Spangler Farm 1907- left to right: Grandmother Ora Spangler, My mother, Susie Spangler (wearing sun bonnet), Aunt Lindy (Lena Spangler with straw hat) Engineer, Aunt Harriett on tractor, Uncle Conally riding the Avery water wagon.

Mom's oldest brother, Conally, was quite an entrepreneur. He owned an Avery steam driven tractor. The Avery, built in Peoria Illinois, was known for it's under mounted engine. With its prominent smoke stack, it looked more like a miniature rail locomotive in the farmers field that other conventional models of the day. Besides tilling the soil, the versatile engine could be used for multiple industrious applications.

Conally also owned a Geer-Scott portable saw mill accessory that could be moved relatively easy from place to place. The equipment could be hauled in wagons to the worksite with the steam tractor, then hooked up to the Avery engine's flywheel with a long belt to transfer power to the saw blade. Avery also manufactured threshing machines. Among other tasks, the engineer was responsible for stoking the boiler with fire wood. A large water tank wagon was pulled to the site to provide the necessary water for the steam. Though versatile steam engines were a handy replacement for water power and beasts of burden; like the use of gasoline today, they did present the danger of possible explosion.*

Though beginning to dwindle, some of Hendricks and Boone County land was still covered with virgin timber, just like the two stands of trees found on the Isley farm. Conally Spangler would come in and mill the customer's logs to precise house and barn pattern measurements. Farmers could buy these building plans though the Sears and Roebuck, or Monkey Ward catalogs. It was a synergy. The farmer not only cleared more land for planting, but got the building material, cut to the publisher's exact architectural specifications, for the structures he needed to build out of the bargain. Sears would even sell you the furniture to go in your newly finished house. Here is my Uncle, Conally Spangler, then (standing on the right) showing off his portable sawmill in action. Who knows, he may have even done some work for George Isley a few miles up the road. After the evening of Friday, August 6, 1906, Grandpa Isley had need of a new barn, after the fire.

Conally usually employed at least four hands; an engineer, an off-bearer, a man to run the wood saw, and a man to scoop the sawdust. Of course the farmer pitched in too. His wife cooked hearty meals for the men. Conally usually milled 4000 to 6000 board feet a day. His minimum set-up was for 10,000 feet per job. Most contracts ran well over that. During the wheat harvesting season the whole operation switched to threshing grain. As an owner/operator, Conally would take his rig from farm to farm contracting to thresh the harvest. A farmer would need to have many acres in production to justify the cost of this machinery for just one farm.

In the fall of 1907, Conally's regular engineer was caught on the moving crankshaft while oiling the engine and was severely injured. Aunt Harriett signed on as an emergency engineer. Conally promised to take her to visit their sister Ella in Seattle and see the 1909 Worlds fair. Being the tomboy that she was, she took to the task naturally and stayed on two more seasons. Alas, Conally met and eloped with Aunt Opal and had more pressing responsibilities at home. Harriett was determined to see that Worlds Fair with or without her brother, so she saved her earnings.

Not sure how it came about, but my Aunt Harriett got national acclaim as the "Hendricks County farm girl that earned her own way to the Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition". Her father, Frank Spangler, might have had something to do with the publicity. He was a traveling salesman promoting and distributing farm implements and related mechanical equipment in the region. Since his oldest son, Conally, actually chose the Avery tractor, Granddad may have well represented the Peoria Illinois firm.

Eighteen year old Harriett came home from the Worlds Fair to bask in her media acclaim. Actually, I think she basked in it the rest of her life. Articles with photographs about her adventure, included a full page feature in the October 1909 issue of the Threshers Review, and other widely syndicated daily news papers, including a September Sunday edition of the Indianapolis News. The allure of Seattle beckoned though, and she soon returned to Washington to make her own way. Maybe it was all those trees… There, she met and married her husband Fred Gross. Mom's brother, (Cecil) Martin Spangler, joined his two sisters there some years later. Both Harriett and Martin eventually found their way to California where Mom's youngest sister, Lena (Lindy) and her husband Clyde Cummings, had settled in the 1930's My Mon, Susie Isley and I showed up in 1952.

* My Fraternal Great Grandfather's steam tractor actually killed him at the Isley Farm (his daughter Sarah Jane's place) adjacent to his. JAMESTOWN PRESS 75 Years ago today: "John Shockley [Memorial #80931848] was killed in a thrashing machine explosion on July 18, 1878."  I have a small clipping recounting the event..

NOTE: Conally's daughter Virginia Spangler married Murray McKee and lived in Florida.

Conally was the oldest of 11. My Mother, Susie (Spangler) Isley, born in 1899, is 3rd from the bottom.

H. C. Spangler from the Lizton section of the 1904 Industrial Souvenir of Hendricks County, Indiana

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