Tractor Drive

Morrow County Antique Tractor & Equipment Assoc Inc

Sixth Annual Tractor Drive

August 23, 2009

All photos were taken from the seat of one of the tractors on the drive.

Antique Tractors on a Quest for Ice Cream

On Sunday, August 23rd, members and friends of the Morrow County Antique Tractor & Equipment Association Inc. gathered in Marengo for their 6th Annual Tractor Drive. The weather was almost perfect for the 34 mile round trip to Sunbury and back.

They left Marengo with 32 antique tractors and one shuttle wagon with 16 people and one dog riding along. Not far down the road they picked up one more tractor. About half way to Sunbury they were joined by the Centerburg Oldtime Farming Festival shuttle wagon with 13 riders and six more tractors. All together there were 39 antique tractors, two shuttle wagons, 70 people and two dogs along for the drive. This was the Association's largest turn-out so far.

The two organizations, Morrow County Antique Tractor & Equipment Association Inc. and Centerburg Oldtime Farming Festival, have joined together before in the Annual Tractor Drive. For the last two years the drive has gone through three counties to get to the Centerburg Twist-N-Shake. In previous years the drive has gone from Mt Gilead to Marengo or Cardington. The Association never plans the same drive for more than one or two years. Plans are already underway for a different route in 2010.

The Association would like to thank everyone who participated in this 6th Annual Tractor Drive and would like to extend a special thanks to the Delaware County Sheriff's Department, the Sunbury Police and the Sunbury Creme Corner.

last update 08292009

Nine different makes of antique tractors were represented on the drive. There were twelve Allis Chalmers, twelve Farmall, four John Deere, three Massey Harris, two Minneapolis Moline, two Ferguson, two Ford, one Oliver and one Case. They made quite a line of tractors, stretching down the road so far that most of the time the last tractor could not see the first!

Traveling at seven or eight miles per hour, the group made it's way down township and county roads into Delaware County. At Routes 36 & 3, the Delaware Sheriff's Department dispatched a Sunbury Police Officer to hold traffic so the tractors could cross in one long line. They proceeded through town to the Creme Corner where they stopped to enjoy an ice cream treat, stretch their legs and visit for a bit. Then it was back up onto the tractors and into the wagons for the seventeen mile trip back to Marengo.

There was much to see along the way. You don't realize how much you miss when you're driving your car down the road at 55 miles per hour, but when you're only traveling at seven or eight, you've got the time to really enjoy the countryside around you. They passed bean and corn fields, homes and old barns and passed through woods and along streams. There were also many people along the way to wave at and shout greetings to as they passed by. (They must have heard the antique engines heading their way, because even along these sparsely populated roads, there were people standing on their porches, out in their yards and even coming out to the end of their driveways to wave as the tractors went by.) At one point they even attracted three bicycles who road along by the Associations' shuttle wagon for quite a distance.

The drive always takes place a week or two after all the hard work of putting on their Annual Farm Days Show at the Morrow County Fairgrounds in Mt Gilead the first full weekend in August. This is just their way of spending a day enjoying their antique tractors, the countryside and each other's company. The members of the Oldtime Farming Festival seem to enjoy the drive as a way of gearing up in preparation for their Festival the third weekend in September.