wheatland tractors and farming out west, what was it like?

I know about row crop farming due being on the East Coast but out west in the 1930's to the 1950's using tractors like the IH W9 and Case LA type tractors were combines pulled behind the tractor and also how the fields fertalized without using manure? Was the pto used for anything on wheatland tractors back then? I guess basically Im trying get an idea what it was like to farm in the wheatland areas. Sorry for all the questions.

I'll take a bit of a shot at telling what I know. I was born in 1947 and have farmed over many a western KS acre with an LA Case and a GTB Minneapolis Moline. Prior to the MM my dad ran D John Deere and his first was a Fordson along the size lines of a D JD.

We mostly farmed with one-way disc plows of 12 foot length or 15 foot length. On occasion two would be hooked together for greater production.

Kansas was homesteaded later than many areas so the soil wasn't yet depleted for nutrients and also with less rainfall (19" for us) less leaching took place. Fertilizing simply wasn't done and really didn't take ahold until about the mid 1960s when newer varieties gave greater yields while also removing more nutrients.

The self-propelled Massey Harris combines started showing up in the late 1940s. A search for Massey Harris Harvest Brigade will provide you with much reading.

The pull type combines were generally powered with their own engines. Header sizes generally ranged from 12' to 20' though the 12s were more common. Most all had auger type headers, that is to say no canvas ones.

PTOs were used on mowing machines to some extent although many a farmer used an old horse drawn ground driven unit with a short hitch to mow. Where PTOs were a necessity was with the grain or corn binders that were used to cut sorghum feed crops. The bundles were hand placed in shocks which some call stooks. The link below shows a field of shocked feed. Always a fall event. Very labor intensive.

What was it like to farm back then? Well a one-way cuts a furrow and all day long you follow it round and round the field, with many of the fields being 80 acres or 160 acres and on occasion 320 acres.

While traveling one direction the wind would be at your back so the dirt the one-way kicked up would make breathing and seeing the furrow difficult and would settle on the perspiration covered skin creating a pretty good layer by evening.

The fan of the tractor blew the hot air back toward the operator and the continual meshing of the gears of transmission and differential as well as the heat of the day tended to bake a person. Still it was enjoyable to be out in nature observing rabbits, hawks, snakes, ground squirrels, and eagles.

We always grew much of our own meat, had a couple of milk cows which provided milk and cream which produced butter, cottage cheese, etc. In other words we always ate cheaply but good food. Steak was as common a food as a hamburger if not more so. Plenty of fried chicken from the chicks raised each spring so that the pullets could replace older hens.

As the old saying still goes---it was a good life if you didn't weaken. It was hard work but generally you were working with family members so it was enjoyable.

Lots of canning was done from food grown as well as purchased in quantity. Each year a 60 pound can of honey was ordered, 200 pounds of potatoes would supplement those grown, a couple of bushels of apples for fresh eating would be placed in the cellar, etc.

Yep a good life that I fondly remember as the best years. Hope I've answered a few of your questions.
Bound shocked feed crop.

You might enjoy visiting the Living History Farm web site at the link below.

Those folk are in south central Nebraska, at least that is where I would call York.
Wessels Living History Farm York, NE

I'm a little too young to know anything from that far back, but growing up as a school kid in the 70's out here in the OK Panhandle, we had a big neighbor farmer who still farmed the "old" way.

On the school bus, many times we passed his small procession of LA Cases and D JD's each pulling a small one-way plow as his crew moved from field to field.

He'd use them to keep the ground clean and then plant dryland wheat in the fall. I never remember seeing him fertilize.

Of course, since one-ways tend to clean the ground of all plant material, and in this arid area it doesn't grow back very fast, a lot of people place a lot of the blame for the Dust Bowl years on that type of farming practice. I agree it sure made it worse...

One of my friends said occasionally he'd bring cokes out for the tractor drivers... And then make them split a coke between each two of them! ha...

Howard

Yep, pretty much as I remembered it growing up in Northern Alberta in the late "40s and early "50s. Ran a WD9 and a WD6, grew all our own feed for cattle, grew our own garden,etc.

Greenbean Man- Where in Western Kansas were you????
We Farmed south of Garden City Ks. Like they said used the oneway for years. Dad took over a quarter of ground that had piles of dirt that would hide a tractor. They wer caused by the dirt blowing in the 30's.
I cam along in '46 so missed all of that.First Tractor I remember was and International 22-36 that my Grandad had.
About the smallest field we had was 80 acres. Used the one ways or sometimes the Grahm Hoeme with12" sweeps. But if you had ragweed the sweeps would spread it.
We had the Fordson Major Diesels in the 50's and 60's. Then Used W-9, then an 830 on the dryland.
When we bought the irrigated place used a 4020 set up for Row Crop.
Didn't need the PTO for much until we got a mower.
Dad did fix the W-9 with a pump so we could have hydraulics for the one-way and the Hoeme.
I thought that was great because I was NOT big enough to pull the levers to set the tillage equipment.
I have pictures of dad on an Avery Combine (pull type) with a motor on it - pulled by the 22-36. Had a 20' draper header.
1st combine I rode on and remember was a 21 Massey with 12' header. We were uptown when we got a Super 92 Massey with 18' header.

Dust and more dust,started out on LA case went to D4 cat and a R JD really thought we had got to the top with with a 66 Case 930 wester special with a Egging cab.We moldboarded everything and used a rod weeder and a 10 fr Gram hoome plow.the farm is all in grass now for the cows

I lived at Utica in the NW corner of Ness County, and I'm sure you know the corners of Finney & Ness touch.

Almost always we grew wheat and of course grew it on summer fallowed ground. There was always a feed crop for the cattle which was a cane or if you wish a sorghum. Dad's preferred variety is still available today and is Hegari. We used an old McCormick-Deering grain binder to put it into bundles. Dad tried silage, AC Roto baled hay, bucking it, but always went back to bound feed. We often grew winter barley for cattle grain and ground our own feed with an International burr mill driven by flat belt pulley.

Generally boys in my area started operating tractors in the field anywhere from age 7 to age 11. Sort of depended upon the maturity of the boy and how badly they were needed. I had two older brothers so probably didn't start until age 10. I operated the left hand clutch LA Case as I was left handed and also got the short end of the straw. We generally ran two tractors in the same field, The LA Case and the GTB MM. They were fairly well matched for speed and power, but the Case always drank an extra 5 gallons of fuel with both fillings of the day.

In the mid 1960s dad was given the opportunity to rent more land and did so. Because it was terraced, our first, he bought a G-705 MM Wheatland model to take advantage of hydraulics, our first. Expect he was also facing that I was graduating from high school and he might be farming on his own again.

We cut our wheat with a Gleaner Baldwin pull type until late in the 1950s when a used 21a Massey Harris self-propelled was purchased for not much more than salvage price. The old pull combine was traded in on it.

Sometime in the 1960s, probably after the additional land was rented harvest became such a choice time-wise that we began using custom cutters.

After schooling, being drafted & a military stint, I married and in 1970 had the opportunity to rent the extra land dad had rented as he found the terraces too difficult to farm at his age and wanted to slow down. He was 70. I then farmed for 13 years.


I grew weary of high interest rates after they had doubled in a years time and the bank began pushing me for a mortgage on my free and clear land as collateral on cattle, combine, and tractor. After a couple of lean years due to weather the fun of farming was gone and I simply sold out. I made the decision timely and walked away with a lot of money while later other farmers had their farms taken from them. Like I said, it is a good life is you don't weaken. Still not sure after all of these years whether I weakened or simply made an intelligent decision.

I have sold all but one quarter section of land. It was homesteaded by my grandparents, willed to my parents, and willed to me as well. Just three sets of owners since 1886, not too bad.

In reminiscing, the fun implements to pull were our 30' spike-toothed harrow, 20' spring-toothed harrow, a rotary hoe in milo because you got to go so fast, and an old disc harrow we had that was a 21'. The disc was only two gangs which were end to end, not a tandem. Often wonder what brand it was, sort of a reddish color. Discs weren't very large in diameter. Couldn't use it for much as it didn't cut in a great deal. Did its job wonderfully, i.e. disc harrowing and left a nice level seedbed. Dad finally gave it to my uncle as it needed new wooden boxing bushings.

I guess our biggest step up was when we finally gave up disc drills and went to hoe drills which were better for drier conditions.

Dang shame I don't have a photo----the last couple of years I farmed I had Vee fertilizer tanks on my Case 1070 tractor and incorporated it with an 18 foot Sunflower disk. Behind the disk I pulled 16' of JD 9300 hoe drills. As the disk turned corners it tended to pull the drill further into the corners and actually made them smaller than if pulled by a tractor.

FYI--Dad was brought to KS from TN by an aunt and uncle after his mother and father had both died. The year was 1910. He retired from farming in 1986. After retiring he lived another 10 years and died at age 97. Eating KS farmland dust must be good for a person as he never owned a tractor with a cab nor 3 point. RIP Pop, you did good.

Sorry for the length folks, once you get the well primed it tends to keep running.
Hegari Cane

Hey Ken -

Did you happen to see that restored 22-36 McCormick with a drag type combine behind it at the Ulysses tractor show a few years ago??

It sure was keen... If I remember right, they had a plaque there explaining the family history of where it came from...

Howard

Row croped,dairy,hogs and beef on and off all my life. I too wondered about the wheatland. Finally bought a W4. It sets on carpet in the garage of our home in a retirement comunity. I pull a couple of hayrides for the old folks every year, but I really just like to have it where I can see it everyday.My wife of 52 years is very understanding.She pushed me to buy it!!

W4