Historic harvest

Douglas Conrady’s restored equipment carries family history in its paint and steel, proving some harvests never fade.

While most of us might struggle to remember what we had for lunch last week, Douglas Conrady can tell you what his grandfather paid for a tractor in 1941.

“$982,” he says without hesitation. “I’ve got the checks and contract to prove it. Grandpa never threw anything away.”

That tractor, a 1941 John Deere Model D, is still with the family. More remarkably, it’s still running.

Conrady, an engineering technician at Alfalfa Electric Cooperative, has spent the past few decades restoring tractors and farming equipment from a time when horsepower meant actual horses, not something you measured under the hood of a pickup.

“I was just a dumb high school kid excited to work with nuts and bolts,” he said, remembering the first time he helped dig out the 1941 D from where it sat retired on the family farm near Wakita.

He, his dad, uncle and grandpa restored it in 1993, launching what would become a lifelong obsession.

“I thought it was cool then,” he said. “Turns out it still is.”

The heart of the hobby

In the world of antique tractors, the John Deere Model D is a legend. Produced from 1923 to 1953, it was John Deere’s first mass-produced tractor and, for nearly three decades, its largest. Today, it remains the company’s longest running model ever made.

“They don’t purr. They thump,” Conrady said, describing the distinctive John Deere two-cylinder engine. “They’re called ‘Johnny Poppers’ for a reason.”

The Model D wasn’t the only green machine to capture his attention. His collection now includes tractors spanning from 1930 to 1962, many with personal ties. These include his maternal grandfather’s 1936 D, now paired with a plow from his wife’s family. Another came from his grandfather’s extended family. And yet another was restored five years ago after a conversation with his uncle.

“One day I realized, if I had that one, every tractor Grandpa bought before 1965 would be restored,” he said. “That’s when my uncle’s light bulbs went off like the sun. He said, ‘Go get it off the farm and we’ll restore it.’”

The family legacy is preserved in paint and spark plugs and it’s alive in the work Conrady and his dad still do together.

“He goes along with my shenanigans,” Conrady said. “At heart, he enjoys it as much as I do.”

Historic harvest

Last summer, Conrady took things up a notch. He fired up a 1940s combine and took it out to harvest a field of wheat outside Wakita.

The combine, an Allis-Chalmers Model 40, holds just 11 bushels of grain. (For context, a modern combine can hold a few hundred bushels). Built before World War II and pulled by a modern tractor for convenience, it threshed wheat just like it did 80 years ago.

The kicker? He posted it on Facebook.

“Half the town was mad at me for not inviting them the first time,” he said with a laugh. “So next time we did, and 50 people came to watch us harvest one acre. People said it was the coolest thing since sliced bread.”

The combine, which he bought at auction from a
relative of his wife’s family, likely cost $345 when it was brand new. A modern combine could set you back close to $1 million. But Conrady doesn’t intend to make a museum of equipment on display.

“If I’m buying it,” he said, “I’m going to use it.”

Out of 15,000 made, only a handful are still in operation. But using it means repairing it, too. When one of the wooden bats on the header broke, he didn’t look online for a replacement — he made it himself.

“You break it, you make it,” Conrady said.

A show for the ages

This September, Conrady and at least one of his restored machines will return to the Major County Historical Threshing Bee & Two-Cylinder Show in Fairview, where visitors can see working tractors from 1923 to 1953, like the famous Model D.

It’s a slice of pioneer life that comes alive with blacksmithing, plowing, threshing, sawmilling and enough funnel cakes to fuel a small town. Conrady fits right in.

“I’ve always had farming at the heart of me,” he said. “It would be really cool to have something of all the things. How did they farm back in the ‘40s? I can literally go show them.”

And show them he does by bringing the past to life with every flywheel crank and plow pass and reminding folks that progress doesn’t always mean forgetting where you came from.

Sure, there’s no power steering, no GPS, no Bluetooth speakers mounted on the fenders. But that’s the point.

“These tractors will outlive me,” Conrady joked. “And honestly, I’d be OK with that.”

Catch Conrady at the Major County Historical Threshing Bee & Two-Cylinder Show, Sept. 26-27, 2025, in Fairview.