The Steam Traction Engine that Wasn’t

As I snapped photos of other tractors and steam engines, I
always kept an eye out for a Townsend steamer, but to no avail. I
figured they must really be rare.

Eventually, I came onto a letter written to the Rock County
Historical Society from Wesley W. Rankin, dated Jan. 18, 1973,
wherein Rankin wrote, “Thank you for your reply to my inquiry about
the Townsend Tractor Co. and their products. Your ‘scandalously
meager’ stock of Townsend memorabilia is not to be wondered at too
much for it has been my experience that such information is very
hard to come by.”

Rankin said he got the address of G.E. Townsend, but the only
information he received from Townsend was the address of Roy C.
Townsend Sr., who started the company. “I wrote to him last fall
and have received no reply,” Rankin wrote. He added, “I missed a
golden opportunity when I ran into an old gentleman at the Rock
River Thresheree (Edgerton, Wis.) about 10 years ago. He had
evidently been a service man, or something of the sort, for the
Townsend Co.”

LITTLE HELP

Reference books weren’t much help in finding about the Townsend
steamer, either. Jack Norbeck in his Encyclopedia of Steam
Traction Engines, for some reason, didn’t even mention it.
C.H. Wendel, in his Encyclopedia of American Farm Tractors
mentioned a few things about Roy Townsend, but it all involved the
Townsend tractor, so I didn’t really pay attention. Other books
were also blank about the Townsend steamers.

Somewhere over the years I came upon two pictures that I put on
my computer, both of which I titled, “Townsend steamer.” When I
started writing for Steam Traction, I figured I was going
to right the wrong: I’d find out more information about the
Townsend steam traction engine and get it out to the world.

So, recently I called the Rock County Historical Society in
Janesville, Wis., and was told they didn’t have much information on
Townsend, but they did have some I didn’t have. Eureka! I thought.
Finally.

I also checked the Internet, but couldn’t come up with any
Townsend steamers, just references to a couple of U.S. locations
named Townsend advertising themselves.

When the information came from Janesville, I ruffled through the
six pages and was ecstatic. There was one page with five small
photos of Townsend steamers at work. The photos were poorly
Xeroxed, but when I checked with the Historical Society, I found
the photos themselves were not available. I would have to do with
these poor ones, which essentially meant I couldn’t publish some of
these fine action photos of the Townsend steamers in the field.

I started writing the article and looking at the photos I had of
the Townsend steamers in my collection, along with photos I’d taken
of a Townsend tractor at the Albany (Minn.) Pioneer Days.

It was puzzling. The more I looked, the more I realized every
photo and every reference was about Townsend oil tractors, not
Townsend steam traction engines. It finally dawned on me, as most
people reading this article probably already know, the reason there
was no literature and no photos of the Townsend steamers is because
there are no Townsend steam traction engines.

I was, to say the least, chagrined. How had I been so wrong?
Reviewing everything I had on Townsend I realized where I had gone
wrong: One of the earliest sheets of information I’d gotten had a
large picture of a Townsend “steamer,” dominating the top, with a
couple hundred words about it, including these: “The same
foundation which is the backbone of any machine, having been used
in steam tractors since their origin and no one has ever heard of
the boiler under a steam tractor giving out …” I assumed that meant
the information was about a steam traction engine, when it was
really referring to how Townsend had been built, with the same
“foundation which is the backbone” like a steamer, instead of this
actually being a steamer.

At least I hadn’t gone around asking everybody if they’d seen
any Townsend steamers recently (although now that I think about it,
if I had, it would have saved me a lot of trouble).

Townsend oil tractors look exactly like steam traction engines
to the untrained eyed. They have a large smokestack, a boiler
shell, what appears to be a firebox, chain steering, and the
general design of a steamer.

I had assumed since the Townsend tractor looked exactly like a
steam traction engine, Roy Townsend must have modeled the Townsend
tractor after his Townsend steam traction engine.

His purpose, of course, was to win over those farmers who loved
their steam traction engines. Not only does the Townsend oil
tractor look like a steamer it also sounds like a steamer, thanks
to the twin cylinders exhausting through the smokestack.

You’d think with the weight of all the evidence against the
existence of a Townsend steam traction engine – no information, no
book listings, no photos – I might have figured it out a long time
ago. I guess it was my personal Bigfoot; just because I hadn’t seen
one didn’t mean they didn’t exist.

I think the moral of the story might be; “Look before you
leap.”

Contact Bill Vossler at: Box 372, 400 Caroline Lane,
Rockville, MN 56369; (320) 253-5414; e-mail:
bvossler@juno.com