[AT] Saskatchewan tractor trek
Indiana Robinson
robinson at svs.net
Wed Jun 15 07:11:35 PDT 2005
I was mowing some waist high fescue in the barn lot down the road with the #$%& CUB
yesterday where I had moved some parked equipment and I saw a "big" travel trailer coming
down the road. Those that have been to my place and have come under the RR underpass will
understand why I don't as a habit see huge trailers using our road for just for fun. :-
) Then another smaller trailer came around the corner and I was a bit surprised to
notice that it was being pulled by an old restored Packard (light yellow). I did a google
search on images and I am pretty sure it was a 1948 or 1949 model. It was pulling a small
Airstream trailer. I am not sure if it was quite as small as the Bambi or not. They
stopped and waited as about half a dozen more caught up to them then went on. The others
were all pretty normal stuff as far as I could tell. I suspect some of them came through
the curve of the underpass pretty slowly... ;-)
I have driven the Deere 45 combine I used to own as far as 10 miles for custom work (at
about 9 MPH) and I have driven tractors a little further. I am here to tell you that such
boredom approaches being terminal for me... :-) About 20 years ago I rebuilt the
engine on the #$%& CUB in a shop in one of the stores we owned in town and drove it the
three miles home as a break-in run. My mind tries to block out memories of the drive home
through the traffic on the slow CUB so I can't recall how many days it took to get
home... ;-)
This reminds me of a fireman friend of mine (now deceased). About 30 years ago
Shelbyville had 2 fire stations and a lot of modern equipment including one of the first
65' reach snorkles in the state. They had however kept in the fleet a 1926 Fox pumper
which was commonly used for investigation runs, small fires etc. My friend was driving it
one day when on a call in a subdivision near the #2 station. He went down the down-hill
drive of the station then made a U turn back into the housing drive. It was uphill into
that drive and he said if it had not been downhill out of the station he would have never
made it up that small hill. He said he was going on back the drive giving it everything
it had and still in low gear when a kid on the side walk watching them started running
along side of them and beat him to the next corner... :-) Shortly after that he
became fire chief and his first official act was to retire the old Fox... BTW, his second
official act was to order mud tires for most of the trucks because he was tired of being
pulled across lots and fields by farm tractors...
Here is a picture of a 1926 Fox:
http://www.cityblm.org/library/fire/pic-7ai.jpg
--
"farmer", Esquire
At Hewick Midwest
Wealth beyond belief, just no money...
Paternal Robinson's here by way of Norway (Clan Gunn), Scottish Highlands,
Cleasby Yorkshire England, Virginia, Kentucky then Indiana. In America 100
years
before the revolution.
Francis Robinson
Central Indiana USA
robinson at svs.net
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