RR #1, Box 63, Avoca, Iowa 51521
I like so many people my age, attended a one room country
school. The last two years of grade school, our teacher had a
‘reward’ program. If one of us got 100 in spelling for the
whole month, we would get a present of some sort. The 7th and 8th
grades were all boys. When we would receive a gift, it was a stick
balsa and tissue paper model airplane. Because we were in the
middle of World War II, all the boys were very interested in
airplanes. I don’t know quite how I did it but I managed to get
6 or 8 models. As I was building them, I was never quite satisfied
with the plan. Since I wasn’t going to fly my airplanes anyway,
it didn’t make any difference how heavy they got to be. I would
make the cockpit more elaborate or make cowling around the engine
so it would open. That way a person could see more of the engine I
would build out of scraps. Very few of my models had a solid
landing gear. Most all were made to fold up and snap in place with
rubber bands.
Before these years, I had very few toys. I recall my mom bought
a little Oliver 70 at a dime store for me. I was so happy I jumped
up and down. I believe she had said she gave 25 for it. This was
quite a bit of money at that time, especially when we were just
getting a foothold after the depression.
I soon found out I was at a loss for farm implements to pull
behind my Oliver. My mom saved lots of things and she had a 2 lb.
cheese box. She suggested I make a little combine, like the
neighbor across the fence had just purchased. I admired that
pretty, new, bright red IHC combine. It had a 36′ cut, I
believe, and lots of vee belts. One day when he was cutting wheat
just across the fence from our house, I waited until he shut down.
Then I examined the machine from top to bottom. It had a little
round grain bin, if I remember right. Also lots and lots of belts.
This was very interesting to me because my dad had a Deering binder
and it had all chains.
The next day, I proceeded to build my combine. I used tinker toy
spools for the bull wheel and feed sack string and rubber bands for
belting. The reel was mostly of wire except the paddles were some
small flat sticks Mom had.
I could pull my combine behind the little green Oliver, across
Mom’s linoleum floor, but it didn’t work very well. I had
to put a wide rubber band on the bull wheel. It was slipping on the
highly waxed linoleum. I noticed my machine didn’t jerk back
and forth, back and forth like the real one. Next day I peeked
inside of the big one and decided I needed some shakers to give my
toy the right feel. I later made one tin tray (with nail holes) for
a shaker. I had it hanging on arms of sharp tin and an eccentric
off of one tinker toy spool, with a pitman arm.
Now many years have gone by. When our boy became big enough to
have a HO gauge train set, I built a 5′ square board with a
river from one corner to the other. I told him to buy trains and
track, and I’d build mountains, houses and other buildings. He
grew so fast, he outgrew the train layout before we could get all
the houses, elevators, etc. placed on it. We have all sorts of
buildings stored away. Each model house has a story behind it.
There is a house like where I was born, a flour mill where my uncle
worked, a railroad water tower that I helped take down for salvage,
etc.
My buildings were built from Post Toasties boxes or card stock
obtained from the local newspaper. We used plastic screen on the
windows and flat toothpick pieces for window and door trim. Old
worn-out sand paper makes wonderful shingles.
Later, when we became interested in old gas engines and
tractors, I started to build those for him. I like to build models
out of odds and ends discarded around the house.
One summer, when we went to visit friends and relatives in
Kansas, we met a man by the name of Donald Prather. We had been
told he was a gas engine collector. A friend of ours introduced
David and I to him and we began feasting our eyes on his gas
engines. There was one that I took a particular fancy to. It was a
1 HP McCormick Deering model M. I thought it was the prettiest
engine I had ever seen. It was filled and painted to a
‘fare-thee-well’. The fellow who had painted it for Donald
put on a glazed finish with red pin striping.
When I had time that winter, I proceeded to make a model of that
beautiful engine. I started with a discarded toilet tissue tube. I
coated it with Elmer’s glue and let it dry to a hard finish. I
cut circles of plywood to fit each end so it wouldn’t collapse.
Then I built it up with rock hard water putty to the shape of a
McCormick Deering engine. The flywheels are made of plastic mud
flaps from a semi trailer. I used a no. 9 wire for an axle to mount
the flywheels on. The cylinder head is a circle of ‘ pine
board. I used 7d nails for valves and valve springs are from a
Weiser door knob lock. As the flywheels are gently turned, the
brass rocker arm (made from a pottie float rod) will open and close
the exhaust valve. For glass oiler, I used a hypodermic syringe. (I
had taken allergy shots several years before and just knew they
would be good for something.) The main bearing grease cups are a
brass tube from a ball point pen with a 5/16 piece of hardwood
dowel glued on top.
I’ve built several models of gas engines from time to time.
I also built the Rumely Oil Pull tractor in a previous issue of
GEM. Some of the models are a Mod. 82 Maytag; the 7 HP New Way, 2
cylinder; single cylinder New Way and, of course, the McCormick
Deering.
Some may say ‘What good are they they don’t run.’ I
suppose this is true, but if I or my boy ever should want to sell
one, I don’t believe we would have any trouble. However, I
usually make them just for my son David.
Another hobby I had as a kid was whittling. My oldest sister and
her husband lived in Climax, Colorado. He would bring home empty
DuPont dynamite boxes from the mine where he worked. They were very
nice soft pine wood. I spent many happy hours with Mom’s paring
knife and a side from one of those boxes. I made two
‘Cowboy’ pistols with a coping saw and that nice sharp
paring knife. Mom helped me secure two snap closepins to the back
of my wooden guns. Then we would cut rubber bands from one of my
older brother’s discarded red rubber inner tubes. I found bits
of paint around the farm and could paint my gun stalks red as well
as the cheese box IHC combine.
I have many scars on my fingers, and especially on my thumbs,
from the trusty paring knife. I would slip and stick myself. Mom
would dab turpentine on the wound as an antiseptic , wrap me up and
I would be out of commission for a week or so. It wouldn’t be
long until I was back at it again. Kids seem to heal fast. I recall
Dad had a big book on all sorts of medicines. He would mix up some
paste of sulphur and an oil of some sort. If we got hurt we would
sometimes apply this to the wound. It made things heal real fast. I
recall him putting some on my foot when I stud a pitch fork tine
clear through one time. However, that’s another story