Posted on 04/10/2013 1:14:18 PM PDT by FlJoePa
A collection of nearly 100 antique tractors, mostly of the bright-yellow Caterpillar variety, will be auctioned at 10 a.m. Wednesday in Trout Run, Pa.
The auction’s 109 lots, which range from farm tractors to heavy earthmovers and various durable parts, carry an total estimated value of $500,000, said Scott Edwards, territory manager for Ritchie Bros. Auctioneers, which is managing the sale.
The presale value is Mr. Edwards’ own best guess because such collections of vintage industrial iron rarely come up for auction. Still, many antique tractor enthusiasts have inquired about the sale.
“It’s not something you see every day,” Mr. Edwards said in a telephone interview. “I’ve had calls from throughout the United States, Canada — all over.”
Rare items up for bid include a 1935 Caterpillar RD8 crawler tractor weighing more than 16 tons and a towable 1933 Caterpillar 48 elevating grader. Mr. Edwards said the tractor-grader combination helped build the Alaska-Canadian Highway, which traverses parts of British Columbia, the Yukon Territory and Alaska.
A contractor, inventor and machine-shop businessman named George E. Logue Sr., pieced together the bevy of bulldozers over his lifetime, housing them in two barns on his family farm in Trout Run. Mr. Logue, who lived in Williamsport, Pa., died in October at 85, prompting the family to sell the collection.
(Excerpt) Read more at wheels.blogs.nytimes.com ...
This is interesting. I have sometimes went to a historic equipmnent show in Bowling Green, OH in recent years and seen some of this old iron actually working in a demonstration field.
The Amish will be there for those horse drawn graders.
Most of the rest looks more like junk.
We have Farmall collectors here ,but mostly John Deere collecters, and their stuff looks better than new.
1938 Minneapolis Moline UDLX ~
Years ahead of its time, the UDLX (ultra deluxe) featured the first factory built tractor cab with radio, cigar lighter, heater, hub caps, and paneling. Other features included 40 mph road gear, headlights, and even a license plate. Only about 125 were built. They sold for $1,800, double what other tractors sold for at the time.
Some were used by custom combine operators in wheat country, others saw service delivering mail in the winter on snow-clogged northern rural roads and some farmers, it was their only transportation —
Nice.
Logue didn’t collect junk. Google him. He has a tractor in the Smithsonian.
Is the WILLIAMSPORT, PA auction the same one of the article?
Yes. Same auction. Having re-read what I posted, I wouldn’t have posted it in the first place because it’s over. I thought it was on Saturday.
Back in high school, a buddy’s dad had a Caterpillar R4, and I actually got to drive it. Sadly, my only experience with heavy equipment, but man it was fun...
Caterpillar is seeing big bucks in reselling their old machines.
They’re going into competition with Ritchie Bros with an auction house of their own.
I LOVE tractor shows!
You will see the true pioneer spirit of wholesome, God earing Americans there.
And not a speck of trash anywhere - unlike any democrap gathering.
God fearing...
If it ain’t red, it ain’t even fertilizer.
Boy, that looks EXACTLY like my old collection of Tonka toys.
Had never seen that. Sweet!
Thought those guys were owned by Fiat now?
Yep, they are not a company you want to be doing business with.
They are, but vintage Farmalls are 100% America at it’s finest. I could argue that everything America became in the 20th century is due to Farmall, but that would be a long, long thread. Suffice it to say, those were the days.
The UDLX and Minneapolis-Moline tractors (”Prairie Gold”) were a recent feature on the Classic Tractors program on the RFD-TV channel on cable. My interests run more toward J-D green and IH/Farmall red but it was still an interesting show.
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