26 replies to this topic

[mike1972chev]

Nice bit of history. Thanks, Michael. Always interested in any history about, well, anything that had an engine in it.

 

 

My family history with tractors goes back to Chicago Metal Foundries, owned by my great-grandfather. They cast most of the large iron castings that went into Allis-Chalmers equipment. His back door into that association came with his marriage to Isabella, daughter of James and Agnes Chalmers.   

 

 

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A solid brass model of the first crawler made by Allis-Chalmers was cast in the brass shop. They were mounted on a wood base and given out to the Allis-Chalmers dealers, and biggest customers. Somewhere in my house is one of those castings, without the wood base. It was given to James, the son of great-grandfather William, as a toy. It was passed down to my father, then to me when he passed.

 

 

Incidently, the headstock bearing casting on the coal mine exhibit at the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago was cast by Chicago Metal Foundries.

VERY cool to know you are lineage from the A/C history Dave! You need to find that brass crawler,and then duplicate a wood base for it again. (Are there any archived photos of those brass crawler hand outs anywhere??? )

[Dave Crevie]

Not that I know of. I have a lot of "artifacts" from the foundry, but only one picture of grampa William. It is of him standing at his drawing board in the iron foundry office. I have his Dietzgen drawing set. His foundry was contracted to make war supplies for WWI,during which he lost all his civilian customers, including Allis-Chalmers.
The foundry folded a few years after the war was over.