Some old Photos for your enjoyment

fiver

Well-Known Member
i learned tractorin on a 48 Allis Chalmers, used to run it down to the elementary school to pickup the kids and let them drive it back home.
it wasn't so funny [to them] when we moved up here and i done it when they were in high school.
 

Missionary

Well-Known Member
1st heavy weight vehicle I drove was an M60 Patton Tank at Ft. Hood, Tx with 1/66 Armor. They paid e to shoot machine guns and a 105 rifled bore!
 

Bret4207

At the casting bench in the sky. RIP Bret.
Back in the States, my squadron used a Ford tractor to haul the munitions trailer round the flightline. It was a tricycle type with a between-the-legs gear shift, hand throttle, and foot pedals for the clutch and brake.
As the saying goes: it'd turn on a dime and give you nine-cents change.
Can't readily find a picture to copy.
Likely a variation of this model, maybe something 10 years older.Allen-1.jpg
 
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Mitty38

Well-Known Member
They must have made a crap load of those old Ford tractors. At least in Ohio here, you can not take a Sunday country drive, without seeing at least 2 of them in some kind of flavor.Our local antique tractor club put together a special show just for the Fords, because they are so abundant they were taking space away from other rarer tractors being showed. You see them vintage 1940'sto1970's Jubille Type Ford's for sale. Fully functional but beat up a bit for like 1500 bucks all day. The farmer next door one he uses for a tool around, and still gets every part he needs from the local NAPA dealer.
 

RicinYakima

High Steppes of Eastern Washington
My Dad quit farming with horses in the summer of 1950 when the Korean War began and bought a English made Fordson tractor, I believe from the 1930's. He only used it for a few years, as we were moving a lot and it was too much to transport a couple of hundred miles a move. When we settled on the small farm in SW Ohio, he went to walk behind Gravely for the truck garden crops and hired out the plowing for the fields of corn.
Manly_1919_Fig_123_Fordson_overview.png
 

glassparman

"OK, OK, I'm going as fast as I don't want to go!"
1st heavy weight vehicle I drove was an M60 Patton Tank at Ft. Hood, Tx with 1/66 Armor. They paid e to shoot machine guns and a 105 rifled bore!
YES! MY BROTHER!!

I was a 19E on an M48a5 and then an M60a3!

Nothing better that the feel of a 105mm round going down range and blowing something up!

The M60a3 was awesome with it's thermal site and laser range finder.

I also ran an M113 a few times and once drive an M88 recovery vehicle.

That's me in the lower left.



Mike
 

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Bret4207

At the casting bench in the sky. RIP Bret.
They must have made a crap load of those old Ford tractors. At least in Ohio here, you can not take a Sunday country drive, without seeing at least 2 of them in some kind of flavor.Our local antique tractor club put together a special show just for the Fords, because they are so abundant they were taking space away from other rarer tractors being showed. You see them vintage 1940'sto1970's Jubille Type Ford's for sale. Fully functional but beat up a bit for like 1500 bucks all day. The farmer next door one he uses for a tool around, and still gets every part he needs from the local NAPA dealer.
When Ford re-entered the tractor market in '39 he had some things none of the other tractor makers had- a dealer network (larger than any other tractor company by far) already widely established across the nation, a well known name and reputation that was already established and above all else- FINANCING! Harry Fergusons 3pt hitch wasn't the reason they sold, that hitch was just as proprietary when it was introduced as any other companies effort at designing a "better" hitch system. The "N" series sold because they were cheap tractors that had easy financing and Ford made implements to fit the tractor. They were the H+R or Stevens or Iver Johnson in that market. When the antique tractor craze started in the mid 80's any old N series $250.00 tractor was suddenly worth 1500.00. There was a period where a decent example would bring $4-6k. Rougher examples that could be picked up for $12-1500 had thousands in parts, tires and paint thrown at them so they could get a prize at a tractor show. Today those tractors might bring $2500 if they are really nice, but more likely $1500.00 is realistic.

I'm not a fan of the N series Fords. You get into the later hundred or better the Thousand series and then you have a decent tractor. It's like the people that go ga-ga over VW Bugs or early Mustangs or early Corvettes- the product itself isn't worth what the perceived value is. The Bugs were junk, the 'Stangs were economy cars and the 'Vettes were terrible handling cars for what they were trying to be. Get into the later years, at least with Ford and Chev and you get a much better product.

Thus endeth the sermon...

ETA- No offense to any lovers of Bugs, early Mustangs or Corvettes. They were just the examples that came to mind. To each their own and enjoy!
 
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Bret4207

At the casting bench in the sky. RIP Bret.
My Dad quit farming with horses in the summer of 1950 when the Korean War began and bought a English made Fordson tractor, I believe from the 1930's. He only used it for a few years, as we were moving a lot and it was too much to transport a couple of hundred miles a move. When we settled on the small farm in SW Ohio, he went to walk behind Gravely for the truck garden crops and hired out the plowing for the fields of corn.
View attachment 26845
The English Fordsons were a whole nuther critter than the American Fordsons that you picture. I'm not sure how many were imported. Ford only made the US versions for a few years but the British ones continued IIRC. The later Fordsons were pretty cutting edge and really would have been a good rig for the US, but diesel was a rarity here at that time.
 

RicinYakima

High Steppes of Eastern Washington
The English Fordsons were a whole nuther critter than the American Fordsons that you picture. I'm not sure how many were imported. Ford only made the US versions for a few years but the British ones continued IIRC. The later Fordsons were pretty cutting edge and really would have been a good rig for the US, but diesel was a rarity here at that time.
Attached is a picture of what I remember his tractor looking like. It started on gasoline, IIRC, but would run on coal oil when hot. But that has been a long time ago.
images.jpg
 

Bret4207

At the casting bench in the sky. RIP Bret.
Attached is a picture of what I remember his tractor looking like. It started on gasoline, IIRC, but would run on coal oil when hot. But that has been a long time ago.
View attachment 26852
I'm not an expert on them. I just know the British Fordsons were a lot more varied over the years than the US version. If it was an early British Fordson, it could certainly have looked just like that, they weren't much different than the early US Fordsons of the 20's. I believe the early US/English made Fordsons were a model E or F and the later ones built in Britain (Ireland too) were a model M or N and were blue instead of grey.
 

Missionary

Well-Known Member
Howdy Mike
Good to jab at another "Treadhead". I got out in 74 so our MOS was still the old 11E Not sure what year they changed it.
Laser would have been fun. Although we did right well with the old optics. at 1200 meters 2x4's were dead splinters if the system was properly linked and sighted.
Yea a HEP would turn lots of things inside out fast!
Mike
 

Bret4207

At the casting bench in the sky. RIP Bret.
Big boy toys Dale!!! I'm working, sort of, on a '53 7U D4. Been working on it for 15-16 years now. A 7 would be fun to operate for a day or 3 though!
 

JWFilips

Well-Known Member
An Interesting one from Shorpy.com
Something from the past !
My FIL was a big time HAM and affiliated to project MARS...He did a lot of work in the Viet Nam war!

From Columbus, Georgia, around 1960 comes this News Archive photo of an amateur radio operator and his assistant, "Shortwave" Sally. 4x5 inch acetate negative.
SHORPY-1480.jpg
 

462

California's Central Coast Amid The Insanity
My base (Phan Rang) had a MARS station/facility. Supposedly, we could use it to call home. I wrote.
 

RicinYakima

High Steppes of Eastern Washington
November 1969, I was in the 74th Field Evac Hospital back in Long Bien. I was told I could call my wife at 0300 through MARS, as she was in Ravenswood, WV and there was a hook up. Got to do some communications, couldn't call it talking, for about three minutes. It was wonderful to hear her voice.
 
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