Dodge County Antique Power Club

By Staff
Published on July 1, 1994
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1302 S. 9th St., Watertown , Wisconsin 53094

A sea of green filled the Dodge County fairgrounds near Beaver
Dam, Wisconsin, last August 7 and 8, as the Dodge County Antique
Power Club presented its 25th anniversary Antique Power Show. That
sea of green was a large gathering of John Deere tractors, gas
engines and implements. John Deere was the club’s 25th
anniversary feature.

Some 140 individual exhibitors brought nearly 200 pieces of John
Deere equipment to the fairgrounds, nearly filling the central
feature area.

Two area chapters of the Two-Cylinder Club were invited to
participate in the show. The Mid-State and Kettle Moraine
chapters’ presence and enthusiasm for all things Deere helped
make the John Deere feature very successful.

Part of the line-up of antique pulling tractors waiting to be
weighed-in Saturday afternoon, August 7, 1993, at the Dodge County
Antique Power Show, Beaver Dam, Wisconsin. A total of 118 pullers
tried their luck on the track Saturday evening. Ronald Schmidt,
West Bend, Wisconsin, has his 1932 model C Case on the scale.

A few Deere highlights included: Ken David of Farmersburg, Iowa,
brought two beautifully restored Waterloo Boy gas engines; Bob
Zweifel, Baraboo, displayed an eye-catching yellow LI with sickle
mower; Joe Joas, Kiel, had his A jacked up and sitting on Coke
bottles while idling smoothly; and Bill Klem of Baraboo brought a
1944 BO Lindeman crawler, a real rarity in this area.

Aside from the John Deere feature, the show was a success in
several other ways with perfect weather helping a lot. It seemed to
be the first completely dry weekend in a summer of excessive
rain.

Exhibitors and guests responded in record numbers. There were
360 registered exhibitors and over 4200 paid attendance, both
record numbers.

Along with all the Deeres there were about 100 tractors of other
makes and models on display, and what seemed to be several hundred
gas engines.

Some notable examples: Herb Miller, Madison, brought a beautiful
1908 IHC 12 HP portable gas engine. Gomer Buehring, Oshkosh,
brought his 1918 Eagle 16-30, a tractor made in Appleton,
Wisconsin. Jack Rhodes, Sr., Beaver Dam, brought his 1923 Wisconsin
tractor built in Sauk City, Wisconsin, and Bob Frank, Beaver Dam,
showed off his freshly restored Hart-Parr 28-50.

Six wagon loads of barley were cut and shocked the weekend
before the show. It was threshed out using three separators: a John
Deere owned by Jim Kassube of Waterloo, a McCormick-Deering, and an
ancient wooden Belle City, both owned by the Power Club. Threshing
at the show is usually supervised by club treasurer Dave Grebel and
Lee and Todd Wanie of Beaver Dam.

Alongside the full size machines, 2-scale model threshing rigs
were set up and running. Mike Kolb, Oshkosh, brought his scale Oil
Pull and Case threshing machine and Jim Gutenberger, Colby, brought
his scale John Deere D with threshing machine.

The sawmill was run by Marv Rustad of Cottage Grove, with help
from Jerry Neumann, Larry Shears and Dave Vande Zande, all from
Waupun.

The sawmill gave the steam engine owners a good chance to show
what their old machines could do.

There were four steamers at the show this year. A 1922 A.B.
Farquhar owned by the Wahl family of Brandon, shown for the first
time at the Dodge County show. The other engines were: a Case 65 HP
owned by Ralph Noggle of Slinger; an 80 HP Nichols & Shepard
owned by Jim Tesch of Lake Mills, and a 65 HP Case owned by Bill
Lanzendorf of Beaver Dam.

Jim and Wayne Kassube, brothers from Lake Mills and Waterloo,
set up their corn shredding display using corn held over from last
year. The corn was fed into a Rosenthal corn shredder powered by a
John Deere AR, the stalks were then baled with an IHC stationary
baler.

Deere was the Silver Anniversary feature at the show and
included 140 exhibitors with over 200 pieces of equipment.

Ken David of Farmersburg, Iowa, fires up his beautifully
restored Waterloo Boy 6 HP gas engine at the Dodge County Antique
Power Club’s 25th anniversary show.

Rudy Schmied of Watertown went through a pickup load of cedar
logs, cutting them up for shingles on a shingle mill powered by a
Rumely Oil Pull.

The Antique Tractor Pull got underway Saturday evening in front
of the fairgrounds grandstand. With 118 pullers participating,
Henry Sillman, Hustisford, had his hands full keeping all those
pullers organized and moving.

The farm toy show, set up in the Youth Building, was a popular
place with lots of miniature farm machinery and dollars changing
hands.

Lee Grimm, Marshfield, and James Hoefler, Watertown,
demonstrated their blacksmithing crafts and Paul Col-linson, Galva,
Illinois, made brooms with real broom corn. Mary Behlke, Watertown,
made baskets and the Sillman family of Waterloo demonstrated wool
spinning.

While all of this was going on, members of the Power Club sold
raffle tickets on a nice little John Deer MT which had been fixed
and painted by club members. Ticket sales were brisk all weekend.
The tractor was eventually won by Charles Grebel of Burnett.

This was the Dodge County Antique Power Club’s last show at
the fairgrounds location. The club finally made the big step of
buying land for a permanent show site near Burnett. Next year’s
show will be August 6 & 7, 1994, at the club’s new home at
the intersection of CTH B & I, which is about 2 miles north of
the fairgrounds location.

The 65 acre site is miles west of the village of Burnett at the
crossroads settlement of Burnett Corners. Plans for the site
include buildings, roads, electricity, a well, and the erection of
a building to house a 150 HP Allis-Chalmers steam engine and
generator that club members removed from the old Monarch Range
Plant in Beaver Dam.

The 1994 show will feature Allis-Chalmers tractors and
machinery.

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