My dad drove down the highway from Anchorage to Glendive Montana in Late October / early November 1946.  He was 15 at the time, and had been hired as a truck driver by a guy taking a couple of military surplus duce and a halfs down to somewhere in North Dakota.  He and his brother drove back up the next spring in March of 1947 in a 1916 White truck and a 1946 Ford, which they ended up towing most of the way because it couldn't handle the mud.