Steam-Up stokes interest in ag history
BROOKS, Ore. — A rhythmic popping sound filled the air at Powerland Heritage Park on Sunday as all sizes of antique machinery chugged along gravel roads and hissing steam came from all directions as exhibitors stoked their boilers to keep agricultural history alive.
The 48th annual Great Oregon Steam-Up welcomed 17,000 to 20,000 people during its two-weekend run, said Michelle Duchateau, president of Powerland Heritage Park, which is on 62 acres off Interstate 5 near Brooks, Ore.
“(The Steam-Up) goes along with our mission to educate people about how agriculture has changed and how machinery has fielded that change,” Duchateau said.
The Steam-Up offers visitors a chance to witness the sights and sounds of the past through many types of antique steam-powered equipment, a blacksmith shop, a unique steam-powered lumber mill and even and old-time electricity-powered trolley. Each day the highlight is the Parade of Power, during which the tractors and machinery drive past grandstands filled with people while an announcer tells the history of each piece.
Tim Ruffing has attended the Steam-Up for decades and now brings his 1911 steam tractor to the event.
“I have been coming here since about 1970, back when this was just an open field,” he said.
“This engine, supposedly … they used it as a road engine,” Ruffing said, adding that the tractor was used to pull a road grader.
Ruffing started out bringing stationary steam engines but eventually worked his way up to a steam tractor.
He thinks that teaching people to run the engine is important, and he usually has other people operate the engine for the Parade of Power.
First held on the current grounds in 1970, the Steam-Up’s roots go back farther, Duchateau said.
“It started as a threshing bee,” she said.
Farmers would get done with their harvests and want to do something fun, so they would hold the threshing bee, Duchateau said. As the event grew they ran out of space on the farm property they were using. They eventually gained use of the current location from another group and purchased it later.
The park is now home to 15 heritage museums, including a truck museum, an antique Caterpillar museum and a blacksmith shop.
One of them is the Oregon Vintage Machinery Museum featuring John Deere. Vickey Winn and her husband, John, have participated in the Steam-Up for 30 years. She is the president of the John Deere museum. While the museum opened in 2013, the John Deere club at Powerland has been around a lot longer, she said.
The Winns and a friend, Joel Messer, have long appreciated John Deere equipment.
“We had John Deeres on the farm,” John Winn said, adding that there was a Deere dealer down the road from his family’s house when he was young and they found the brand reliable.
Messer’s story was similar, he said as he motioned to a yellow John Deere tractor and said he had driven one just like it.
For all three, being a part of the Steam-Up each year and being members of the museum allow them to preserve the heritage of farming for the next generation.
“This is history,” John said.
The three spoke of the old machine shop across the way from the museum and mentioned there is an importance to showing younger generations how things used to be done.
That’s why the museums and Powerland exist, Vickey Winn said.
Powerland Heritage Park is open 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Sunday from April through September and periodically hosts other events. It is closed Aug. 18.
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