A STEP BACK IN TIME

Story & photos by Joe Dan Boyd

As part of the Second Weekend of Autumn Trails, the Tractor Pull featured a special exhibition of an antique hay baler.

Seeing this rig crank up and operate properly was like entering a time capsule, going back to the days when Arvin Newton kept crews like this busy for several years running, providing much needed jobs for the Tinney Chapel community. Joe Bob Busby said his dad worked for Arvin from time to time, as did my Uncle Kay Cater, when his own farm work permitted.

In these series of pictures, you will see the rig being filled with gasoline, then hand-cranked before the crew started the involved process of constructing hay bales along the rig's built-in assembly line. The Farmall Cub is also owned by Mike and Elaine Tinney Banks.

In the demonstration crew, Joe Bob Busby wears a yellow-hued vest over his greenish shirt, David Richards wears a brown shirt, Bill Cason wears a striped shirt, Jesse Edwards wears overalls and Mike Banks wears a green-hued shirt.

Mike estimates this Case antique hay baler was manufactured between 1940 and 1945, and says that a talented, busy crew could turn out up to 100 bales a day. "That's if they didn't stop to eat dinner," quipped Jesse.

This rig required that a wooden board be placed at intervals as the loose hay moved along the assembly line, while being

formed into bales, divided by those wooden boards.

Eventually, crew members punched and secured wires, using the boards as guides, just before each bale was ejected.

One observer at the demonstration had himself worked on such a crew in 1940, and said the wire punchers were called "monkeys" by other crew members. He didn't say why.

Bales formed at this Autumn Trails demonstration will be auctioned to the highest bidder, with proceeds benefiting the Trails Country Centre For The Arts.

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Joe Dan Boyd Communications