What is more satisfying than a great show, great food and to end the day with a parade? Not much!

The first full weekend in August was the 29th year for the Franklin Grove, Ill., summer harvest tractor show. The show was held on club grounds, which the club acquired in 1998.

“In 2007 we paid off the final land payment. We don’t charge an admission fee. We accept donations and have a good food department. We are different in that we have enough and don’t have to answer to anybody,” club member Roger Schnell said.

The show was just part of the community involvement for this Franklin Grove festival weekend. An end-of-the-day parade downtown included many of the antique tractors on display at the show, and a local restaurant offered a carryout pork chop dinner.
The historic Lincoln Highway goes right through the center of town and a few old cars were also part of the festivities. At the show, there were an array of rare tractors, signs, engines and even some horse-drawn activity. This year for one of the demonstrations, club members planted potatoes and showed how to dig them.

One of the oldest and of historical significance machines was Schnell’s amazing 10-20 hp Mogul. This International Harvester tractor was a one-cylinder tractor that ran on kerosene.

“The Mogul was the first tractor that Dad ever owned,” Schnell said. “This is serial number 5408, and is a 1917; Dad bought it in 1919. My dad, Vernon Schnell, used this to pull a threshing machine just five miles south of here.”

On the front of the Mogul was a neat display including literature and pictures of the tractor. “The first time the tractor was away from home was when Amboy had their Centennial Celebration in 1954,” he said. “In 2004, the sons of the man that asked Dad to bring his tractor had us bring it back. We had fun bringing it.”

This tractor has been on one of John Harvey’s Classic Calendars and was part of the 20-year gathering at Penfield, Ill., in July. While the Mogul stayed back at the show during the parade, Schnell did bring his Farmall with the 2M picker attached.

Besides the tractors, the engines are a big part of this annual event. Most likely the oldest engine at the show was an IHC Victor Horizontal Engine that dates back to 1912. Larry Hackbarth from Polo, Ill., owns it. When he found the engine, it was in the stationary mode rather than portable as it is now.

“This was used in a machine shop,” Hackbarth shared. “Now being portable, it would have run a small threshing machine since I put a clutch pulley and added the truck.”

He saw the engine in an ad. Once he made the purchase and got the engine home, he tore it down. “I had it apart over two years and painted every piece separately, then put it together,” he said. “I had to rebuild the fuel pump, carburetor, valves, and I made a new wrist pin, a new water pump piston and a new sleeve.”

Once his portable engine was up and running, Larry painted it and John Barnharth or Oregon, Ill., did the pin-striping for him. When asked if his engine was operational, Hackbarth replied, “It runs like a top!”

That statement pretty much covers how this year’s summer harvest festival went.

Readers with questions or comments for Cindy Ladage may write to her in care of this publication.

Published on Sept. 30, 2009