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37chief

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California
My 10 year old grand son always has his head in his laptop playing games. His mom and dad have a house right below my barn now. I am sure he will be getting into everything when I'm not around, just like what I did when I was growing up with Dad's stuff. He came in to our house a couple days ago. His grandmother asked why his hands were full of grease. He said he was around the tractors. Tonight he asked if he could have one of my crawler tractors. I said sure. When my hip heals he wants me to show him how to operate it. Wish he was a little older I would start him mowing on some of my easier fields. I think 10 is too young. I was around 14 when dad had me on a tractor by my self. How old were some you you guys, and gals when you were by your self, operating a tractor? Stan
 
When I was 6 I was driving the grain truck to the combine when I saw the hopper was full. When I was 10 I was in the field all by myself mowing with an 8N Ford with a mounted 7' mower. My biggest problem was getting to and from the fields without a drivers license. I should note that I spent many hours with Grandpa on the 8N in the field before I was left alone, so I knew what I was doing. Also spent many hours with Grandpa working on the mower, so I also knew how to fix it. Grandpas greatest lesson to me was to keep my fingers out of the sickle. Still have all 10 digits.
 
My job was to drive the 8N with the wagon. I wasn't heavy enough to get the clutch down without jumping on it. I'm betting I must have been 6-7. I wasn't out in the fields alone until I was probably 11. I ran wheat to town in the old Ford 600 when I was 13 and ran the auger into the bins without anyone to help me that summer, too.

It would be child abuse now. My parents must have realized I had the mechanical sense to keep out of trouble and yelled and screamed about safety every chance they got. I still walk out around the loader on the front of the tractor when it is in the air. Mom always said a hose could break when you least expected it. Later on when I was about 12 one did break when I had a bucket of sand for dad. I still remember how fast that loader dropped and how much hot hydraulic fluid I was wearing. Moms are pretty smart.
 
I remember I was 6 when Dad bought our old Zetor 4911 and I got to sit on it alone steering while Dad and my cousin picked rock. I was even there when he was negotiating the trade in which was a Farmall MD. Dad told the salesman how to start it than switch it over to diesel,I quickly pointed out "when that doesn't work Daddy just tows it to start it". Ya he shoulda left me home lol. I remember I was hauling silage by myself with it and our old 4610 Ford in 16' boxes by myself on the road when I was 14? I wish Dad and those 2 tractors were still here miss him a lot.
 
I was 11 before I was left alone on an AC WC.I was too young for hand brake and the steering wheel whipping about. Had some close calls, At 12 I was a little bigger. I think you should wait a couple years before anything besides slowly driving around getting used to starting and stopping.
 
I wouldn't be in too big of a hurry. Everyone loves to brag about how young they were when they first drove a tractor. I'm waiting for someone to claim they were 2.

Whenever this subject comes up, I always have to think of a neighbor of ours who thought his 13 year old son was old enough to be sent out on his own with a 4020 and an 18' disc. He wasn't

The kid is forever 13.
 
I completely agree with you there. Just because some of us were (or thought we were) operating equipment to some degree at a very young age doesn't mean it was at all safe. Our oldest just turned 17 and this is the first year he's been running equipment much on his own. He might have thought he was old enough in years now past but at least he's still alive.
 
I started driving the ford jubilee at about 6. Was regularly working in the fields by 10. But then I had been a regular rider back even while I was wearing diapers. I never knew a day that I wasn't around tractors, so I had a lot more experience that most kids today. Plus I was 8th of 9 kids, so by tje time I came aroumd my parents were less worried about the small stuff. Lol. My boys also rode with me as soon as they could walk. I used to take a diaper bag with in the combine with both my sons. They started driving at about 12, but then my tractors were less kid friendly than the jubilee.
 
(quoted from post at 19:21:46 09/04/16) My 10 year old grand son always has his head in his laptop playing games. His mom and dad have a house right below my barn now. I am sure he will be getting into everything when I'm not around, just like what I did when I was growing up with Dad's stuff. He came in to our house a couple days ago. His grandmother asked why his hands were full of grease. He said he was around the tractors. Tonight he asked if he could have one of my crawler tractors. I said sure. When my hip heals he wants me to show him how to operate it. Wish he was a little older I would start him mowing on some of my easier fields. I think 10 is too young. I was around 14 when dad had me on a tractor by my self. How old were some you you guys, and gals when you were by your self, operating a tractor? Stan
Click to expand...

Since I was the oldest boy, my dad probably pushed it a little....but I was riding on the toolbox of the WD45 diesel when I was 3 and probably figured out what every lever did by the age of 4. At 6 my dad had me spreading manure with the JD ground drive spreader, with the hand clutch on the Allis I could start and stop it without being able to change gears....so I always went in circles. By 10, I could use the foot clutch and was running 2 miles up the road with the 12 foot tandem disc, cultivating corn with the JD B and 2 row cultivator, raking hay, chopping silage and mowing a little with the B and 7' sickle. One thing Dad never let me do was pull the 6 section drag, cultivate with the 4 row, or bale with the rotobaler. My next brother, 4 years younger never got to do much until I went off to college....and youngest brother never really did much at all, as the 3rd brother was back home from college and farming with dad by the time he got old enough.
 
It sounds like your hip is doing OK. Good for you. I hope it continues to mend well.

My dad was pretty careful and mom was a nurse so they were cautious about me running anything at a real young age. I might have been 7 when I drove the tractor slowly while dad rode on the platform behind me. I don't remember how old I was when he cut me loose. Come to think of it when I was 14 and getting my driver's permit I was pretty good at backing wagons up to the elevator for unloading ear corn so I must have had a couple of years under my belt by then at least. In my mid teens I was on the tractor full time when I was home from school but I have never told dad about some of the close calls I had. He made me fix the fence a couple of times after I was less than attentive about where the disk I was pulling was at. He watched me fix it too and it had to be perfect when I was done. He did give me a few pointers on technique but I had to do the work myself. It's a good way to learn to pay attention.

When I was about 17 I helped drag a mortally injured man out from under an overturned tractor and carry him up the steep ditch on a stretcher. I was a much more careful tractor operator after that incident and have been ever since.
 
For someone who has not grown up around machines or spent lots of time with Dad on tractors or driving, 10 is to young. I was using a tractor, an LA case because Dad thought I couldn't fall off it, when I was 7. Right along in the same field usually right behind him plowing or using the one-way. An LA Case is a pretty forgiving tractor but sure made my arms tired with no power steering. Hand clutch and a single brake.

He should have 4 years of riding with or driving for Dad (you in this case) before he gets left alone to finish a field. I don't remember how old I was when I was left or sent alone to do a job but likely 12-13. We did a lot of work together. I was 10 when Dad bought a 1959 Farmall 460 for me to use, he had his M. The year before he had bought a MF-65 for him and my sister. Where did the time go.

Accidents happen real fast on tractors so take his time. I lost a very good friend to a tractor driving in a pasture in 1965. He had just turned 15 and I was still 15. He was a good driver with a lot of field work under his belt. He turned to quick on a side hill with a tricycle Farmall M and flipped it. His foot was caught between the brake pedals when they found him. Sad.

I kinda taught my grandson to drive on my little Kabota with the hydrostatic trans. Drummed it into his head if he gets where he thinks he is in trouble just put your feet on the platform and the tractor will stop and sit still.
 
I grew up around farming, learned to drive at 7, and was plowing with an ihc 300 and 2-16 Oliver plow when I was 8. Dad was on the field with me he was on the Oliver 88 and 3-16 plow.

I'd agree with less farm experience he can learn at 10, see what he can handle in a year or two.

Paul
 
Grew up learning how to drive tractors and pickups from almost out of the hospital. Always had dad or grandpa along until around 11 years old. Got started doing small stuff... Pulling wagons, arranging bales, raking hay. By 14 was running the combine harvesting beans... Mostly freestyle as the float and tracker weren't up to snuff.

Not trying to brag at all like some have said.. Just saying that that's what I was raised on. I'm 28 now.. And my brother and I didn't learn how to drive at 11 years old, we learned how to drive for 11 years. I'm proud my family had the courage to raise us the way they were raised and teach us that hard work and learning start instantly. Mistakes and lack of safety happen.. But that's how we grow and learn.

Josh
 
Believe it or not but when I was 4 Dad had me steer the SC Case while he fed hay from the flatbed. Was 6 and drove the SC and 10' IHC disc discing corn stalks while he plowed with the DC Case and 3 16s.
 
At seven I was keeping the Ferguson and the seed wagon up with the planter,the next year I was plowing with the To20. By 11 I was doing most of the field prep work and working for the neighbors putting up hay.
 
I was driving tractors at a young age and grinding feed etc. and I had my Sons driving tractors and vehicles at young ages but they were my Sons and that is the big difference, no way on earth would I make the decision on what age one of my grandchildren could do certain jobs because it is not my decision to make. There was a man who shot and killed his grandson while deer hunting on the place adjacent to our place several years ago and since that happened I have asked myself many times how I would explain to my Sons or Daughter if something real bad or fatal happened to one of my grandchildren under my care.
 
I certainly hope you are right that the grandson takes to the equipment- just because they have the opportunity, does not make them like it. I assumed when we got to move on to the farm that my boys would be boys and play/spend time in the barn and with me. Not so much. Mom really discouraged it, for one. We kept them busy with other activities as well. Now, either will help make hay when asked, or will wrench on the motorcycle with my help, but neither is in the barn just learning on their own.

I recognize that this farming stuff is my hobby/fetish, not theirs. If they don't love it, they will find something else.

I'd spend time with that grandson showing him all he will listen to/learn. Ask his folks if is okay to let him slowly begin to operate on some easy tasks and work your way up. Definitely be wary, the obvious is not always so.
 
Great! I noticed my son's little friends admiring my tractors, climbing up on them, wheeling the steering back and forth...... and I installed battery disconnect switches and removed the keys, keep little busy-bodies from trying to start Pop's tractors.
 
Glad you're on the mend take time don't push it awfully tempting to do it. I know I found out the hard way. Like some of the guys mentioned unless a kid grew up on a farm and seen daily what happens it's best to start slow it's like learning a new language. This year 2 older farmers drove lawnmowers over walls both survived I wonder if that was in part to the controls being where most farmers are used to the brakes are at and instead of hitting the brakes hit the drive petal basically we can do the wrong thing no matter how much experience we have.
I don't remember how old I was just my uncle setting me in the seat putting the tractor in gear and jumping off it was on the job training. Funny thing my folks were farmall with a few john deere the first tractor I drove was an oliver 66 and today I have oliver tractor must have made quite an impression.
 
My boy started mowing when he was 10 using a riding mower. He wanted to buy a go cart.

Today's riding mowers are safer to use, get off seat mower dies.

My yard was flat. Boy used first gear and was supervised for a long time. Never got hurt or ran over anything. Daughter was slow learner, ran over small trees, damaged fences, damaged mower. Good thing I had a newer mower with safety devices for her. She has always been more accident prone.
 
I started at about 4 years old on a DC Case. Dad would open the gate and I would drive the tractor through and he would close it and take control again. That hand clutch made it easy to start on. I would push it forward just enough to move the tractor and let it go to stop.

I progressed from there. At fourteen I was operating about everything we had. Times have change and things are allot different now.
 
Probably drove the 46 International pickup when the youngest. Would get to drive it when dad was throwing off bales feeding cows. Always knew where granny low was. Tractor driving started out by dad saying, go get the tractor out of the shed and pull up to the gas barrel. Some of my first real tractor driving was raking hay. Probably 11 or 12.
 
4 or 5 yrs old pikin uphay with a SC CASE,,. used the kill switch for stopping ,..rotary hoed soybeans with 35 massey , had a 3pt lift hoe , probably 10 then ,. raked hay about that age too ,old farmhand wheel rake .. dad al;ways drummed safety ,safety ,safety . around that time I got totry my hand at 1 row cultivating sweetcorn , while dad and older bro and sisters hoed,,my older bro had got the big head and plowed out some corn ,. dad stopped him and said , I think jim has hoed enuf ,lets see how well he does cultivating with the little 35,. the field was 4 acres and in 2nd low it took a couple days doing the new corn ,. by age 14 I was trip rope plowing with a DC CASE, and discing with a 12 ft disc ,. ran the 30 combine after dad got it set perfect ,,dad always liked watching from the sidelines under a shadetree , sitting on the tailgate drinkin his beer , the summer before I turned 15 drove his truck to get baling twine in town 4 miles away with him sittingon the passenger side 360 ford 4 spped
 
my dad owned his 1st truck in 1927, a homemade model t cut off from a car ,, he was trukin fruit and vegges to louisvile hay market ,,. he was doing so well he never went back into the 6th grade.
 
Not sure exactly when I started but cracked a sprocket on the dozer in the woods when I was 8 and was told I knew better. I remember trying to run a grade with the dozer before then and also my dad had me on a bank near a pond pulling a harrow and I didn't like it because the dozer was sliding down as I went across.
 
Started driving the horses on the hay stacker when I was 6. Drove the 9N when I was 8.
 
37 chief. have a speedy recovery. i am the oldest so i was driving to young probaly.fall of 63 on a za m-m.was 4 months from 5 yrs old. Richard
 
37 Chief,

That's great that your grandson is showing interest in your tractors. (I worry that our grandson will be crazed by video gaming... because our son-in-law is really into that stuff.)

Dad had me very slowly drive his old John Deere A while he hand-picked ears from corn left standing as a snow fence. But I was such a scrubby kid that I couldn't pull back on the hand clutch to stop it - so dad had to come running out of the corn and hop on the tractor. He didn't really put me on there after that day because I had two big brother's who usually helped with farm stuff.

My husband said he began running the tractor and baler when he was 7 years old, so his dad and his uncle could stack the hay. And he ran it every time thereafter.

I remember a neighbor kid whose parents had him drive their grain truck to the elevator a couple miles away - starting when he was only about 6 or 7. (I remember my folks discussing between themselves that it was a bit crazy to let that child out on the open road.)
 
Always thought I was driving horses at a very young age while loading oats bundles for threshing. I suspect the horses paid more attention to dad then me. Do miss the neighborhood threshing days.

Being the oldest, I was doing field work at a about 9 or 10, mainly disking with a VAC case while dad plowed with a WC Allis. Cultivated a lot of corn with that old WC. Not my favorite tractor for cultivating. Snagged a few fence posts with that crank hanging out the front. Dad bolted a block of wood on the clutch so I could reach it.
 
Memories one day I was real lazy and didn't want to go open the gate and get in and out of the truck. Can't remember how old my nephew was at the time doubt whether he could see much over the steering wheel and I thought he couldn't reach the gas. I put the truck in 4 low and set it moving real slow got the gate open about the time I hear the engine getting floored. I jumped on the running board as he goes by (thankful I had them on that truck) reached in and knocked the transmission in neutral. I will never forget the way he was frozen to the steering wheel and then he turned his head real slow to me eyes wide open and says uncle Larry I went real fast. I figured that was something grandma didn't need to know about cost me a farm toy but thankfully he was willing to take a bribe
 
I was about 10 or so and used the IH Cub for plowing and cultivating as well as mowing and pulling a wagon.
 
I don't remember exactly, but I'm guessing I was about 7-8 when Dad had me pulling grain or bale wagons with the Ford 8N. There was always someone in the field nearby. In the spring I would pull a spike toothed drag/harrow behind Dad who was pulling a disk/harrow or field cultivator. By the way, we just called them a drag, a disk, or a digger. In late 1956, Grandpa bought a brand new John Deere 60 and plow. First tractor on the farm with power steering, live PTO and live hydraulics.. I was 10. He told me that was my tractor. Took me out in the field with the new hydraulic lift plow, 3-14's. made a few rounds with me, then told me, your on your own. Plowed a lot of ground with that 60. Although, there was usually someone else, Dad with his 1950 A and 3-14's and one of my uncles with the 51 B and 2-14's.
By the way, my sister still has the 8N, another sister had Dad's A, my cousin has the 51 B, and I own the 56 60.
 
I drove our VAO before I started school. We picked fruit into boxes so empties had to hauled in and full ones hauled out of the orchard. I drove the tractor pulling the trailer while my dad handled the boxes. I couldn't reach the clutch from the seat so had to sit on the transmission. When I started school I would haul boxes myself when I got home from School. I struggled with the full ones when I started but it didn't take long for me to be throwing them around. At first I had to stand on a box to stack them six high.
My grand kids love to drive tractors but I am with them at all times. I have a rule that all electronic devices stay at home when they come to the farm. They keep so busy they don't miss them and want to keep coming back.
 
In 1955 at 4 years old dad stood me on the deck of his Super H to hold the steering wheel straight down the rows while he and the crew bucked alfalfa bales onto the wagon, a job I'd have until my early teens when I was added to the crew. I raked hay with an 8N and JD rake when I was 8. By the time I was 14 I was sent by myself with the 460 to hook up and run any machinery we had except the planter. We didn't have a combine. By the time I was 19 I'd had enough and was out of there. I finally had a childhood when I was in my 20's and 30's. Luckier to live through that than the early years I spent running machinery. gm
 
8 yrs old grandpa's H farmall pulling hay wagon. by 12 I was plowing fields on a 41 B jd with a 2bottom trip plow. By 15 I was running a silage chopper on a super M feeding and milking 40 head of ornery Holsteins.
 
Started raking hay alone the summer I turned 6... but I wasn't allowed to drive on the road (alone) until 9 or 10.
 
I was 10 when I started on the tractor. up to that for the 2-3 years before I drove a Model T around the farm delivering water and lunch to the farmer in the field. In 1943 a tornado came through the orchard and downed about 60 fruit trees. That when I started on the tractor pulling trees up so the men could stake them and wire them back upright;. Only lost 2 trees.
 
I was 4 or 5 when they turned me loose plowing and cultivating , don't mash the clutch just turn the switch off , that was good advise as a youngster can't get more than one thing at a time in his head . I used a farmall 460 and a moline V and some times a B John Deere . I found in Louisiana flat ground if you turn it off 5 - 10 feet before you needed to stop it would sit there until I was ready to move , I only used gears that were real slow and just enough throttle to keep the engine running .
 
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