608 Clarks Lane, Winona, Minnesota 55987.
Your magazine provides very interesting reading and each edition
is something to be looked forward to, and to be gladly received.
I’m not a steam engine man as such, but I’ve been
completely fascinated by them ever since I was a small boy, many
years ago.
The revival of interest in them, and the steam shows have been
wonderful in that we have chances to see engines about which we
have heard but never before seen. Pictures in your magazine make
visible still more engines which I have never seen in the upper
Midwest, at those shows I have attended at least, such as the Frick
and the Port Huron. I’m still waiting to see a Buffalo-Pitts,
although I’ve seen their separators when I was a kid.
Before my time there was a Three Rivers steam outfit in our
neighborhood. I’m wondering if a Three Rivers steam engine is
anywhere in existence at this date.
So I take your magazine for my interest in only one subject, and
that is steam traction engines. The old sawing, about ‘one
picture being worth a thousand words,’ is certainly true, and I
have some pictures I took last September at the Lake Region Pioneer
Threshermens’ Association Fall Show, Dalton, Minnesota on
September 7, 1974.
This is a dandy show. It is some 320 miles distance but I’ve
seen it the last two years and it is worth driving a lot farther
than that, even at today’s gasoline prices.
This is not all the pictures I took by any means, but they
should reproduce quite well. I’ve made notes on the reverse of
each, in case you care to use any of them.
This is a real quality show, and a good place to see the big M.
Rumelys, Gaar-Scotts, and Nichols & Shepards, although in the
30 or so engines they have a good representation of others.
It is not for me to itemize what they have to offer, but I vouch
that this is a good place to see the ‘works’ when it comes
to the steamers of work, old tractors, ‘one-lunger’ gas
engines, big stationary steam power plants and the usual things
that go with a good show, without the hoopla of carnivals, queen
contests, etc., that you see some places at ‘Steam Engine
Days,’ where they have possibly 4 to 6 engines that are only
incidental to what is actually a business promotion for the town
that is ‘sponsoring’ it.