Tractors Get the Nod Over Horses in 1915

By Staff
Published on May 1, 1980
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‘Farm Power,’ an International Harvester book of 1915,
tells farmers they cannot afford to use horses when tractors are
available.

It is a sales piece, convincingly done. It probably had much to
do with the replacement of horses by internal combustion power.

Tractor power is cheaper, the book argues, and therefore it
should be adopted by the farmer.

It does concede that the horse is not entirely outmoded:
‘Some horses will always have to be kept, especially on corn
belt farms, but in most cases sufficient horses can be sold to pay
for a tractor and still have enough horses on the farms to do the
light jobs.’

This is a historic book, recalling the period when gasoline
power (and kerosene) was replacing horses in many parts of the
nation.

Illustrations are good-sketches, graphs and photographs. Some of
the pictures show the many jobs that could be done with a
tractor-pulling up trees and stumps, pulling plows and harrows, and
doing many other jobs around the farm and on the roads. Special
drawings and diagrams illustrate hitches.

Published by the American Society of Agricultural Engineers,
this softbound reprint should prove valuable to all GEM readers. It
is available for $4.50 postpaid from Stemgas Publishing Company,
Box 328, Lancaster, Pennsylvania 17603.

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