I am your typical farm boy with an underlying mechanical aptitude. As soon as I was big enough, probably 8 years old, Dad taught me to drive the farm tractor. It was a Gold Belly Ferguson and it was our sole tractor around the farm on Mt. Tomah. 

I remember very clearly, the cold start procedure for the ‘35’ which involved a glass bottle of pure ether and a piece of rag. We would slosh a bit of ether on the rag, hold it over the air cleaner intake, and crank the engine. After a couple of revolutions, the engine gently fired into life with no pre-ignition knocking, even when there was snow on the ground outside. 

My ‘everyday’ tractor now, is a JD 1120 with a loader on the front, which I