If this is friday, this must be the Balaton tractor show. “twas tempted to post some pix from the car show yesterday, but didn’t find much of anything interesting to photograph… Just the same neatly parked parade of Mustangs, 57 Chevies, old pickups, etc.. Heck, the aircooled VW and my hack’d BMW airhead made up the whole “foreign” contingent, despite the fact that for over half the automobile’s history “foreign” cars have been here, even in rural america, in volume. Other day someone posted a 60s British Motors Company dealership roster on one of the Mini forums, and here deep in the cornfields there were multiple BMC dealers in South Dakota and darn near a dozen in Minnesota. But to the old men and their aging big 3 “collector” cars, the sun rose and set on the big 3 “american” auto industry. Apparently they never heard of AMC or Studebaker, who weren’t represented at yesterday’s show either. So screw yesterdays photos…
And let’s remember what we do well here, tractors! Even Dr. Porsche was late to the party, with Henry and Harry F. building a few hundred thousand N series tractors before the Porsche tractor even saw volume production. Worldwide, american tractors still dominate the mid and high horsepower markets, and the smaller tractors look like what would have happened if the N series had been updated instead of growing bigger and badder.
Big and little brother Case, the proud sons of Racine, Wisconsin.
Twin City and later Minneapolis-Moline tractors, built in Minneapolis…
The factory was bulldozed in the 70s, the workers robbed of their pensions, and replaced with a Target store full of Chinese made throwaway junk.
An alternative to Harry Ferguson’s 30s 3 point hitch solution to the tipover problem? Rear view:
Meanwhile, Dr.Porsche put his aircooled diesel in front. The Allis-Chalmers G models design has a lot of advantages- visibility, traction, etc.- But it’s an evolutionary dead end. Farmers seemed to prefer to put the dust behind them, but what if enclosed cabs had preceded the G model?
Ahh, the way it should be… Old School parts counter at the tractor dealer that hosted the show. ‘Twas a John Deere dealer ’til big green forced them out in ’77, still open today as an indy shop with an excellent reputation hereabouts. Oughta be declared a historic site!
GearheadGrrrl 