Ageless Iron

This tractor offered hope in The Great Depression.

As most of you know, I am committed to Persian Orange and am as faithful to Sweet Allis as I am to Lovely Linda. Yet now and then my eye roves. Sometimes even to the Green.

In 1953, Deere came to the inevitable conclusion that their 42-year reliance on a two-cylinder engine could no longer sustain the company.

While not financially strapped, Deere still faced a funding shortfall. Its chief competitor, International Harvester, had just introduced the game-changing row-crop tractor, the Farmall Regular.

The inside story of restoring Stella.

In the late 1920s, the European corn borer was having its way with the crop. A USDA program set out to provide farmers with a tractor and PTO-driven stalk shredder for rent at $1 an acre.