Kocher displays handmade miniature farm

PENFIELD, Ill. — Historic tractor and equipment enthusiasts may recall visiting Ken Kocher with this check-row planting and cultivating demonstration at the Half Century of Progress Show, featuring his 1945 Oliver 60 Row Crop with mounted 1012-D four-row planter.

Kocher, of Thomasboro in east-central Illinois, who hosted the biennial demonstration across a decade, featured a different look into the past at Historic Farm Days with a one-sixteenth scale farm set that included both handmade and purchased items.

The miniature farm featured both equipment and farm buildings he constructed, along with several classic tractors and trucks he’s collected over the years. A few pieces of modern equipment are also included.

“I have a showroom at home and everybody kept saying that I need to bring it out,” Kocher said of portable display.

“So, I built this trailer last winter to put all this stuff on. I’ve never moved the barns before because they’re hard to move. They all work. The hay goes up. The sacks go up.

“It’s the same thing we had on the farm at home. I built it from what I could remember. All of them were torn down and gone now. It’s from what I can remember because I was in the barn every day milking cows and working.

“I built the wagons, too. I built some of the plows and the tractors. I built the elevator going into the crib, and I used an air filter cover off of my Kubota to make the sides of the round corn crib. It took me all day to make the roof for that to make it look like a corn crib.”

Adjacent to his farm set display was a full-size wagon from his family’s farm that was built in the late 1940s, early 1950s. A one-sixteenth duplicate is also included in the farm set.

The miniature farm display includes a replica of his 1945 Oliver 60 with mounted four-row planter he used at the Half Century of Progress Show.

“I just like doing stuff. I can’t sit home and watch TV. I like to be in the shop and play around,” Kocher said.

He began collecting miniature antique tractors about 30 years ago and has double the amount that were on display at Historic Farm Days.

“I have a 24-foot-long wall and two eight-foot-long walls with five shelves each that are all full. I wish I would have started collecting earlier when a lot of this stuff was easier to get. It’s hard to get some of them. The older Oliver models that I want are harder to get. They didn’t make that many of them back then,” he said.

“I’ve had this collection a long time. I did little by little when I was working, and since I retired I decided I wanted to build a barn. That’s been on my agenda for a long time and I finally got it done. I’m no carpenter, I’m a ditcher, but I think it looks pretty good.

“I buy the trucks, but then I also buy trucks all put together to use the axle, that’s my problem. I have two or three hopper bottoms and there’s no wheels on them.”

Growing up on his family farm, Olivers were the tractor of choice. So, most of the farm set tractors are that brand. However, in observance of Allis-Chalmers being the featured brand at this year’s Historic Farm Days and the Gathering of the Orange national show, he added some orange.

“We had an Alis-Chalmers combine. So, for this year, I added some Allis-Chalmers for the show. It would normally be all Oliver,” he said.

Kocher’s display was a big hit with visitors to this year’s show.

“I’ve had a lot of older people stop by. I’ve had a lot of little kids stop by, too. They go crazy when they see all of this stuff. I enjoy dong it,” he said.