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Farm Power of the Past
Early farm
equipment “told” stories of the past
By Bob Robinson
I took my second bath of the day on Saturday… the first was a ‘welcome
to the morning’ wake-up shower. The second wasn’t so welcome.
I wasn’t on the Darke County Fairgrounds more than five minutes when I
was soaked in perspiration.
I didn’t pay much attention to it, however – it’s been that way for
nearly a week - as the familiar rhythmic chugging of old farm equipment
made its presence known… unaffected by the heat.
The Annual Darke County Farm Power of the Past Reunion fought high
temperatures and discomfort but still managed to draw large groups of
people checking out how food was grown and farms functioned 50, even
100 years ago. A couple of the comments, however, included “the heat
hurt us.”
One visitor had camped on the grounds. He said his wife had already
left for home; he’d be leaving in the morning because of the heat.
Sheriff’s Patrol Volunteer Scott Riffle was on duty for the event. He
said that for the most part everyone was well behaved and there were no
problems. Only one incident of vandalism had to be addressed.
“We got them,” he said. “There were witnesses.”
Vendors probably weren’t as busy as they would have liked, but the food
and drink was excellent and participants were happy to explain how
everything worked.
The tractors and early engines, for instance, mostly chug along on
propane although they originally worked on natural gas.
“It was free, pumped out of the ground,” exhibitor Mike Buirley said.
Much of the functional equipment on a farm was belt-driven by tractors.
Two examples were the corn-shucking machine and saw mill. The machines
did the work, but the tractors powered them with belts.
Watching the corn-shucker (sorry about the terminology if incorrect)
was amazing. Stalks fresh cut from the field were fed into the machine…
shavings and debris shot out one end and clean corn ears were dropped
onto another conveyor belt and loaded onto a trailer bed.
Even more amazing was the small sawmill demonstration… not because it
was hard to fathom how it worked but because of the amount of effort it
took to produce a few pieces of lumber.
The photos in Set 2 showed what had to be done 50 years ago… while
equipment is more automated and sophisticated today, processing lumber
is still a major undertaking.
The equipment shown, a Frick Sawmill with a 56-inch blade, was
manufactured in 1954. The tractor powering it was an M-Farnell Super
MTA.
This information, which I hope I wrote correctly, was supplied by the
family that put on the demonstration… brothers Larry, Dan and Roger
Fox, and cousin Dennis Delk.
“Yep, this is a family event,” one of them said, grinning.
Farm Power Photos Set 2: Trimming out lumber, 1950’s style… click here
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