My experience is that the first thing a kid will do is to push buttons, or turn the key to try to start the tractor, and a clutch or transmission safety switch is a good idea! I have an 8N Ford (Yes, I have "red" ones, too). They have the transmission interlock on the starter button, so they won't start in gear. I was an only child, and when I was a teenager I painted up the old 'N, and installed a keyswitch with a start position, because the transmission switch was bad. Years later, I put it back to original, after leaving the key in it, and the tractor unattended for a few minutes. One of my boys was about 5 or 6, and turned the key, and it started! Thank God is was in low gear, so I could catch up quickly! Another incident, we were remodeling the house, and had a tractor with a loader on it with an 8' bucket parked with the bucket up close the the front steps so the carpenters could throw the old sheetrock in the bucket. We had a sitter on a Saturday, and left the kids home with her and went out of town. I made sure the key was out of the loader tractor, knowing the kids would climb in the cab. What safety dummy me forgot was to lower the loader to the ground. The bucket was probably 2 or 3 feet off the ground loaded with scrap, busted up sheet rock when Son #3 got off the front step into the bucket, and Son #2 got in the cab and pushed the hydraulic lever, dumping Son #3 and the construction mess into a not-so-neat pile. Thankfully, he was not hurt, but it illustrates the point that no matter how carefully you think you have safety covered, there's always another way for an accident to happen! The tractor didn't even have to be started for kids to get into danger!
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