John Deere Vintage Tractor Timeline
Most people who have been interested in vintage John Deere Tractors
for several years are already fairly familiar with those of the Two-Cylinder
Era: unstyled came before styled, lettered models preceded numbered
models, and so on. A review of this may well be unnecessary for
many readers, but we decided to do it anyway; the purpose being to add
some momentum to a timeline that carries beyond the year 1960.
New Generation, and sometimes later models, have been showing up
at the Worldwide Two-Cylinder Expos since the early 1990s. Also, this
publication has not been neglecting New Generation Tractors on its
pages for several years. The first New Generation Tractor, the 8010, hit
the ground exactly 50 years ago; most of the rest of the lineup was
introduced in 1960. Still, it is our experience that only about one out of
four readers has much — if any — interest in anything beyond the
Two-Cylinder Era.
Over the past few months we’ve been asking people about that, and
the answers tend to line up:” “I don’t know much about ‘em,” some say,
while others admit that the numbering system leaves them confused,
and they don’t really understand one model from another beyond the
3020 and 4020.
So, that’s the real reason for publishing a timeline now. With New
Generation Tractors at the half-century mark, equivalent to a 1937 tractor
at the first Expo in 1987, we felt it important to at least make an
attempt to provide some assistance to readers in understanding the lineage
of the post-1960 models; while still staying clear of that “30-yearsold”
mark that defines “vintage.”
The Timeline, which starts on page three, concludes with a tractor
listing that will hopefully help to relate familiar two-cylinder models to
those that came down the line at a later date, thereby possibly resolving
a plethora of additional questions on this matter.
To keep the attention of those who already know all that is being presented,
we interspersed the timeline with snippets of unrelated historical
facts that may be of interest.
For the September–October issue, we will return to our regular format
of providing a comprehensive feature article on a specific family of
tractors; at that time the Standard Tractors built at the John Deere
Dubuque Tractor Works.
Jack Cherry, Editor |
