Against All Oddities: The Best Wednesday on Record

I did not get married on a Wednesday. My son, August, was not born on a Wednesday. Nor was I born on a Wednesday. I’m sure I’ve had good “hump days” in my life, but in my experience, midweek is usually a rough time. Then again, a broken clock is right twice a day, right? A recent Wednesday ended with seeing old friends, rescuing a tractor, buying a saloon car worthy of emperors, and picking up some antique tables. Oh, and a home-cooked meal from Mom. (I should really take more Wednesdays off from work.)

The Big Red Tractor

Upon moving back from Germany a few years back, I was out of practice and out of tools when it came to lawn maintenance. People felt bad for me and my haggard pseudo-pasture, so they started throwing equipment my way. My boss gave me a cordless weedwhacker and an old but nicely maintained Honda push mower. Mentor Truett, king of generosity and lord of the dairy-farm-turned-Studebaker-haven, gifted me a Wheel Horse on long-term loan. At the time, I was looking at an International Cub, but I had been warned of their uselessness long ago. “Why wouldn’t you just get either a real tractor or a Wheel Horse?” Truett would ask. Now that I had a Wheel Horse, the question of why I didn’t have a tractor started echoing in my head.

Truett had once offered me a 1958 International 504, the same one I used to bush hog with as a teenager. We sure had a lot of lovely memories together, the 504 and I: me lifting the front wheel using the foot brake, it obliterating all objects in its path. Sweet, sweet destruction.

At the time Truett offered it to me, we agreed that I already had too much on my plate to accept. Other projects he was helping make progress on—such as my Studebaker Lark—still weren’t done. None of us could seriously justify reviving the old tractor.

Fast forward to years later, now. Thanks to a lot of hard work from Friend and Foundry Member Thomas, I had been able to make enough progress on the Lark to feel qualified to ask about the big red tractor. Truett’s verdict: If I could pick it up, I could have it. Other than my dad occasionally starting it up, I don’t think it’s run much since 17-year-old Matt Anderson wielded it in laying waste to all manner of ground-dwelling objects. The thought of it re-entering my life had me dreaming about all the things I could run over in my yard. Fence post sinking would be fun. Or maybe driving over a small field in preparation for plowing? For my 3/4 of an acre, it would be a wondrous excess.

The Little Tan Tractor

And now, for some important context: I’m not the only tractor lover in our household. My wife, Dana, owns a 1968 Bolens, which has been sitting at my friend’s house for the past three years. Its residence there is the result of inertia from the makeshift storage solutions we put in place while living overseas; now that we’ve been back Stateside for a while. I debate grabbing the Bolens every time I pass the Durham exit on I-40, usually while heading to visit my parents.

Is now the time? After all, what better to pull cars around the car storage foundry with?

I called Steven, the keeper of the Bolens these last three years, and voiced my intent to reclaim the tractor. I’ve done this many times before, leading to precisely zero action. This time, I’d be backing up my brave claim with a trailer and a truck with an eight-foot bed. Perhaps as sweeteners to ensure follow-through, he offered me two beautiful rolling metal cabinets with wonderful wooden worktops. One grey and one yellow, both over a century old. I mean, when in Rome!

The Plan

The only truck I have with an eight-foot bed suitable for tractor-hauling is Fuggles, the red beater Dodge truck currently down with a blown head gasket. (Consequences of a leaking freeze plug and unresponsive temperature gauge.) Even if the combustion gases weren’t supercharging the cooling system, the Fuggles’ hitch isn’t up to capacity. And even if it was, said hitch appears to be connected to the frame by wiring alone. So for all practical purposes, I didn’t actually have a truck with an eight-foot bed.

I called my friend Nick, who—to my best recollection—owned a Tundra with an eight-foot bed. My dad works here and there for Truett on the farm, and I had been begging him to beg Truett to let me borrow the scrap trailer for a few weeks, at least until I could bring it home. Success, finally. On the morning of the planned pickup, I texted my dad to see if everything was ready. “Locked and loaded,” came the response. I threw in a handful of 1 straps for securing odds and ends.

Haul math: Weight of International 504 + wood tool mower + two tires full of glycol + two welding tables + a Bolens with mower deck + a steel-deck dovetail trailer… we were barking at the edge of the Tundra’s capacity. But it would work. With my stuff all packed up—including a 2 5/16″ trailer ball—I headed to work to swap my GR86 for the Tundra. Upon arrival, I became concerned. Nick’s truck was gorgeous, but it was about three inches taller than I remembered. And that supposedly eight-foot bed? About two feet shy of it, in reality. I called to ask Nick if I was an idiot, and he assured me that I (still) was.

My forged hitch didn’t have enough drop, and the truck didn’t have enough room. Oh well. Onward, ho!

As you’d expect would be the case with a modern pickup truck, I got to Durham without incident. First stop: Bolens. I rolled up to Steve’s driveway, leading to a nicely fenced-in compound in downtown Durham. (It used to be a boarding house.) He opened the privacy gates so I could get a look at the tractor and the two welding tables.

The Surprise VIP Saloon

And there it was. The ultimate VIP saloon, in the metal—a Toyota Century, complete with its overhead-valve hemispherical V-8, electric corner windows, and dual climate control systems.

“Steve, why didn’t you tell me about this? I thought we were friends,” I said, after picking my jaw up from the kudzu. He made some excuse, or maybe he told me something before about importing it and not being able to find any service information for repairing the collapsed air suspension. So it sat. Shortly thereafter, my baby was born, displacing exactly this type of information from my brain for several months.

Steve and I have known each other since we were eight years old. He knows how my brain works. He wasn’t surprised I wanted the Century. “Please… just get it out of here.” We worked out a fair deal: for the cost he incurred importing it, the big Toyota was my problem now—collapsed suspension and all.

Steve wasn’t surprised that all the stuff I agreed to pick up wouldn’t fit in the truck. Nor was he shocked by the lack of a drop hitch. We rolled the tables in off the deck and left the Bolens, again, for another time. Sigh. We headed to his beautiful shop in downtown Durham to pilfer a hitch off of something before hitting the road.

The Pickup

Twenty minutes later, I was at Shade Tree Garage. I saw Truett’s empty scrap trailer. Next to it, I saw a man in a cowboy hat airing up the tires. That would be my father.

“Dad, I thought you said ‘locked and loaded’… not that I mind,” I said, “I just didn’t bring any chain binders or straps…”

“Oh,” he said. “You’re right—that is perhaps not the best idiomatic expression to have used.”

The mighty 504 lit off with a spritz of ether. It drove right onto the trailer. Watching the mighty 504 push the Tundra into a full Carolina Squat, this was definitely not a job for a 4Runner or Fuggles. We got it all strapped down, and I had both my dad and I triple-check the load. The tractor was glorious, it was a beautiful day, and I couldn’t believe it was mine.

Just when I thought the day couldn’t get any better, my mom showed up with a paper plate full of a homemade delicacy called Krautstrudel (I know, sounds made up)—an old family recipe—and some sausage and corn. The Tundra left the farm on its tiptoes, and I crept it home on back roads. Of course, we made short stops to check the chains and wolf down monster bites of strudel.

Not wanting to punctuate this most-best Wednesday in any other way, I threw my backpack loop over the top of the three-point hitch, backed the trailer off, and commuted back home with a line of cars behind me. Even the rush-hour traffic couldn’t get me down!

Matthew Anderson is a North Carolina native, professional engineer, and devoted crapcan connoisseur. He owns a Holden, a Citroën, a Hobby 600 camper, a Moskvich, a Studebaker, an Isuzu, and he thinks that’s it. We don’t ask him too many follow-up questions. –EW