History of the Tractor

By Curtis Benson

  • The first tractors

    The first tractors
    The first engine-powered farm tractors used steam and were introduced in 1868. These engines were built as small road locomotives and were handled by one operator if the engine weighed less than 5 tons.

  • Gasoline Powered Tractors

    Gasoline Powered Tractors
    Credit goes to the Charter Gasoline Engine Company of Sterling in Illinois for first successfully using gasoline as fuel. Charter's creation of a gasoline-fueled engine in 1887 soon led to early gasoline traction engines before the term 'tractor' was coined by others.

  • Williams Patersons Gas Traction Tractor

    Williams Patersons Gas Traction Tractor
    harking back to the firm's history in the gas tractor field, claimed 1892 as the date for Paterson's gas traction engine, though patent dates suggest 1894. The early machine ran, but not well enough to be produced.

  • First Threshing Tractor

    First Threshing Tractor
    John Froelich, a custom Thresherman from Iowa who decided to try gasoline power for threshing. He mounted a Van Duzen gasoline engine on a Robinson chassis and rigged his own gearing for propulsion. Froelich used the machine successfully to power a threshing machine by belt during his fifty-two day harvest season of 1892 in South Dakota.

  • Charles Hart and Charles Parrs Gas Traction Tractors

    Charles Hart and Charles Parrs Gas Traction Tractors
    In 1897, the two men formed the Hart-Parr Gasoline Engine Company of Madison. Three years later, they moved their operation to Hart's hometown of Charles City, Iowa, where they received financing to make gas traction engines based on their innovative ideas. Their efforts led them to erect the first factory in the United States dedicated to the production of gas traction engines.

  • Henry Fords First Experimental Gasoline-Powered Tractor

    Henry Fords First Experimental Gasoline-Powered Tractor
    Henry Ford produced his first experimental gasoline-powered tractor in 1907 under the direction of chief engineer Joseph Galamb. Back then, it was referred to as an "automobile plow" and the name tractor was not used. After 1910, gasoline powered tractors were used extensively in farming.

  • The Frick Company

    The Frick Company
    The Frick Company was located in Waynesboro, Pennsylvania. George Frick started his business in 1853 and built steam engines well into the 1940's.