I visited the family farm for the first time in over 3 decades

   / I visited the family farm for the first time in over 3 decades #1  

JimRB

Veteran Member
Joined
Nov 11, 2008
Messages
1,349
Location
Covington, GA
Tractor
JD 870
My uncle is semi-retired and is a bit hunched over. On the other hand he is in his late seventies so that is to be expected. The family farm is around Ossian, Indiana which is the eastern edge. Corn and beans country. My cousin and my uncle were working on getting the combine ready. Beans and corn have another week or so before they are dry enough to economically harvest.

My uncle was not interested in old iron until he was nearly retired. He had a run of a few decades of fixing things up, buying and selling until he started losing sensations in his hand which makes it hard to work.

He had a few poppers. Two that were his and two that he had restored and was storing for a someone. He had a yellow 430 popper but it had vertical cylinders. Beside that was the JD he farmed with for years. He bought it new in 1958 and it was one I rode on when I was a pup 45 years ago. He was sort of embarrassed about the leaks on his tractor. He was just spraying some freshen up paint before he got into the proper restoration mode. Of course his idea of freshen up paint is more of 3/4 restore. 068.jpg 069.jpg070.jpg

The steel spoke one he really liked with the straight pipe. We tooled around the yard on it. First time I drove a tractor that has a arm operated clutch instead of foot operated. 071.jpg

We took out his propane power 520. This is another pride and joy as they only made less than 800 units. Another hand operated clutch. We rode around the 15 acres of woods for a while looking at Ash borer death. He was using the 520 to move around combine heads. 072.jpg

In the barn were some more modern diesel power JDs. Nothing huge as they are only farming 550 acres on mostly flat land. Case combine was sort of small with a 25 foot head while those high production or filthy rich folks might have bigger combines with much wider heads.. Again they are running a small farm.
 
   / I visited the family farm for the first time in over 3 decades #2  
Some nice tractors.
 
   / I visited the family farm for the first time in over 3 decades #3  
Thank you very much for the pictures! Great restorations.

Ta.
 
   / I visited the family farm for the first time in over 3 decades #4  
Great pictures and I bet great memories.
 
   / I visited the family farm for the first time in over 3 decades #6  
I like the yellow 430. Tell your Uncle nice looking tractors :thumbsup:
How does propane sound running, any different from gas or diesel?
 
   / I visited the family farm for the first time in over 3 decades #7  
Thanks for sharing! Beautiful tractors! :licking:
 
   / I visited the family farm for the first time in over 3 decades
  • Thread Starter
#8  
I did not notice any different sounds on the propane tractor. Exhaust smells different like every other propane engine I have been around.

The yellow tractor is pretty cool. I noticed some gearing by what should be the rear axles. If you have looked under an original Hummer and probably some other similar vehicles you would know what I am trying to describe. The gear units let the tractor run low or high. I guess it would let it the tractor run 4-8" higher/taller in the air if you flip the gear boxes over. It was a county tractor and they had it set up low.

The sheet metal was pretty beat up when he got it. It looked pretty good to me. If you have ever sprayed yellow paint it is not the easiest color to spray as the one time I sprayed a yellow car it took a few coats more than say a white to get it to start looking nice.

I suppose if I lived closer I would be heading over to participate in the farm. Hard to do that from 700 miles though.

So what is sad is that my uncle had no one to pass the farm on to as his daughters had no interest. My cousin from my Dad's side married my cousin from my Mom's side which kept the farm running another generation. Now cousin Mark does not seem to have a farming heir apparent. Sort of the same thing with my Grandpa's bee keeping. My brother kept bees for a while and my Dad took over for another decade. Another cousin started bee keeping and is tending to 700 supers and has a business selling to stores. But none of his 4 kids have taken an interest in the bee and honey business. Maybe I will get to see some more people step in to keep things going another generation. Farming in the family has been going on since the early 1800's.
 
   / I visited the family farm for the first time in over 3 decades #9  
Thanks for showing the pictures and telling about the tractors.The old Gentleman did a nice restore on those old iron machines.It's too bad there is no one in the family that wants to carry on with the farming.
 
   / I visited the family farm for the first time in over 3 decades #10  
That is sad, so sorry.
 
 
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