[AT] Other related collections question for the list

[Larry Goss]

I've been doing that for years with Power King, Jim Dandy, and Economy tractors, John, but the situation is a bit different with the products from EPCO (Engineering Products Company).  They were only in business for 50 years, so the whole archive is effectively closed -- there won't be any additional models or literature produced. Bottom line: The archive currently contains around 32,000 pages of literature, and we use a wide geographic distribution of the whole collection as a way to make sure the information doesn't disappear.  Those of us who actively collect that brand have the ability to repair and/or restore whatever model crops up.  It's being distributed in PDF format so anyone can open the whole collection and use it.

The heirs of a former dealership gave me all the literature that had collected over the lifetime of the dealership.  I filled the whole crew cab of my pickup to move it all home. About a dozen various dealers and collectors from across the country have contributed literature to the archive over the years so we can make it as complete as possible.

Larry   

----- Original Message -----
From: "john hall" <jtchall at nc.rr.com>
To: "Antique tractor email discussion group" <at at lists.antique-tractor.com>
Sent: Tuesday, December 20, 2011 9:39:28 PM
Subject: Re: [AT] Other related collections question for the list

If literature comes my way, I keep it. We have got a ton of IH stuff since 
dad worked at a dealer. I've got a massive pile of farm and construction 
literature that needs to be thinned out. Honestly, who needs 20 sales 
brochures for late model Farmall 140's? When I ever get the time I intend to 
keep the 2 best of everything and put the rest on Ebay. One thing I find 
real interesting are the salesman books showing the list prices and in a few 
cases, deals being figured with individual farmers, some with trade-in 
allowances. Unfortunately I don't know what happened to the rest of the 
literature the dealer had. Hopefully it was sold when they closed up. It was 
everything from horse drawn equipment to refrigerators. I never saw anything 
from the truck division, they must have liquidated that when they gave up 
the contract about 20 years before closing.

We've also got the Remington and Mall chainsaw parts books--along with some 
literature for other brands they had picked up for comparison.

Other stuff we use is the entire line of Cub Cadet parts books through 1991, 
and all the air cooled engine, magneto, and Echo parts books. I sometimes 
wish we had bought the service manuals for the IH items, but those went for 
a small fortune at auction.

John Hall

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Grant Brians" <sales at heirloom-organic.com>
To: "Antique tractor email discussion group" <at at lists.antique-tractor.com>
Sent: Tuesday, December 20, 2011 2:16 PM
Subject: [AT] Other related collections question for the list


>I collect other things than just antique tractors as has been clear from
> some of my list postings. I am curious about two closely related types of
> collections other list members might have. Ephemera related to farm
> machinery (in other words old advertising covers and postcards and 
> pictures
> and brochures related to the machinery) and postcards and covers that are
> rural/historical in nature - i.e. related to the machinery because it is
> from the periods of the machinery that interests us and is from areas 
> where
> the machinery was used. Do others accumulate such items? I know that the
> pictures and brochures are of interest to some on the list from past 
> posts,
> but what about the other items?
>     What brought this to mind is that I am trying to put together an
> exhibit for our historical museum of the historical towns/rural post
> offices/rural gathering places that had post offices in our county in the
> past. I think our county is typical of many around the country in that 
> today
> there are only 4 post offices (in the two cities and the two small
> unincorporated "towns" that still exist here), but that historically there
> have been roughly 39 post offices depending on how it is counted. Like 
> much
> of today's midwest, there was a migration away from the homesteads that
> populated the hilly and mountainous parts of our county and while those
> parts of the county lost most of their population, the city grew and grew
> and grew to where over 65% live in the city limits of the county seat and
> easily 80% live in its sphere of influence.
>     My personal interest is not limited to just this county or even
> California in these covers and postcards and occasionally I come across or
> someone gives me these kinds of items from all sorts of places and they 
> are
> really interesting. Are they interesting to others on the list?
>
>          Grant Brians
>          Hollister,California Vegetable, Fruits and Nut farmer
>
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