The first weekend in August was the 47th annual Western Threshers Show. It began like many have originated – as a group of collectors that met, in 1968, to figure out how they wanted to display their growing collection of antique tractors.

The discussion has grown into the three-day annual show with the goal: “To educate, to demonstrate and to inform the youth and citizens of today of the methods and usages of agricultural production and transportation of the past. At the same time, the group works to preserve the skills of the homemakers of the past era and keep alive the strong sense of home, family, and community.”

The first gathering was called a Threshing Bee and the first organizers were Fred Buckert, Larry Buckert, Raymond McVeigh, Lester Starr and Leon Hartweg. Held on the 80-acre grounds of the Western Illinois Threshers in Hamilton, Ill., the show included an array of antique tractors, cars, trucks, gas engines and steam engines.

The first purchase of 40 acres soon saw another 40 added, and over the years the Threshers have erected two main buildings used as a meeting place, food stand and exhibition area, a tractor headquarters and raffle buildings, two depots, an early 1900s schoolhouse, general store, print shop, permanent steam-powered sawmill, sawyer’s shed, two log cabins, a blacksmith shop, museum, an old-time gas station – and, in 1990, the Western Illinois Shortline Railroad was established on the grounds.

This year’s featured model was Massey Harris and the 2014 raffle tractor was a Massey Harris Model 33. The show also featured David Bradley gas engines.

Visitors to the 47th Western Threshers Show were able to view daily activities that included tractor plowing, steam power threshing, pony power threshing, straw baling, large and small sawmills, corn shelling, stonemill cornmeal grinding, blacksmithing, rock crushing, gas engines, rail hand car and motorcar display and ride, a Ladies’ Bazaar, antique household items and shop tools, quilting, rug weaving, sheep shearing, woodworking and crafts.

This year the big steam engines were attached to large gang plows requiring riders to plow the ground.

A Saturday night favorite is the smoked pork chop dinner, and this year visitors were enthralled to listen to Mark McDonald of “Illinois Stories” fame take listeners through the central Illinois they thought they knew.

Besides this show the first Friday, Saturday and Sunday each August, the Threshers host school tours in May for hundreds of area children.

For more information about the show, log onto www.westernillinoisthreshers.org