Oliver world opens doors for magazine publisher

GREENVILLE, Ill. — Sherry Schaefer has a long history with the Oliver tractor world.

“My grandfather was an Oliver dealer, my dad is named Oliver and he became an Oliver dealer, so I grew up in the Oliver dealership and we only had Oliver equipment,” she said.

Schafer’s dad tractor-pulled on the side while operating the Oliver dealership in Greenville in south-central Illinois.

“I was immersed in tractors all the time and one day I found out there was an Oliver club,” she recalled. “I went to dad and said, ‘Do you know that people collect this stuff?’”

Schaefer joined the club and within a year she became the editor of the magazine.

“I edited for them for 10 years and then I went out on my own and started the Oliver Heritage magazine in 2004,” she said.

“I had no intention of being in the magazine business,” she said. “I did not go to college and I hated English, but I knew tractors so that was the most important thing.”

Many times while tractor pulling, Schaefer said, the pulling sleds would have mechanical problems.

“My dad said there’s got to be a better way, so he bought a sled,” she said. “Then there wasn’t time for the dealership because tractor pulling took over.”

At one time, the Schaefers owned seven tractor-pulling sleds.

“I ran one for many years — dad threw me in a semi when most kids are getting a car,” she said. “When I graduated from high school, girls were getting a Camaro or a Mustang, but I got a Freightliner.”

Schaefer’s Oliver collection includes six unique tractors.

“My biggest collection is literature because that helps me do my job since they have information to back things up,” she said. “Literature is a lot easier to store, it starts every time and it doesn’t run out of gas.”

One of Schaefer’s special Oliver tractors is an experimental model. When she purchased it, she knew it was different.

“I had this feeling but even if it wasn’t anything special, it was still going to be a really cool tractor,” she explained.

After purchasing the tractor, Schaefer traveled to where the tractors were built in Charles City, Iowa.

“I found a negative in the experimental department and the picture was so clear you could zoom in and see the serial number of the engine,” she said. “When I got home, I found the serial number was a perfect match to mine.”

Another tractor in Schaefer’s collection is an Oliver 880 front wheel assist.

“They never built an 880 with a front wheel assist, but dad figured out how to put one under it,” she said. “When dad passed, I got that tractor.”

The 1944 Oliver Airport 25 tractor was built specifically for pulling airplanes around at airports.

“It was a war-era tractor and they are really hard to find because they only made about 150 of them,” Schaefer said. “I’m a pilot, so I had to have one of those.”

“Dad had an Airport 25 tractor, but my sister claimed it many years ago, so when dad passed, she got it,” she said. “I kept looking and couldn’t find one and then I got a phone call and the guy said, ‘I have something you need,’ so the tractor found me.”

Schaefer plans to attend Historic Farm Days, set for July 10-13 and organized by the I&I Antique Tractor and Gas Engine Club, since this year Oliver is a featured tractor at the event.

“I will be there and I will take a tractor, but I haven’t decided which tractor I will take,” she said. “I’ve been to Penfield many times and I was on the team to restore the Hart-Parr No. 3 that they have on display in their museum.”

The Oliver tractor world has opened many doors for Schaefer and provided her the opportunity to travel all over the United States and the world.

“I have been to New Zealand for a tractor show and I went to Australia for a month to do a tractor trek across Australia,” she said. “I stayed in the home of the president of Oliver and one of the last decedents of Oliver came here so I could take photos for his Christmas cards.”

Tractor collectors enjoy owning Oliver tractors, Schaefer said, due to the heritage that goes along with their family owning Oliver tractors and because the company was ahead of its time with a lot of features that other manufacturers didn’t have.

“Some of those features include the live independent PTO, front wheel assist and they had a really strong rear end in them,” she said. “It is hard to tear up a rear end in an Oliver — that’s why so many pulling tractors have Oliver rear ends.”