3228 180th Street Fort Madison, Iowa 52627-9767
This International Harvester Mogul Engine is a side shaft
portable, 15 HP, serial number JB-583 and the following is what is
known of its origin.
This engine was bought by the late Harry Stein, my dad, in 1928
from Hade Ford Motor Company, Fort Madison, Iowa. It had been
traded in the purchase of a new Fordson tractor and was not in
running condition when Dad bought it. According to information
supplied by my older brother Bernard, Dad enlisted the aid of a
neighbor, Al Best, to help him move the engine home. They had to
pull what we always called Prison Hill, up US Highway 61, which at
that time was considered a mile long. This hill being what it was,
with an. engine this size and heavy, I believe would have done one
team in, if they were not a pair of good heavyweights. There was
always a small clevis in the end of the engine tongue and this
makes me think they used a four horse tandem hitch to ‘pull the
hill.’
Dad got the engine to run and got a feed mill that, at one time,
was used in the Saar Mill in Fort Madison, Iowa, to grind stock
feed. This feed mill was a Kelly Duplex and one of the few
manufactured with a cast iron hopper. This engine also saw service
on the silo blower and fodder shredder.
About 1933 the oil slinger on the crankshaft stopped up and the
babbitt was melted out of the connecting rod bearing. An old
thresherman neighbor, Waldo Gregg, helped Dad rebabbitt the rod
bearing, so while the engine was down Dad also decided to replace
the engine valves and piston rings. A glance at the serial plate
reads 12 HP, so he ordered 12 HP parts. When they came, he found
they were not big enough, and he had a trip back to the dealership
to reorder.
At the dealership he was told International Harvester had the
engine built and people thought they were too big so they would not
buy them. It appears there was a decision to sell them as 12 HP
engines.
Just before the beginning of WWII, Dad bought a John Deere model
D tractor and, a little later, a Let: feed mill, so the old engine
was pulled to the side for the next 45 years. Nearing retirement
from the Santa Fe Railroad, I took an interest in the old engine
again, and in the process got badly infected with Engin it is. This
is a serious affliction one that leads to the desire to have
more!
I moved the engine to Streator, Illinois, late summer of 1987,
where I would tinker with it a while, let it sit a while and back
to tinkering again. So far I have replaced all but one piece of
wood and reconstructed the exhaust system. The bottoms of the fuel
and water tanks were rusted, so it was necessary to patch them
believe it or not, they are the originals!
One day I decided to photograph the serial plate so I wanted to
brighten it up a bit and made a startling discovery. Around the
horsepower rating there were the circular marks of a big punch. The
next thing I noticed, the one and two were cut deeper in the plate.
Then 1 got my bifocals into fine focus and found a ’15’
showing out from under the 12! This alteration was found 60 years
after Dad bought this engine secondhand. I have since received a
list of early serial numbers and year of manufacture of
International Harvester Company engines and tractors and believe
the alteration was done at the company.
Curt Younkin is the fellow who traded this engine on the
purchase of a Fordson tractor. The Younkin farm is located just
northwest of Montrose, Iowa. My grandmother’s brother, Ferddy
Barnard, worked as a hired hand for Curt Younkin, and I guess
through him, maybe my dad gained information that influenced him to
buy the engine.
Somewhere in its earlier days this heavy engine went through a
bridge and the scars are still there. There is a terrible wobble to
the left rear wheel after reconstruction, repair work to the right
rear wheel and exhaust valve rocker, plus a break in the base. As a
small youngster I barely remember some of the small plank bridges
over drainage ditches and creeks in the neighborhoods where Ferddy
Barnard lived. I think of it in this way: the bridge would hold a
team and a wagon load of hay, but not this Mogul engine.
September 12,1991 was a very important day. This is the day the
engine returned to life again and ran on its own after being idle
48 years more or less.
This is quite a bit laterhave communicated with Curt
Younkin’s son, Bob, and he tells me the line shaft is still in
the building where they belted the Mogul to the line shaft to power
a corn sheller and feed mill. He says he still remembers the big
flywheels. Beyond that he says they do not have any information on
the Mogul. Also, he mentioned they used the Fordson tractor until
about 1936.
Information about the engine appeared on a placard posted at
antique machinery shows when it was owned and shown by Earl
Thiebaud, Black Forest, Colorado. I am also the new proud owner of
Mogul Engine, serial JB-501.I picked this engine up September 20,
1996, and on the way home put it on display at the Iowa Farm
Progress Show in Amana, Iowa, in the International Harvester
Collectors, Iowa Chapter 5 exhibit.
1914 I.H.C. Mogul.
‘This engine was selected as the logo for the 1987 Front
Range Antique Power Association (F.R.A.P.A.) buttons, quite an
honor. Serial No. JB-501 was the first 15 HP model engine off the
factory floor. There were only 118 of these engines built during
the years of 1914 to 1918. It was bought by Adolph Mulvay who had a
ranch and farm near Westcliffe, Colorado. He used it to run a grain
separator and a cordwood saw. I bought it in 1976 from his
daughter, Gertrude Schwarz, who with her husband Harold lives near
Canon City, Colorado. The engine at that time had not run since
1943. It is still 100% original.
‘This engine has several unusual features not found on most
‘one lungers’. It is a side shaft engine, so called because
of the revolving shaft coming forward from the main bearing. This
shaft runs the fuel pump, oil lubricator, governor, inlet and
exhaust valves, magneto and ignitor. Most one lungers use a push
rod to do these things. The engine has no spark plug. Ignition of
the fuel mixture is brought about by the tripping action of the
ignitor. Water in the engine is cooled by running it over the
screen on top. A screen cooled, ignitor fired, side shaft engine is
indeed a rare engine.’