Indholdsfortegnelse for January 2022 i Farm Collector

Looking for a way to grow your show? Here’s one easy way. Bring a friend! It’s as plain as the nose on your face, but when a fellow shared that tip with me this summer, my mind reeled at the potential. There’s nothing complicated about it – and that’s the beauty of it. “I take a different neighbor to a show every year,” he says. First, it’s just plain neighborly, and we could all use a refresher course in that concept. Chances are you haven’t spent a lot of time with your neighbors in the last couple of years. Could be they’re in a bit of a rut and would enjoy an outing. Take a neighbor to a show, and you have time to catch up and reconnect while you…

Agricultural methods today are drastically different from those used 50 or 100 years ago. In these days of no-till and minimum till, it’s difficult to remember that the mold-board plow once reigned supreme. The plow was the basic primary tillage tool; farmers were judged by the straightness of their furrows and the cleanliness of their plowing. Plowing loosened, inverted and aerated the soil, controlled weeds and insects, and turned vegetation and manure under to rot, adding to the organic matter in the soil. The first plow was nothing more than a forked tree limb, with the end of one fork sharpened. Later, the sharpened end was reinforced with a flint, bronze or iron point. In the 17th century, the Dutch developed a plow with a curved, wooden moldboard reinforced with…

Although pipe smoking was a common habit of many men in the mid-20th century, today it is almost a thing of the past. The “roll your own” cigarette culture died out quickly with easy access to commercially produced cigarettes. Pipe smoking lingered longer, partially because certain segments considered a pipe smoker to be somewhat sophisticated. The amount of tobacco consumed in those two habits has declined so dramatically that it appears the R.J. Reynolds company may be seriously considering ending the supply of the Prince Albert product. Prince Albert tobacco cans were found in many, if not most, small farm shops for decades, but the number of existing small farms is lower than ever before. When writing this article, I asked several individuals if they could supply me with an…

Volunteer looking for details on donated Case steam engine to enhance museum display I volunteer at the Siskiyou County Museum in Yreka, California. Quite a few years ago, a family donated a Case steam engine to the museum. No sign was ever made to tell about the engine. I’m trying to do a little research to make the sign interesting. The family said that the engine was bought new in 1908, but the engine number (10601) says that it was built in 1902. The engine number is on a cast iron plaque and all that I have seen were brass plaques. I’m hoping one of your readers can help me. I’ve looked and looked for a manual of some kind that would list differences between the various years and models.…

AMERICA’S RURAL YESTERDAY 3-VOLUME SET Have the entire collection of America’s Rural Yesterday Volume 1, 2, and 3. All of these books have beautiful photographs by famed photographer J.C. Allen. Set includes: America’s Rural Yesterday: Volume 1 Fieldwork More than 100 photographs of field work including planting, tilling, harvesting and more. Includes shots of threshing, corn shelling, milling, haystacking. Horses, mules, oxen, vintage tractors, and steam engines provide the power back when rural life was the norm. Many of these photos have never been published. America’s Rural Yesterday: Volume 2 Barn & Farmyard More than 120 photographs of farm work performed in dairy, poultry and hog barns as well as the wide variety of tasks performed in the barnyard including ensilaging, stock feeding and watering, haymow loading, threshing, corn grinding,…

The genius of pioneer inventors can confound us. Countless contraptions that revolutionized farming in the 19th and early 20th centuries have become contemporary curiosities, or even mysteries. Here are six sent in by readers. Do you know what they are? Answers to the January 2022 items will appear in the March 2022 issue. Answers for new items in this issue must be received by January 5, 2022. JANUARY MYSTERY TOOLS A. Marked Todd’s PA Made in USA No. 1. Measures 12 inches long. Triangle-shaped handles. Jaws measure 1-3/4 in length. Jaws are removable and fit in milled slot. B. Tool measures about 9 inches long. C. No information provided. D. Handle with screw measures about 4 inches tall; arm measures about 3-1/2 inches. No markings. E. Tool measures 8-1/2 inches in length (not including…

Some incidental objects – like the stethoscope, for instance – are understood by all to be related to a specific occupation. Other items can be identified with multiple occupations. In most cases, they played a part for a period of time and were later forgotten. Then there were those items that came to be associated with a particular way of life that was far from the original reason they existed. The focus of this article is Prince Albert pipe and cigarette tobacco. Since a good share of men who farmed or worked on farms in the early days used tobacco, Prince Albert tobacco was a staple. As a 13-year-old being introduced to farm work for the first time, much of what I experienced has stuck with me for a lifetime. For…

My grandfather had the first rubber-tired tractor in Meeker County, Minnesota, and according to Firestone, the entire state. My grandfather was a successful farmer, businessman, legislator, father and Christian. He had five sons; four were in their late teenage years and early twenties in 1920. At that time, a thresher with a big steam engine did the threshing. You had to put your grain bundles into stacks until he got there. Many times, it was December before he got done, depending on how much rain or snow they had. Launching a business With all of the help my grandfather had, he decided to buy a Huber thresher and an International Harvester Co. (IHC) Titan tractor. He used that equipment to start a custom threshing business. Silos were just coming into use,…