The 29th Huron Pioneer Thresher Reunion, 1990-09-05, Page 4PAGE A-4. THE CITIZEN, WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 5, 1990.
Restoring tractors a family affair
Rescuing old tractors and fixing them up
has become a family tradition for the Gross
family, west of Blyth.
The “bug” first struck Harold Gross
then spread to his brother Gordon and
Gordon’s son Brian. Today there’s a
collection of classic tractorson each of the
Gross farms and Gordon is a director of the
Huron Pioneer Thresher and Hobby Asso
ciation.
The two collections feature Case trac
tors, the first tractor that was on the farm
of Harold and Gordon’s father William,
although in each case there’s a patch of
green in the form of a John Deere.
Harold got interested in old tractors
about 10 years ago. It’s a cheap hobby, he
says. Most of his tractors he bought for
$300 or so and putting them back on the
road takes more time than money.
Gordon picked up the hobby five years
ago with a good deal of urging from Brian.
Gordon says he was at the Thresher
Reunion at Blyth one year and decided that
by the next Reunion he’d have a tractor of
his own to put in the show. Actually, he
had two. His first tractors were a Case D
and a Case S. The family started farming
with a Case D, he says.
Gordon’s wife Bernice recalls when the
two went off to pick up a tractor to be
restored, daughter Anita commented on
Rescued tractor
looked like
Gordon (left) and Brian Gross stand with their collection of specializes in Case which was the traditional model on their
restored tractors. It was at Brian’s urging that Gordon started farm.
buying and restoring tractors five years ago. The family
"heap of junk’
their return “I thought you were going to
get a tractor, not a heap of junk.”
Gordon and Brian have travelled from
Exeter in the south to Brussels in the north
to get their collection. Some of the tractors
are salvaged from the scrap heap, Gordon
says.
The most fun, Gordon says, is in getting
the old tractors running. Most are seized
up. It takes hours and hours of tinkering to
make them run again.
Finding parts is not a big problem, he
says. Since the tractors they work with;
come from the late 1940’s and 1950’s
period, there are still parts readily avail
able.
Brian, who wants to be the fifth
generation to farm the Gross homstead
loves the tinkering involved. The work goes
on in the winter months and in slack
periods in the summer.
The men do their own cleaning up of the
old machines and co-operate with repaint
ing, done in the summer time.
Harold has a particular love affair with
one of the tractors in his collection, the
object of a lengthy search. He’d already
assembled quite a collection of tractors
when in 1989 he decided he wanted to find
a tractor he had used on his threshing gang
but which he’d sold 15 years earlier. It took
two weeks to track down the machine. He
traced it to a farmer in the Lucknow area
but he had died and it had been auctioned
off. The auctioneer was helpful, going back
in his records and finding out the tractor
had been sold to a man near Tiverton. The
auctioneer found the name and number of
the buyer but the buyer no longer had the
machine. He’d sold it to a man at Neustadt.
Mr. Gross went to see the 70-year-old
owner who agreed to sell the machine,
saying the big heavy tractor without power
steering was getting to be too much for
him. Mr. Gross brought the tractor home
and only had to do a minor overhaul to have
it working good as new. Now repainted, he
Detective work
led to return
of favorite tractor
estimates the machine he paid $4,600 in
1954 and paid $1,500 to get back in 1989,
might be worth as much as he first paid for
it if he offered it for sale. He’s not about to
part with this old friend, however.
Gordon says his tractors still get used on
the farm. They come in handy for moving
wagons or raking hay, he says. They’re a
lot more convenient to get on and off
because of the lack of hydraulics but the
lack of power steering does make them
heavier to use.
Harold and Bernice Grossstand with their collection of tractors. Included is the first
new tractor Harold bought in 1954.
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Welcome
Congratulationsto the Pioneer Thresher Association
on their 29th Reunion
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