I very much enjoyed routine tractor work - whether in the field or driving the corn sheller from job to job - during my on-the-farm days - from the late 1960s through 1979. But I definitely was not the gearhead type and remain not-knowledgeable about pretty much anything mechanical, including tractors.
Yet - my dad's 2022 death at age 93 and the subsequent auctioning of all of the farm goods triggered a higher degree of interest for this kind of thing, or nostalgia, or whatever it is. I'm enjoying seeing various social media feeds and photos of old days tractors. (Dad owned Farmalls until a John Deere 4020 showed up later - so we supported Farmall.)
So I bought this book - thinking it was more of a coffee table item but it turns out that there also is a great deal of interesting history. Much enjoyed.
The foreword portion was captivating - it included a passage about farmers' proclivity for tinkering with their machines - dad certainly did this with the corn sheller, to the point where Charlie put together a mock patent office filing going through his innovations.
The early portion of the book is dedicated to the development of reapers and the like - tractors aren't even on the scene. This part is more interesting to me than lots of the later tractor detail - I never understood very well what was involved in the "threshing" crews that my parents and grandparents talked about; let alone the incredible amount of labor to get anything done during the phases prior to that. It's easy to see how mechanization depopulated the rural areas.
McCormick family, competitors, reaper wars, early 20th century antitrust, lots of patent litigation, Rockefeller involvement, branding, educating consumers.
Interesting characters - including a John Steward wounded at Vicksburg, started out with John Wesley Powell's second Grand Canyon expedition (1871). Abraham Lincoln hired one of the attorneys involved in the reaper patent litigation for some of his own matters.
Later hiring a consumer goods artist to design the attractive "letter series" Farmalls - these were the Ms and Super Ms that we were familiar with (followed by the "number series" tractors, such as our 400 diesel). Now that I think about it and see the photos - the design was pretty cool! Designer even put together art-deco type (or was it midcentury modern?) dealership buildings, a few of which have survived.
Replacing horses - early tractors with not much more power than a couple horses. A huge market.
Steam, kerosene, gasoline, diesel, etc.
Lots of pulley work in the early going. Development of the PTO (something I took for granted).
Did not realize how many Fordson tractors were sold through Ford - it was a great little machine, sold at a low price and a genuine threat to IH (though priced so low that this probably contributed to Ford shifting away from it).
Eventually we get to the F-20, M and then the larger tractors.
I had no idea how much IH was involved in WWII.
Great photography throughout - this will sit on the coffee table for easy access.
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