Grandpa was called back to take care of his parents around 1925, his duty as the youngest. He farmed their little patch plus worked off-farm, then bought the place next door. Still worked several jobs, building roads or loading train cars with fruit.
He was working for one local general store, when they had a fire in late 1929 or 1930. The family that owned the store couldn't scrape the money together to rebuild, but the insurance company man offered the business to Grandpa. He bought it for less than the value of the inventory that was salvageable, I can't remember if it was $300 or $3000. They cleaned things up and moved into a building across the tracks. He took one of the original family brothers on as partner, because he was the butcher and Grandpa didn't know how to cut the meat.
The store was his life for the next 35 years, providing a decent living, in exchange for long hours. He would talk of all his customers as we drove around the area, times when he loaned a family $300 to get a new well, or $2000 for a downpayment on the farm. All while never making more than $10K in a single year.
Most all the customers were on credit, some by the month, some by the year. When he retired and sold out in 1965, he kept the receivables as part of the deal. We cleaned the attic out to remodel 40 years later, and found the box of ledgers and letters to and from people who still owed money, most so thankful for carrying them through those tough times. Most of the folks who beat him out of money were family members.
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Today's Featured Article - Timing Your Magneto Ignition Tractor - by Chris Pratt. If you have done major engine work or restored your tractor, chances are you removed the magneto and spark plug wires and eventually reached the point where you had to put it all back together and make it run. On our first cosmetic restoration, not having a manual, we carefully marked the wires, taped the magneto in the position it came off, and were careful not to turn the engine over while we had these components off. We thought we could get by with this since the engine ran perfectly and would not need any internal work. After the cleanup and painting was done, we began reassembly and finally came to t
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