Oldschool Equipment Walk

Farming equipment, and oldschool equipment overall, has definitely been one of the coolest things I've seen in a while. It just hits you differently when you see the genius of people! There were no fancy computers and shit to help these people do these things. It was schematics and people working to build things with their hands and some machines to help them along the way. That is true damn ingenuity!

There are definitely great things about computers and things like that. They enable us to do all kinds of wonderful and complicated things but a lot of these things we are very detached from. It has allowed us to live some pretty safe lives that's for sure however when there is minimal disruption in that type of stuff, people freak the fuck out and can't cope. I think that's a pretty sad state of affairs.

With the fair that we went to, these group of men here don't fuck around! If things go sideways, the world gets hit by some crazy solar flare and knocks out all kinds of power and electronics and shit, these guys would be able to handle themselves pretty well haha. I know they likely use phones and all that but they know how to work these machines to cut wood and things for their family.

There were so many of these little farming engines it was awesome! I wonder what the average farmer would be using 100 years ago or more. Would that little green one be sufficient for most of their needs? Could be! I know the bigger ones are certainly a good thing to have around for making all kinds of wood things but it doesn't take a lot to really make a lot of work into short work by having such a strong and reliable mechanical device.

This guy here was a mans man. He was not messing around and splitting these logs, staring at people who were nearby and taking pictures of him hahaha. I felt bad, a little bit, but knew that he was pretty good at his craft. That machine there was no joke either, it did not forgive! I know that many people have lost fingers to that thing that's for sure. It was a mechanical lever that went up and down to split a lot. You have to keep your fingers back otherwise they will get split the fuck off, with no questions!

What was the coolest for me was seeing the various tools and devices hooked directly up to a running tractor! I learned a pretty good amount that day about how crucially important these tractors were to the people who own them! That guy split all those logs just that morning from running it on the tractor. We got there like 90 minutes or so after it opened, so the guy was crushing the work. If you had that on a farm, you could cut down and drag the timber over to your wood shop and cut up the winters worth of firewood in an afternoon or two. That's pretty incredible to see!

These guys were good at building the wooden cedar shims that would be used on the siding of houses and in other various parts of the houses and barns. I call them cedar shims because that's what I know them the most as but I don't think that's cedar itself there, that looks more pine to me. The cedar has a red tint to it and it's definitely one of my favorite woods. These here could be pine or some other wood but nonetheless it's awesome to see them using an old machine to mill them into shape for a bundle!