I enjoyed reading the articles on the Famous Fleury Plows (Farm Collector, March-May 2003). As a young lad, I can remember my grandfather using a Fleury plow here in Ontario, Canada. I believe he brought it with him from Saskatchewan, Canada, where he was a homesteader.
Bruce Fleury’s articles have led me in a search for the plow my grandfather loved. A distant cousin may have the plow in his barn near Madoc, Ontario. I have written asking him to look for it in the hopes I can purchase it. Thanks to Farm Collector for highlighting a Canadian company and to Bruce Fleury for rekindling memories of a prized Canadian implement.
Ken Gould, Sharon, Ontario
A pat on the back
I would like to commend Farm Collector for all its great work. I was raised on a large farm, but I was transplanted to the city many years ago. We had many farm implements around, but as a little girl, I paid very little attention to them.
Farm Collector is teaching an oldster how very lucky she is to have been exposed to farm life. I so remember the days of threshing and storing the grain. The grain was hauled from the thresher to the grainery by a team of horses and wagon. What fun it was to ride the wagon barefooted and to let the wheat sift through my toes!
I would also like to compliment your writing staff. Each and every one of them write with great creativity and professionalism. Farm Collector really knows how to pick the cream of the crop. I look forward to each of the magazines.
Oh yes, one of the newest staff members is my grandson. A big hello to Scott Hollis.
Betty Hollis, 4171 South St. Louis Ave., Tulsa, OK 74105
Mysterious mill
I purchased this mill in August and can’t find any tags or identification markings anywhere on it. All the casting numbers start with the letter G, and it also reads on one side ‘NO 1.’ Can anyone help me identify, date and find the place of manufacture for this mill?
John Peters, 2844 Musgrove Road, Chillicothe, OH 45601; e-mail: jwpeters@horizonview.net
In a wrench pinch
I’ve shown this wrench for 10 years to people at the Tri-state Gas Engine and Tractor Show in Portland, Ind., and also at the Franklin County Antique Machinery Show in Brookville, Ind. No one knows anything about it, and none of my antique wrench books show it.
The wrench is 5 inches long, and the lever on top only goes down 1/4 inch and pushes the round top prong up. The bottom prong is part of the wrench and doesn’t move.
The only name on it is ‘Intertype.’ There are no other markings or date on it. What was it used for? Is the name I found on it the company name or just a wrench name? Any information about this wrench would be appreciated.
Howard Williams, P.O. Box 91, Monroe, IN 46772
Plow politics
I found a few catalog pages from the #27 McCormick-Deering catalog after the company’s buy-out from its competitors in the plow business. It sort of discounts Sam Moore’s assertion that breaking plows always ‘threw left or right’ in ‘Plowing through plows’ (Farm Collector, July 2003). There were many plows that would break in the middle or center, and others that could be changed at the end of the furrow and then return back across the field in the same furrow for terracing on hillsides. They also plowed out ‘headlands’ at the end of fields and out to the fencerow. Some farmers always ‘threw out’ toward the fence, which made the dirt pile up in the corners. I also enjoyed the articles about the early Ford cars (Farm Collector, September 2003). I still have my Uncle Tim’s original bill of sale for 1916-1917 Ford touring car for $370.30. – O.M. Ramsey, 8114-1A Bridgeway Circle, Fort Wayne, IN 46816; (260) 447-2099
Follow-up
Occasionally Farm Collector will print answers to readers’ questions when information is available from knowledgeable sources.
Question from September 2003 Farm Collector. I just purchased a horse-drawn mower in good condition. However, I can’t identify the manufacturer. Several areas on the mower I find a cross cast in the metal. Does anyone know what brand of machine I have purchased?
Richard Butts, 4369 Seidel Place, Saginaw, Ml 48603
Answer: Your mower was built by the Milwaukee Harvester Co. of Milwaukee, Wis. About 1850, Israel Love built a few reapers in Beloit, Wis. Love took on several partners during the next few years including a man named Gustave Stone. Eventually Love left the company, and Stone and L.H.
Parker formed the Parker & Stone Co. to build reapers. Business was mediocre until 1875 when John Appleby began to build twine-tie grain binders in the Parker & Stone factory.
The twine-tie grain binder caught on, and by 1884, the firm moved to Milwaukee, was renamed the Milwaukee Harvester Co. and built and sold many mowers and binders. The Milwaukee mower was unusual because it was driven by a flat-link chain rather than gears like most other mowers.
In 1902, the merger that formed the International Harvester Co. included Milwaukee Harvester, Piano Mfg. Co.; Warder, Bushnell & Glessner (which built the Champion line of harvesting machines), Deering Harvester and
McCormick Harvesting Machine Co. IHC continued to make and sell all five lines into the 1920s, when the McCormick-Deering line was introduced and the others were phased out. Milwaukee Harvester Co. used the distinctive logo you found on your mower. It actually represents four triangular mower sections arranged to form a cross with their points together and overlaid with the words ‘The Milwaukee Leads.’ Sometime after the IHC merger, a Milwaukee gear-driven mower was introduced, although it appears that the chain-drive model was retained as well, so your machine could be either chain or gear driven.
You’re lucky you found such an unusual mower in good condition.
Sam Moore is a columnist for Farm Collector and other old-iron publications, and became interested in agricultural machinery while growing up on a western Pennsylvania farm.
