Plymouth Division, Chrysler Corporation Other manufacturers followed suit, and most Detroit cars of the immediate postwar era came off the assembly line with three-on-the-tree manual transmissions.

The "three-on-the-tree" column-mounted manual transmission shifter was, for a very long time, the most common setup in American motor vehicles. My 1941 Plymouth Special Deluxe came with one ...

"Three on the tree" refers to the shift lever and transmission type, with three forward gears and one reverse. In this configuration, the lever was on the steering column, also called “the tree,” ...