“I know what I know, and I’m not listening.”
Sound familiar?
In the world we live in, we develop thoughts, ideas and ways of doing things that allow us to be successful or unsuccessful. We adapt to our environment and, if our ideas are correct, we reap a profitable reward. Too many times we are not open to change.
Farmer Brown (not his real name, as it is lost to history) was summer-fallowing his field one hot summer day in 1939. Half of the field was seeded into wheat, and the other half he kept fallow (weed-free).
Farmer Brown began farming with horses and graduated to tractors. That giant step in technology allowed farmers many advantages. They no longer needed to feed horses all winter long, horse runaways became a thing of the past, and the need to clean horse stalls every day with a manure fork soon became a distant memory. They no longer had to worry about horses deciding to visit the neighbors, and they no longer wasted precious time hunting down horses that simply disappeared.
Trying out a new line
From the late 1800s to the early 1900s, farm implement companies worked with local hardware stores to sell their products. It would be commonplace to see threshing machines, hay mowers, buck rakes, and other farm implements displayed on store lots.
Frazer, Montana, was home to a local hardware store. Frazer was located next to the Great Northern Railway and served Great Northern steam engines as a water stop. Lien & Quam Hardware Store, located in Frazer, sold International Harvester implements as well as the usual inventory of hardware.
In 1939, Lien & Quam acquired the new line of Farmall tractors. It decided to test its first Farmall tractor before attempting to sell them. One of the hired men, Bill Peters, was told to drive the tractor up the Frazer Grade (road), traveling north until he came to Farmer Brown’s place. On that day, Farmer Brown was out in the field, summer-fallowing with his green John Deere Model D pulling an 8-foot one-way disc plow.
Mr. Lien and Mr. Quam had followed their new tractor in their auto, arriving at Farmer Brown’s just in time to see him in the field. They waited until Farmer Brown came to the end of the field next to where they were parked. Farmer Brown stopped his John Deere Model D and got off to see what was going on.
“Gentlemen,” he asked, “what brings you this way?”
“We want to try out this new International Model H tractor we just got in,” one said.
Farmer Brown shook his head as he looked the new tractor over. “I don’t mean to get sideways of you fellas,” he said, “but you better just take that tractor back and tell the company they they messed up. A lot of red paint don’t make a tractor.”
“Why’s that?” one asked.
“Any fool can see that the tractor is no good,” Farmer Brown said. “Just look at that small engine. I’ll bet it could hardly pull itself up here with those big rear tires. They got it all wrong. Don’t waste your time trying to sell something like that.”
The proof is in the pudding
Farmer Brown then turned, remounted his John Deere, and began to make another pass around the field. More and more of the green field became brown as the one-way turned the soil over, burying the weeds.
When Farmer Brown got back to the end of the field, the red tractor — and its companions — were still there.
“Farmer Brown, we talked it over and decided you were right. We don’t want to try selling bad tractors. That would ruin our reputation, and we don’t want that. Let us hook our tractor up to your one-way and find out if it is any good. If it is no good, as you say, we’ll ship it back. But first we need to find out.”
Farmer Brown acquiesced, and the Model D was unhooked and moved to the side. Bill then drove the Farmall Model H over to the one-way, backed up and hitched up. He put the Farmall into first gear and opened the throttle wide open, hoping it would pull the one-way.
And it did. Farmer Brown’s eyes widened as the tractor moved forward. Then, the tractor stopped. Bill shifted it into second gear. The tractor moved forward again. Farmer Brown’s eyes grew larger, and his mouth dropped open.
Again, the tractor stopped. Bill put the tractor in third gear and let out the clutch. It flew ahead effortlessly as if it had nothing hooked behind it. The dirt from the one-way flew beyond the dead furrow into the already worked land. Farmer Brown’s comments were not fit for publication.
After finishing the round, the tractor pulled up beside the onlookers and stopped. Bill stepped down from the Farmall H and began to unhook it from the one-way.
“Leave it hooked up,” the farmer said. “I’m buying that tractor. You guys just take that John Deere back with you. I’ll be in town tomorrow to close the deal.”
For many years Lien & Quam sold the red line. Then, as transportation improved, tractor dealerships consolidated and small towns like Frazer lost their dealerships. The International Farmall H, like the John Deere D, become obsolete as technology improved and farmers looked for bigger and better tractors.
Today, us “sticks in the mud” love those old marvels of what was once new technology. We parade our John Deere, International, Case, Massey Ferguson and Ford tractors at reunions, at threshing bees, and anytime our grandchildren want a ride. It matters not the make or model, you will find them there alongside proud owners ready to defend their prize tractor. FC
Jim Marmon is a retired teacher and now a fulltime farmer/rancher in northeast Montana. Email him at Marmonjd@gmail.com.
