1946 – 2026 Watching Steinbach Grow: Steinbach’s first Ford dealer still at same location on Main

It stands to reason that the “Automobile City” would be home to Western Canada’s first Ford dealership.

There are few firms in Manitoba that can boast of having served the public at the same location for well over 100 years. The Steinbach auto dealership established by J.R. Friesen on Main Street is one of those.

When John D. Penner opened Penner Motors, billed as the brightest spot in town, the Friesen family, just a block down the street had already been in business for 50 years.

What is now Fairway Ford had its start as a modest implement shop, long before the popular transportation method of horsepower on four legs was replaced by motorized conveyances on rubber tires with plenty of horsepower under the hood.

In 1903, J.R. Friesen went into the implement business. In the same year, Henry Ford launched the famous Ford Motor Company.

In 1953, in a Carillon News advertisement the company stated, “Although J.R. Friesen & Son did not immediately take on the Ford agency, it gives us a great deal of pleasure to celebrate our birthdays together. A great many changes have taken place in the last 50 years and we are proud to have been able to play a leading role in a half-century of mechanization and transport.”

Jacob Friesen and his three brothers showed their mechanical bent early and all left the family farm. Brother Klaas started Friesen Machine Shop in 1893, and from this machine shop sprang many early advancements for the community, as it provided the facilities to build machines and equipment. Jacob first was maintenance man and sawyer in the various sawmills that supplied lumber for the fledgling community of Steinbach.

Friesen was a natural at selling machinery, having a keen interest in everything mechanical. A man named Ford was building a motor-car and not to be outdone, the Friesens helped a local farmer, C.F. Broesky, fashion his own self-propelled vehicle, powered by a gasoline engine.

In 1907, Friesen bought his first Ford car, and five years later received a Ford dealership. It was then one of the very first Ford dealerships in Manitoba; today, it is one of those original dealerships still operating in the province.

Vehicle sales were slow in those early years, but implement sales more than made up for it.

In his later years, Friesen recalled that the heyday of the implement business was in 1918-19, when farmers stood in line at the Giroux loading platform, money in hand, and waited as the Fordson tractors were unloaded from the train cars.

But, bad days followed the good and the depression of the ’30s hit this firm hard. Friesen’s belief in hard work and innovation kept his firm going when times were tough. People didn’t think of driving cars much during the winter, so when the car season was over the J.R. Friesen Garage manufactured a type of snow plane for use in emergencies when area roads became impassable.

Two sons-in-law, Wm. P. Wiebe and Frank Sawatzky, and J.R.’s son Ed J., started their apprenticeship during those days. They carried these “winter-work” projects further to build and fly airplanes powered by Model A engines. All three had licences to pilot their own planes.

Even though plans were to manufacture these planes commercially, the scarcity of money prevented any large scale operations. Three planes, including the famous Pietenpol in 1932, were built. Two were sold and one was kept for local flying.

In February, 1940, the Friesen garage was destroyed by fire. Before too many months had passed, a new building, modern in design and layout, stood on the ruins of the old. It still was the biggest garage in Steinbach at the time.

Ed J. Friesen, who took over management some years before his father died in 1950, inherited the keen mechanical inclination from his father, and spent more time in the back shop than he did in the front office. That continued long after his retirement and when his mobility became limited, he would still whiz through the repair department on a motorized wheelchair.

It was during the 1950’s Steinbach earned the reputation for being the place to buy a vehicle as the auto dealers shifted gears from implement sales to cars and trucks. The first informal co-operative effort on the way to establishing the Steinbach Automobile Association came when the Penner Brothers and Ed Friesen got together for a joint sales promotion.

For A.D. it was an opportunity to get a larger share of the action and for John D. and Ed J. it was an opportunity to further establish the Southeast as “Ford Country”.

The friendly competition was no more apparent than in 1955 when two Steinbach salesmen were in among top 12 in Ford sales in all of Canada.

Elvin Fast was one of those salesmen and along with three other longtime employees at J.R. Friesen and Son, became part of a five-man partnership in 1972 when Ed J. Friesen sold the major portion of the Steinbach dealership to four senior employees, Art Baerg, Jac Ketler, Alvin Reimer and Fast.

That was the first in a number of shifts in ownership as the Friesen family business eventually became part of the Walters buying group in 2022.

In 1982, the business was sold to Floyd Hiebert, who operated it along with partners Ike Kroeker, Ken Reimer and Dave Hiebert. This ownership group changed the name to Fairway Ford in 1983 and sold their shares in 1992 to former Steinbach mayor Helmut Pankratz.

In 1995, Bob Banman and Ron Loeppky bought Fairway Ford from Pankratz. Loeppky took sole ownership of the company in 1996.

After running the dealership for over 25 years, Ron Loeppky sold Fairway Ford to Matt Walters in 2022.

While the latest ownership change moved Fairway Ford into a buyers’ group, both community and customers will notice little difference at Steinbach’s oldest dealership.

Both the general manager John Verret and sales manager Joel Enns have been with Fairway over 20 years. Veteran salesman Fred Purchase has been there 28 years.

Verret says the shifts in ownership have never changed the culture at Fairway over the years. The dealership was always very involved in the community and that support from Fairway has never wavered.

Today, hockey fans will see Fairway’s name on the back of all Pistons’ jerseys. That tradition of sponsoring hockey teams dates back to 1958 when Ed Friesen sponsored the East Steinbach Eagles.

But the dealership’s role in community support goes far beyond sports and beyond the boundaries of Steinbach. Fairway sponsors more than two dozen events and organizations including the Hanover Agriculture Fair, Steinbach Bible College, Youth for Christ in Steinbach and the Main Street Project in Winnipeg.

Fairway Ford is also still very much a part of the Steinbach Automobile Dealers Association along with Ledingham GM, Highway Mazda, Harvest Honda and Steinbach Dodge.