I’m fascinated by Fordson tractors

I learned to drive when I was fourteen years old on a Fordson Major tractor. They were build in Essex between 1952 and 1964, and when I had weekend jobs on farms a few miles from my home, I usually found myself driving a Fordson. Those who worked full time on the farm had the newer tractors, such as the Ford 5000, which back then in the early 1970s, was considered to be a large tractor.

When I bought a barn to convert on the edge of Leiston, the guy I bought it from had a 1954 Fordson Major, and let me drive it one Saturday afternoon, to top the paddock our new home was going to overlook. It was a joy to drive, and all the controls came easily to hand, as if I’d been driving in the day before. But then I’ve been driving Fordson tractors now at every opportunity, for most of my life.

I spent August 1971 working at Church Farm Aldringham, baling straw with a Fordson Super Dexta. The farmer, Michael Newson died a few years ago, but one day not so long before showed me the actual tractor I’d driven that year, which he had lovingly restored. Sadly, it was stolen after his death, or I would probably have bought it to replace my own Super Dexta which is now at my daughter’s place in Maine.

When we lived in Norfolk we had two and half acres of land, so owning a Fordson was easier to justify. It was useful for cutting grass. Now I have just one acre, half of which is trees, and my daughter has around 70 acres, so the tractor my father-in-law had given me, crossed the Atlantic and is enjoyed a new lease of life, having had a few things such as its brakes repaired by my son-in-law who is a very able engineer. It now stops as well as goes, which I guess has made it safer to drive.

Could I justify owning another Fordson? It would be difficult, but I’m hoping that someine not too many miles away from my Suffolk home has one they’ll let me drive now and again. I’ll be at the Suffolk Show next month. If you want to chat, I’ll probably be somewhere near the old Fordson tractors, remembering my teenage years on the farm.