Site Visit: John Deere Tractor & Engine Museum

This December a new museum opened in Waterloo, Iowa: the John Deere Tractor & Engine Museum.

Waterloo, IA

I had driven past it for about a month on the way to and from work. It looked new but never looked like it was in operation, until I saw in the newspaper that it had finally opened. Before I launch into the museum, you should have some background about Waterloo before you can appreciate the museum more fully. Waterloo had first been settled in 1845 as Prairie Rapids Crossing, but when petitioning for the Post Office in 1851, one of the founding fathers of the town liked the name"Waterloo" and put it as the name of the location of the Post Office and the town eventually came to be known as Waterloo. The latter part of the 19th century was a busy time for Waterloo with the establishment of the Waterloo Gasoline Traction Engine Company followed by the Rath (meat) Packing Company and the Illinois Central Railroad. Waterloo was dubbed the "Factory City of Iowa". Speeding through the 20th century, the town was doing well for itself until the Rath Packing Co. ceased operations in 1985 and the John Deere Company had some layoffs not too long afterward. The town today is post-industrial in nature and retains its blue collar neighborhood feeling.

However, the story with the museum goes back to the Waterloo Gasoline Traction Engine Company mentioned earlier. I know a thing or two about farming, thanks to the Living History Farms and from working in the farm implement store, but the rise of modern farming implements, their names and uses, are foreign to me (so if I goof on something, don't get crazy on me). So, manual and animal power can only get you so far. Arms get tired, animals need rest, and with more interesting and useful implements comes a need for more power. In 1892 John Froelich invented the first practical gasoline
powered contraption we know today as a tractor. He centered his operations in Waterloo, using the nearby Cedar River for energy as the Waterloo Gasoline Traction Engine Company. By 1914, the company was producing the most popular tractor on the market, the Waterloo Boy. The John Deere Company, meanwhile, was successful in farming tools but wanted to get into the tractor market and decided to simply to buy the best company after their own attempts to break into the tractor market failed. Overnight, the John Deere Company became the industry leader. Since that purchase, John Deere has had a presence in Waterloo.

The John Deere Tractor Museum documents the life before tractors, the invention of the tractor, the acquisition of the Waterloo Gasoline Traction Engine Company, and how the Deere Company weathered the challenges of the 20th century and how Deere tractors are being used both today and into the future of farming.

The lobby for the Museum

Rather than synthesize what I learned from the museum and interpret the history, the purpose of the site visit was to look at how the John Deere Tractor & Engine museum tells their story, rather than
what their story was. Because I'm not a tractor guy and I have zero knowledge of tractors (If you are, great! If I don't note a tractor as being a 1947 Model X, I apologize), I thought it was an excellent opportunity to see how well their told their story and maybe understand something about it.

My wife trying the plow interactive display

My initial reaction to the building is that it looks new, and the refurbished tractors in front and in the lobby looked sparkling and fresh. It was $8 admission for an adult and less for children, students,

military, seniors, and Deere Co. employees and includes a 15 minute video presentation that runs quarterly round the clock. The pre-tractor section of the museum was my favorite, because this is my world. Lots of wood and "old-timey" looking mock up set design. There was lots of touch and try. For example, there was a demonstration area where you could put hand to plow as the mechanical plow bumps and jimmys and you have to keep the plow pointed straight. If you are not straight, a red light flashes on the side you need to correct. It was interactive and fun, but as I smugly told my wife, you aren't having to wrangle draft animals and steer with the lines and trying to keep the plow straight. However, the liability to make it as real as it gets would be too great. Nevertheless, it was a great piece to interact with. Another interactive piece used weights to simulate how much human energy you would need to create a single horse power. It was like an exercise cable pulley

Feel the burn! I mean, have fun learning about horsepower

machine and I joked that I could do some tricep curls. But unlike the gym, if you drop the bar, it doesn't crash into the other weights like that jerk does at the end of his reps, but slowly descends back to the start on a winch system (thankfully!).

The panel on early tractors

Towards the end of that exhibit room, they have a couple interpretive panels on John Froelich and his traction invention. I was glad they had it, but felt that because he invented tractors, that there could have been more of an emphasis on this, but I feel that John Deere wanted you to get from the archaic history stuff into the newer modern era of tractors most of the public might be familiar with. It is their museum after all. The traction machine was a large complicated looking machine, and a wandering Guest Services staff member remarked that it was started from a shotgun shell. I asked them where it was inserted and they didn't know. I don't remember if a shotgun shell start up was in the panels I read either. So, minus some points for that. Along with some of the flat panels were push button audio tapes of notable people speaking in character about their role, which helped break up the flat panel reading monotony.

Lean Green Machine

The next room was bright and modern and in the center was a Waterloo Boy tractor. This was given centerpiece attention, and rightly so, for being popular and one of the reasons for Deere purchasing the Waterloo Gasoline Traction Engine Company. Along the wall were more interpretive panels describing the process the Deere Company took in arriving at the point of getting into the tractor

business. All other rooms went on to describe Deere's contributions to the war efforts and life here at the factory. There were more interactive opportunities as well. Touch screen displays allowed a visitor to make decisions about designing tractors, whether to change engine configuration or what kind of wheel placement would work. I wanted more of a futuristic look rather than classic and after I submitted my design, it was graded according to what decisions were made historically regarding my design. The remains of the rooms were 3 sided walls with the back of the wall opening into a showroom of all the tractors made by Deere at this location.

The "Showroom" was open and had different models scattered around. As far as I know, all the tractors were rebuilt or refurbished models by private individuals and almost all were given a fresh

The "Showroom"

coat of paint. All except one, and naturally it drew my attention. The donor requested that their donation retain "its work clothes", meaning that it shouldn't get a new paint job but to be in its natural state as if it were to be in an old tool shed somewhere, ready for work. I appreciated the gesture by this person who donated because everything on the show room was show room quality, even though they were not collectors items, they were work tools and while they were taken care of, keeping the paint fresh was not on farmer's minds. But as I wandered through bright green and yellow tractor after tractor, I could feel myself reaching a saturation point. This was not my world and I had difficulty relating to it.

Guess the start-up sounds on the left,

the tractor design with clues on the right

If you have or had experience with old tractors, there were a few more interactive opportunities that you would enjoy that might take you back. There was a section near the back that sounded the start up of an engine with the push of a button and could guess which model of tractor it came from. Your answer would be hidden under a pull panel that would reveal the name. I didn't grow up around tractors or learn how to tell what model tractor it is by the start-up and running sounds but if you did, it might be a better section for you than me. It was still interesting to hear. The same is true for the section of grille patterns.

I liked the drafting table as interpretive space idea

There was another designing section that utilized drafting table drawers that

was interesting to look at and younger people could draw their ideal tractor and display it in the museum. By the foundry area I had reached maximum saturation. I don't understand machining or foundry work but I couldn't relate to it and did not really connect with it. The center of the museum was about the factory itself. By picking up a approximately two and half foot water tower and placing on a map that took up the floor, the screen would tell you about the factory and its history.

By the end, a room was dedicated to the tractors that John Deere was producing today and a small enclosed exhibit on the Deere Logo, dealerships, and their brief foray into bicycle manufacturing. Along the wall was a video of where farming might be going in the future with touch screens and smart phone automation connected to the internet and beyond. It was a video with grandpa working farm software that look like it was developed by Tony Stark and was beaming his HUD into a tractor in the field. It was something to think about. By then we had finished and wandered over to the gift shop to look over the John Deere-branded-anything-you-want merchandise.

In the cab

Analysis: This was a very well done museum. Everything is bright, clear, clean, and professional. Some people have done an excellent job with the presentation in getting all ages involved with the exhibits, from youngsters drawing tractors, to older folk remembering the distinctive sound their tractor made when it started up. There are a lot of interactive pieces, which shows that it wishes to engage learners visually, auditorially, and kinetically (seeing, hearing, doing). It engaged me as a historian by exploring many aspects of the pre-tractor life, the development of the Deere company, and its role in defining 20th century farming. The tractors are all immaculately presented (a little too immaculate if you ask me) and exhibits are simply all well done. However, there are some things that were not-so-great. Aside from the expected self promotion, there was a lot of flat paneling, which means a lot of reading. Most people do not take the time to read everything and tend to glance over information, especially if they have read a lot at the beginning and will increasingly just glance at large panel text after a while. Guest Services people were not terribly engaging. "Do you have any questions?" is not an dynamic engagement technique, for example. Some sat on the tractor seat design exhibit and chatted with each other and what appeared to be someone they knew somehow and I didn't get to sit on historic seats. I wasn't sure if they were Deere employees in Guest Services or guides hired for this position in the museum, but my guess is that they are not trained interpreters.

Over all, they generally did well in engaging a person who has little to no background in tractors and had a lot to say about what they did. I would recommend this museum to people who enjoy farm life, tractors, technical mechanics, John Deere fans, and to interpretive exhibit designers. If I were to give it a score based on 1 to 10 I would give it an 8 for being clear, well designed, engaging, interactive, and a good use of my time, but needed some refining in their interpretive staff.