Harold Beer and Stuart Gibbard
Harry Ferguson's system of farm mechanisation is brought to life here by some 25 implements filmed at work. Beginning with early summer cultivations and potato planting, the programme covers weed control in potatoes and kale, hay and silage-making, hedge-trimming and general farm tasks such as post-hole boring and milk-churn transport. It concludes with potato lifting, disc ploughing, earth-moving and work with the Ferguson reversible plough, leaving a companion programme to look at other winter and spring activities.
This video shows a wide range of Ferguson equipment, ploughs, cultivators and disc harrows at work. Ferguson provided a complete system of mechanisation and we see many of the rarer implements in action, including the sub-soiler, rowcrop thinner, crane, dump skip, winch, cordwood saw and hammer mill. Muck-spreading and bale-loading sequences show all the different Ferguson trailers and loaders, illustrating just how extensive the range had become by the 1950s.
Our third visit to Great Shortridge farm sees Harold Beer demonstrate implements from the later Ferguson era as well as machines from the early Massey Ferguson range. We join him in the spring as he uses a Rotavator attachment to prepare a seedbed for potatoes that he then plants with an M-F 718 Automatic Potato Planter. Going on through the year, we see Harold at work with an M-F 770 Heavy-Duty Spike-Tooth harrow, a 32-7 unit seeder, an M-F 37-7 hay conditioner and a 732 mower. Some eighteen different sequences show a variety of machines in action from an M-F 203 digger-loader to unusual ploughs. Highlights include an M-F 711 potato harvester lifting the crop we saw planted earlier.
Mike Thorne
This programme looks at many Massey Ferguson tractors in detail, showing them working with the equipment with which they would have been coupled at the time. The film begins with the MF 35 and 65 and deals with the 100 series ‘red giants’ of the mid 1960s, concluding with the new high-horsepower tractors of 1975. It covers variants and rarities.
George French
Filmed mostly in Devon, this programme looks briefly at the end of the 100 series and at detailed examples from the 200, 300, 500, 600 and 2000 ranges. It also includes models from the 1200 and 4000 ranges and finishes with a brief look at the 3000 series.
Stuart Gibbard
This 65-minute video examines in detail the tractor models with which Ferguson was involved, from his early collaboration with David Brown, through the Ford years and up to the FE35 and the formation of Massey Ferguson.Some forty models were specially filmed during 1998 with the help of five leading Ferguson enthusiasts and collectors. The TE20 is at the core of the programme, and a good range of variants and industrials are shown, including some that are rare.
The era of Fordson Farming was probably the greatest epoch in the history of Ford tractors. It began in 1945 with the launch of the stalwart E27N Major and continued through the E1A series, which included the acclaimed Fordson Diesel Major. In 1957, the Major got a workmate as the Dexta added a new facet to Fordson Farming before the ‘New Performance’ models of the mid-1960s brought the era to a close.
