Page Vii Excerpt
Featuring "Tractor"
Farming holds a special place in the human
consciousness. The fact that farms produce the raw
materials for most of our food and clothing (“No Farms,
No Food,” as the bumper sticker reminds us) is quite
beside the point. Neat rows of crops, well-tended barns,
and contented grazing animals all speak to our hearts
with an intensity of feeling that cannot be explained by
merely utilitarian considerations. With its rich evocations
of home, hearth, and harvest, the very word “farm” has
a feeling of security about it, as well it might, derived
as it is from the Latin firmare, “to make firm.” Even in
these latter days, we can imagine what a sense of relief
our ancestors felt as they looked out over cleared, tamed
land, having hewn it out of the howling wilderness.
Yet the farm also reminds us of the fragility and
transience of all human endeavors. Unworked fields
revert to forests. Barns and houses do their best to fall
into ruin. Drought, flood, lightning, wind, hail, frost,
blights, and insects threaten the crops. Even a good
harvest may be a disaster if it creates a supply that exceeds
demand. And whatever nature has left standing, the
government may destroy through some change in the
rules: taxes, regulation, or deregulation—anything that
upsets the plan. Or human innovation may render old
ways obsolete. The spirit of the pioneer must animate
the farmer even today.
"Tractor"
We visited an antique tractor show at the Washington
County Fair, and I fell in love with this old 1950 Farmall
(H series) tractor that was on display. It was hard
to paint; this was my third attempt because Barton said
that if I didn’t get it right all of our farming friends
would never let us live it down.