An end of an era

A line of antique kerosene-fueled Rumley tractors at Sunday's event.

Dick Trail/Courtesy photo

On Sunday, August 11th, your old columnist ventured south of Indianola to attend the final “Bum Malleck/Griff Malleck Memorial Threshing and Wanda Malleck Memorial Quilt Show.” It was the concluding part of the always exciting and fun Old Settlers Picnic of the Indianola community. Parades, lots of homemade food, friendly people to visit with, and the Threshing Show was only four miles south.

The threshing bee was a bit bittersweet for me because it will be the last one—ever! All the special antique equipment gathered over the years by Griff Malleck is headed to Indiana on semi-trucks, where it will eventually be sold. The beautifully preserved and restored farm equipment was Griff’s personal collection, and it all worked. Griff hosted the show each year free of charge to attendees, including meals, water, soft drinks, and homemade ice cream. Griff and his crew worked for weeks preparing the grounds and equipment, and after the show, it all had to be put away. Sadly, Griff passed away, even after a heart transplant, so his widow Vicky asked Bob Mart to put the show together one last time. It's sad for those of us who appreciated the remembrances, but time marches on, and it was time to bring it all to a close.

Your columnist is getting a bit long in the tooth, so I personally remember working a couple of times on the farm where I grew up. The wheat had been bound and shocked at its peak of maturity several weeks before the threshing machine arrived. My job was to run a buck mounted on our Ford tractor to pick up the standing shocks and bring them to the threshing machine. Griff did it by binding the wheat and loading the bundles on several hay racks originally intended to be pulled by a team of horses or mules. Then neighbors who had gathered to help pitched the wheat bundles into the conveyor that transferred them into the threshing machine, where the grain was separated from the straw. The thresher then blew the straw into a large pile to be taken care of later. Griff had an early model of a McCormick Deering International binder that cut the standing straw plants and carried them on canvas belts to be tied mechanically into bundles, which were then dropped on the ground. In the early days, those bundles were picked up by hand and made into shocks where the grain finished drying out to be ready to be threshed.

Griff had a couple of working steam engines, one of which powered his very antique all-wooden threshing machine by a long belt. The one that my dad contracted was belt-driven by a very antique International tractor, and the men who pitched the grain were all neighbors who were paid back by dad going to their place to return the favor when the threshing machine came by.

An essential part of the threshing event on each farm was the large dinner prepared by the ladies of the household, and they also helped each other. Home-raised peas, potatoes and gravy, salads, and of course, pie and homemade ice cream. Farmers, their families, and neighbors all worked together, just like the volunteers that helped the Mallecks put on their show.

The farming world changed with the modern self-propelled combine. One operator now does all the work of cutting and threshing standing grain. Some of those are even guided by GPS. Incidentally, such changes also required that the wheat plants be bred to stand until their fully matured heads of grain can be harvested dry enough to be stored.

Griff somehow gathered about one of each model of tractor the manufacturer Rumley ever made. Those were some of the very first models of tractors that were invented to replace the earlier steam engines. Steel wheels, the largest about seven feet in diameter on the largest model, and they used kerosene for fuel. Hand-cranked, they started on gasoline but then switched over to run on the cheaper kerosene. With two large cylinders to produce power, those tractors had a distinct rumble and big vibrations. No hydraulics to help; all was done with manual labor, and reportedly, they were exhausting for the operator to put in a day’s work.

Griff also had a collection of John Deere D tractors, a couple of R John Deeres, the company’s first diesel, and even a more recent John Deere 720 diesel that his dad used, plus several models of International Farmalls. He also used a large, ancient tractor to belt-drive his sawmill that produced boards or planks from homegrown trees. A smaller Farmall powered the belt-driven intricate machine that produced wood shingles.

On display was a large collection of small single-cylinder engines that were built to help with chores around each farm. Before the arrival of electrical power to our rural area, the use of a small engine was necessary to power the washing machine. They were a source of frustration for many a housewife but got the job done.

Included for the ladies was a nice display of handmade quilts. I looked but don’t know enough about the art to comment.

New this year was a reconstructed 1940s blacksmith shop, complete with a trip hammer, a lathe, and a live blacksmith practicing his skills.

It was a wonderful demonstration of how agriculture was practiced in this area so many years ago. Tuck it into your memory because it will all be gone. Such was the dream of a good man, but yes indeed, time marches on.

Well now, my Nebraska friends of Democratic political persuasion can proudly have a native Nebraskan running for the office of Vice President. Presidential candidate Kamala Harris chose Minnesota Governor Tim Walz as her Vice Presidential running mate. He has some beliefs, like abortion up until the moment of birth, that I would oppose and seems a little soft on the Communist regime in China, which is again bothersome. Retired from the Army National Guard, he has made some statements that actual combat veterans are violently opposed to. Politics in action. It will be interesting to watch. Vote wisely!

That is how I saw it.

Dick Trail