Tractor On Silo

Tractor on Silo AG WORLD Ag World 14-2-17 "Hey, Ma! What the heck is on top of that silo?" "Watch the road, Pa!" "Oops.. just look at that. What d' ya think it is, Ma. Looks to me like it's a tractor." "Pa, I swear you've been watching one eclipse too many. Who in the world would put a TRACTOR on top of a silo?" "Ivan would." "Who?" "Ivan Weaks, that's who." Conversations similar to this just might be taking place every day as motorists approach the intersection of State Route 109 and Fulton County Road C, about half-way between Delta and Liberty Center in northwest Ohio. Ivan and his wife Beulah own five acres plus a 45 ft. cement stave silo and some buildings there, and the fact that he now has a Farmall H sitting on top of his silo doesn't really surprise anyone who knows him: Ivan is a prodigious tractor collector and a veritable wellspring of tractor lore and trivia. He currently his about 70 full-sized tractors in his collection. Some are waiting to be restored, some are in the process and some have been restored to the point of looking almost "showroom new". "I always wanted to set one on top of the silo to top off my collection," he says. "I decided the Farmall H I bought last August in Michigan for $100 would be especially relevant since 1989 was the 50th anniversary of IH." To ready the tractor for display, he screened and plugged all the holes, nooks and crannies so birds wouldn't use his high-flying tractor as a place to build nests. After applying six coats of paint, he welded a channel-iron grid to the tractor's wheels and fastened 4 in. adjustable angle-iron shoes to it. The shoes are designed to fit down inside the silo and press tightly against the edge. Ivan hired a contractor who came out with a 70 ft. hydraulic crane to lift the tractor, which weighs a tad over a ton, atop the unused silo. "He hooked onto it and had it up there in five minutes. My son Mike went up the silo and unhooked the cable and it was all over," Ivan recalls. He notes that many motorists turn off Route 109 and onto Road C to take a close-up look at the eye-catching "tractor on top of a silo" display before driving on. For more information, contact: Ivan Weaks, 7216-C, Rt. 2, Delta, Ohio 43515 (ph 429 822-5061). (Reprinted from Farmland News, Archbold, Ohio.)

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