Minnesota Machines
(Page 2 of 4)
January 2004
Bill Vossler
Kinnard-Haines Co. of Minneapolis manufactured the well-known and successful Flour City tractors in several sizes. The firm also turned out giants like the 21,000-pound Flour City Model 40-70 in 1910, down to the Flour City Junior and Junior Model 14-24, which weighed 'only' 6,700 pounds.
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Minnesota companies also included Gas Traction Co., which made the Big Four tractor, P. J. Downes Co., which manufactured the Liberty tractor, but was better-known as a manufacturer of tractors for other Minnesota companies, as well as a tractor distributor, and the Nilson Tractor Co. and the Strife Tractor Co. All these companies operated out of Minneapolis, to varying degrees of success.
Who are you again?
Besides equipment makers that gained attention far beyond Minnesota, the state also was home to many lesser-known tractor companies. The Adams-Farnham Tractor Co. built the Adams-Farnham tractor in 1909 and 1910. This gasoline tractor weighed 11,000 pounds, but quickly disappeared from the market.
One of its inventors, Harry W. Adams, resurfaced in 1915 in another Minneapolis concern, the Common Sense Tractor Co., which astounded the tractor world by actually testing the proposed machine in the field - in this case, North Dakota - and ironing out kinks before it was sold on the market.
Other lesser-known Minnesota tractor companies included the McVicker Engineering Co., whose owner, Walter J. McVicker, designed early Twin City tractors for Minneapolis Steel & Machinery Co. The Kinkead Tractor Co.- which started production in 1915, but quickly ended when R.S. Kinkead, the owner, was drafted during World War I - and the Minnesota Tractor Co. that manufactured the Minnesota Model 18-36 in 1919, were also flashes in the pan among agricultural equipment producers in America.
Perhaps the most popular of the little-known companies was the Farmers Union Central Exchange of St. Paul, Minn., due in no small part to its Co-op tractor, which was produced in at least five different cities by five different companies. The tractor was popular, in part, because it was built in so many different places, but also because the cooperative movement was strong among farmers when the tractors were produced during the 1930s-1950s.
Some Minnesota tractor companies organized, like the Challenge Tractor Co. of Minneapolis, but never manufactured a single machine. Challenge Tractor applied for a trademark on Dec. 26, 1916, but that was the beginning and evidently the end of the road, according to records.
The Corn Belt Tractor Co., which made at least one tractor, also disappeared shortly after its inception. Crown Iron works is listed as a tractor manufacturer in 1921 records, but it never made a tractor.