Farm equipment

The plows and salt trucks have been busy the last few months and they are not finished yet. This is not the type of equipment we like to see. My husband and I look forward to the first of the farm equipment on the roads and in the fields for another season. 

That time is months away.

Going through some photos last week, I found pictures of old tractors which were on display in a yard in St. Chrysostome, Prince Edward Island last summer. 

The tractors are part of a history which illustrates an economic and some would say political problem.

Two companies which made tractors, Oliver and Minneapolis-Moline in the United States were each formed from a combination of smaller companies in rural parts of the country. A third company, Cockshutt Plow was a family owned Canadian business.

Beginning in 1960, the White Motor Company of Ohio bought the Oliver Farm Equipment Company, expanding its business to agriculture as well. Later, in that decade, White purchased Minneapolis-Moline and Cockshutt. Small manufacturers disappeared as larger companies gobbled them up. Jobs disappeared from rural areas to larger centers.

Over time, the same occurred across manufacturing and has become part of the problem we see today in the western world. Middle class jobs have disappeared from rural areas and job training for a new economy has not kept up. Now, as computers and automation take over, the problems will multiply. Before long for example, automated trucks will work at mining sites and eliminate the need for truckers there. The problem is further complicated by companies sending jobs overseas where costs are lower.

In St. Chrysostome, the display includes the Cockshutt 20, a row-crop tractor, built in Brantford, Ontario. There were only 4,000 of them built and in 1953, they cost $2300 U. S. 

An Oliver 1655 by White, in production from 1969-75, is also displayed. In 1975, it cost $10,000 U. S.

Also on display was the Farmall 300, built by Farmall, a branch of International Harvester of Illinois, from 1954-56. In 1956, the cost was $2900 U. S. 

Today International Harvester, itself formed from a two company merger,  is known as Navistar International Corporation, a holding company based in Illinois. The company is also in the defense business and has developed hybrid and electric vehicles as well, far beyond the agriculture business where it began. It has facilities on six continents and dealers in ninety countries, globalization at work.

This Zetor tractor is made in the Czech Republic. It found its way to rural Prince Edward Island, evidence of such globalization.

We saw a farmer on a tractor at the harvest display at Kool Breeze Farm in Summerside. He looked a bit tipsy.

Is it any wonder?