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19b4, and he worked there under the new owners (a school) well into his eighties. Today, in his early nineties, he remains a healthy testimonial to the salubrious effects of cerebral acupuncture.
Gasoline was in short supply all during the war, and that helped to prolong the use of horse and mule power on the farms. With the war’s end, fuel became readily available and at affordable prices. The introduction of the Ford-Ferguson tractor with its revolutionary three-point hitch system of integral implements was the beginning of mechanized farming as we know it today. Rather than being towed behind, as was done with the horse-drawn implements that had been modified for use with earlier tractors, the new Ferguson implements became, in effect, a part of the tractor. They were attached at three points for rigidity and stability, but at the same time capable of being raised to a high, carrying position when not in use.
When in use, a plow, for instance, could be lowered to a desired depth, and it could pretty well be counted upon to remain in that position until it Was raised by means of the tractor’s hydraulic system at the end of the fur-, row. The simple retnoval of three pins would release the plow, and a hay mower or other implement could be attached to the tractor exactly as the plow had been. A steadily increasing number of implements became available for these tractors, and other manufacturers began producing their versions of the Ferguson System - often, it seemed, very close copies.
We didn’t exactly jump right in with both feet. In 1947, we bought a Ford-Ferguson tractor with a plow, a disc-harrow and a corn cultivator. I remember hearing, I think, that the tractor cost $750 brand new.
The tractor didn’t replace the
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