A PIONEERING spectacle is set to jump off the history pages in January when one of Australia’s biggest private collections of vintage headers are fired up to harvest a southern New South Wales wheat crop.
In a scene reminiscent of the 1920s and 1930s, the working display of 27 tractor drawn vintage headers harvesting the wheat will be a sight current generations may have never witnessed.
Pleasant Hills farmer and vintage header collector Kerry Pietsch wants to give young, old, rural and urban people the chance to see, hear and smell living history.
Mr Pietsch said the Warrangong Vintage Harvest Day on Saturday, January 11 would be a one-off with no plans to hold it again.
“It will be a scene not witnessed in the Australian bush for generations and will give a unique insight into how our forefathers farmed a century ago,’’ he said.
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Kerry, as the principal of the Warrangong Heritage Collection Incorporated, is staging the vintage harvest day on his Pleasant Hills farm, as a follow up to his highly successful vintage harvest day held in February 2014.
The vintage harvest day will feature an array of restored and working harvesters, winnowers, strippers, chaff cutters and tractors, harvesting a 15 hectare crop of the heritage wheat variety Ford.
His collection spans a stripper, headers and harvesters, including horse drawn, PTO and self-propelled machines – of every make and model, jockeying for space in an ever-increasing number of sheds.
The collection ranges from a horse-drawn 1902 David Shearer Maker’s Mannum stripper to a 1980 John Deere 1051 PTO header and includes Kerry’s favourite, a fully restored US manufactured Cockshutt once belonging to his uncle.
Kerry concedes he was born in the wrong era and enjoys nothing more than harvesting on a machine open to the elements.
Now semi-retired from sheep and grain growing, he can devote more time to his passion of restoring historic farm machinery.
The collection also includes a homemade header comprising a Gleaner crawler tractor converted to a harvester with planks of wood on the tracks to help with traction in wet conditions.
It featured two gear boxes – one to drive the tractor and one to operate the harvester.
A centrepiece of the vintage harvest day will be a restored 1925 Sunshine Auto Header which was designed by Henty’s own Headlie Shipard Taylor and marked its centenary in 2024 at the Henty Machinery Field Days.
With gates opening at 8am, the demonstrations will get underway at 9am.
“This day will be very special as 95 per cent of young people have never seen any of these headers operating,’’ Kerry said.
“They only ever see modern machinery with air-conditioned cabins – on these old machines you are sitting out in the dust, chaff and hot sun.
“Most of these old headers will only ever sit in machinery sheds – it is rare to see them operating and it will be a once in a lifetime event to have so many together in the one crop.’’
Vintage machinery enthusiast Kevin Elphick will provide talks throughout the vintage harvest day, while lunch and refreshments will be for sale.
Entry fee is adults $22, concession $18, children 12 to 16 years $10 and Under 12 free.
Tickets available online or at the gate via card only.
For more information contact Kerry Pietsch on 0480 143 398 or email warrangongharvestday@gmail.com
