Toy Land:
Farm Implement Dealership Showcases Toys
By Dianne L. Beetler
Photos by Dianne L. Beetler
When Dan Dexter toyed with the idea of building a new showroom and retail store for his implement dealership, he decided the new building also should showcase his gigantic collection of toy farm implements. Today, many people visit Dexter Farm Equipment in Wataga, 111., just to see the toys.
Dan became a farm implement salesman 26 years ago. That's when he started collecting toys, trading with children whose parents had bought tractors.
Today, his collection includes more than 4,000 toy implements in 1/16-scale, countless tinier models, and about 100 pedal tractors. Custom-built showcases hold the small implements, and old tools and agricultural advertising signs hang on the showroom walls. Pedal tractors line shelves along the upper part of two walls.
"I'd like eventually to make the whole showroom a museum," Dan said. "It's unbelievable how far people have driven to look at these toys."
The collection includes all brands, models and makes of toys. Some toys are antiques, while others were produced only a few years ago. Two wagons were built as salesman's samples to pull behind pedal tractors. Almost every implement imaginable is displayed in its toy-size version.
Dan doesn't collect many of the special edition toys on today's market.
"Forty years from now, the shelf model stuff is going to be the most expensive," he predicted, "because nobody kept it."
He especially enjoys collecting John Deere and Case toys. His Deere toys include combines, tractors, balers, a pickup truck, a road grader, a semi-trailer, and farm sets in their original boxes.