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