Growing up in rural Iowa I was subjected to many a debates over Ford, Chevy, and Dodge trucks. There were guys in my high school who fondly preferred one over the other and would adamantly defend their position during our lunch time discussions. While the jury remained inconclusive on trucks, there was a general consensus that John Deere made the best tractor.
It wasn’t even a debate. In fact, you didn’t go there.
Mean Green
So prominent were those green machines that to suggest red, or yellow, or blue (especially not blue) would be outright madness. Even the “town kids” wore John Deere shirts. Patrons at the local barbershop, upon leaving the chair and paying, would often proceed over to the coat rack to grab their John Deere hat. Tossing on a hat following a haircut is a contradictory concept in most parts of the world, but in my rural Iowa home it was just another day. Our Book Garage series is (normally) filled with muscle and sports cars and other classic performance vehicles, but this time around, we are featuring something a little different. And The John Deere Century by Randy Leffingwell qualifies. The cars we normally feature should be green with envy by now (see what I did there).
The 1929 Model C appears on page 40. At the time, farmers pulled implements behind them similar to how horses would have. Photo: Deere & Company Archives.
Nothing Runs Like . . .
The John Deere Century opens with the famous manufacturer struggling to grain...