Dave Bakke: You never forget your first ... tractor?

From The State-Journal Register
By Dave Bakke
Posted Nov. 1, 2013 at 12:01 AM

For some people, their first car remains a sentimental memory. Some even go so far as to find that car (Where, oh where, is my blue 1963 Chevy Bel Air?) and get it back. That is what Norm Diehl did — but not with a car. For him, it was a tractor.

Norm was all of 8 years old when he first climbed onto his dad’s 1952 Oliver model 77 on their farm outside of Carson in western North Dakota.

“I probably started by cultivating corn,” Norm says.

In those days, the Oliver Farm Equipment Co. was churning out its green and yellow tractors from its huge factory in Charles City, Iowa. Norm’s father, Ruben, bought his and drove it 20 miles home at a top speed of, oh, 12 mph or so.

Some years later, that yellow grille on the family tractor was painted white because Oliver was painting its newer tractor grilles white and the family wanted its tractor to look like one of the newer ones.

Norm grew up, left the farm, attended the University of Illinois and eventually settled in Springfield. His father died in 1995. His casket was drawn from the church to the cemetery behind that Oliver 77.

A tractor is a partner to a farmer, especially a tractor that has been around and done as much farm work as that one. It almost becomes part of the family. Norm’s dog is named Oliver in honor of that tractor. Like real estate, they aren’t making more Oliver tractors, either. The Charles City factory closed in 1993.

Norm’s sister has a ranch near Almont, N.D., and she and her husband used the tractor after Ruben died. In recent years, with its better days far behind it, the Oliver 77 was used mostly as a power source for an irrigation pump. Otherwise, it had pretty much fallen apart.

Just over a year ago, Norm asked his sister if he could have it, and she agreed. He went to western North Dakota, about 1,000 miles from here, and hauled it back to Springfield.

Norm took photos of the tractor when he brought it home. “You can see it was quite a mess,” he says as he shows the different frames.

Then he got a break.

Norm uses some of his farming background to operate Kristin’s Pumpkin Patch by Toronto Road. He is also treasurer for his subdivision’s association. The association uses a bank in Chatham. One of the bank tellers is Olive (an appropriate name, considering), Olive Mayes.

“I talked to him about his pumpkin patch, and he was saying that he had an old tractor,” says Olive. “I said my husband has a tractor-restoration business.”

That was what we call serendipity. Her husband is Russell Mayes, who was a jet engine mechanic at Garrett Aviation at the Springfield airport for more than 20 years. When Garrett closed, Russell opened his tractor-restoration business, first in Pawnee and now in Raymond.

Norm took his old Oliver tractor to Olive’s husband about a year ago. Two weeks ago, it was finally finished. Norm was going to drive the tractor from Raymond to Springfield to re-create his father’s drive home when the tractor was new. But he thought better of it.

“It would probably be throwing rocks,” Norm says, “and I didn’t want to take a chance on chipping the paint.”

He hauled his tractor home on a trailer instead, and it looks great. It still has the original steering wheel and the original tractor seat that once held Norm’s 8-year-old backside.

Norm says he will use the Oliver a little, possibly to work the pumpkin patch next year, and maybe for hayrack rides.

“Other than that,” he says, “I don’t think I’ll use it for much, other than to look at.”

And to remember.