MOUNT VERNON — The Knox County Fair hosted this year’s antique tractor parade and pull under blue skies and blazing heat on Thursday, July 24.
Several fairgoers gathered in the grandstand to watch 20+ vintage tractors parade around the harness track, all varying in age, size, shape, and model.
Following in the tread marks
Shane Wilson, the owner of a 1954 Farmall M, has owned his vintage tractor for eight years and got into the hobby because of his grandpa.
“Well, grandpa had a bunch of old tractors when I was younger, and he’s had them for a long time, of course,” Wilson said. “But I wanted my own tractor to bring to the fair, so we got a tractor, and we come to the fair.”
For many antique tractor owners like Shane Wilson, their tractors don’t do much back at home on their farms. They might pull a plow here and there, but for the most part, they are showpieces for when fair season comes around and the antique parade and pull take place.
Generational tractor ties
However, for three generations of Stewart men, an old tractor doesn’t mean it can’t still pull its weight.
“I guess we kind of just started collecting them [antique tractors] from the family farm, and then as a need, we bought one or two that we would use to bushhog or use around the house on the farm,” Kurt Stewart said. “So, last year we decided to make a couple of them good enough to bring to the fair.”
Each one of the Stewart men shared a brief backstory on the tractor they were standing in front of.
“So this was my great-grandfather’s, his [Kurt] grandfather’s, and his [Cliff] father-in-law’s. He bought this new in ’54 for his farm and used it for a while, and then just decided he needed a bigger one,” Cord Stewart said. “It sat in a barn from the 90s until last year when I drug it out of the barn and decided we were going to rebuild it.”
“This is an Oliver 770 that my grandfather used on the farm. I believe he bought it in the mid-70s, from what I understand and remember,” Kurt Stewart said. “That’s the tractor I grew up on, mowing hay, baling hay, doing everything we could with it.”
“This was Kurt’s tractor, and he’s the one who rebuilt it,” Cliff Stewart said. “Somehow, my wife ended up with this tractor, so she’s kind of the owner. I still use it to bushhog the farm every year.”
Whether the tractor sat in a barn or bushhogged some fields before fair season, it doesn’t matter. The family history that lives on through these tractors today is what keeps these owners coming back year after year.
Wilson and the Stewarts competed in the antique tractor pull held on Thursday evening. Below are photos from the parade and the pull.
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