AS I SAW IT CHAPTER 31

Maxwell, Route 4, Huntington, Indiana 46750

As I sit here writing this November 11, 1976, I well remember
that date in 1918. We were painting a new corn crib that was just
finished and we heard whistles and church bells ringing in the city
four miles away. Our mother came out and said the Armistice had
been signed and World War I was over. The press made a big issue
that this war ended all wars and would make the world safe for
democracy forever. Well it didn’t, because there has been
continuous war some place in the world ever since.

Up to 1905 The International Harvester had not yet made a
tractor. The Ohio Tractor of Upper Sandusky, Ohio, was making a
chassis, frame and wheels for sale. Anyone could mount an engine on
it and have a tractor. In 1906 I.H.C. got them to build a tractor
using their Famous gasoline engine for power. They were made in 10,
12, and 15 HP sizes. These were hit and miss engines, friction
driven. In 1907 they made the Type A gear driven 15 HP. In 1909 a
few of Type B 20 HP using a throttling In 1909 at Winnipeg a type A
15 HP and a type B 20 HP were given Gold Medals and
Sweepstakes.

governor gear driven engine, also a few Type C in 20 HP with a
friction reverse.

By today’s standards these tractors would be crude, but in
their way they were something. In the 1912 American Thresherman for
January was given the details of a 20 HP I.H.C. tractor using
gasoline pulling a six bottom 14′ Oliver plow, on the James
Oliver farm at South Bend, Indiana. Engine was a 8? x 15′ bore
and stroke. These engines had big heavy flywheels and when they got
rolling there was power. Now the 20 and 25 HP either Mogul or Titan
had good sales and can be found yet in collections in the northwest
and Canada. While the ground speed was slow, they were good in the
belt. The following are sizes of Moguls and Titans and the year
built:

Now in 1908 I.H.C. bought out the Ohio Tractor plant and moved
it to Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where the Titans were to be built and
part to a new tractor plant being built in Chicago where the Moguls
were to be made. The new tractor plant was built in 1910 and
production started in 1911. Now you will note the Titans and Moguls
were built at the same time, the Titans in Milwaukee and Moguls in
Chicago. The Titan was the Deering and the Mogul the McCormick
line. Both very similar, depending upon which factory made them.
Both models were sold by the same dealer.

The first tractor I ever saw was in 1910. A man had bought a 160
acre farm across the road from our home. It was all in pasture and
be hired a man north of town to custom plow it. He had just bought
a new 20 HP one cylinder Mogul and a four bottom hand lift plow to
do the job. I can remember very well seeing and hearing that
tractor come across the field. People came from miles in horse and
buggy to see their first tractor work. Most of their comments were
not favorable to the tractor. No one could conceive that the
average farmer would ever own one, etc.