John Deere Green and Yellow

[JD 41 B]

I have often wondered what color John Deere painted their implements before they acquired the Waterloo Engine Gasoline Engine Company. Were they painted green and yellow or did John Deere start using those colors because they were the colors on the Waterloo Boy? Just curious.

 

[Anonymous-0]

They are green&yellow to hide in the grass when they are broke down! see Retiredtractors.com Gary

 

[Gary from Muleshoe]

I have done some research on this myself and I have not found an answer to this question. The best i can come up with is as follows from the web site below.

Why are John Deere tractors green and yellow?
No one really knows. The earliest color illustration of Deere equipment with the green and yellow color scheme is of a Deere sulky plow in the 1905 Deere & Webber catalog. There are probably earlier implements painted in this color scheme, but we haven't been able to verify that.
John Deere

 

[ericlb]

i think they carried those colors over from the waterloo boy did john deere even have its own tractor prior to buying the water loo boy company?

 

[Jim H SW-PA]

AAAAAAHAAAA-HAAAAHAAAAA-HAAAAAAAAAA!!! OOOOOO!!!!! HAHAHA!!!! ROLL !!!ROLL!!! AWWWWWWEEE!!![my belly hurts]whhhewwweee!!! NOW THATS FUNNY,RIGHT THERE DONT CARE WHO YA ARE---But I still like JD green and yellow

 

[Rusty wheel]

I made a discovery quite by accident and very happily I might add. I had two JDs that were in need of paint. Before I got to it I acquired a Farmall Cub for garden work. I put the Cub in the barn when I got it home and low and behold, the Deeres turned green over night. How about that...............rw

 

[JD 41 B]

John Deere had a prototype tractor in development when they bought the Waterloo Gasoline Engine Company and acquired the Waterloo Boy.

 

[Bill(Wis)]

John Deere makes reference to a green and yellow plow in their 1905 sales literature which was 8 years before Waterloo Gasoline Engine Company introduced their Waterloo Boy One-Man Tractor. I was told that the colors yellow and green were chosen because that's the color of corn. John Deere was ready to go into production with their in-house designed "Dain" tractor which had a four cylinder McVicker engine and all-wheel (3) drive through chains and sprockets. They produced a "duotoned" sales brochure that showed "The John Deere All-Wheel Drive Tractor" pulling a three bottom plow away from the camera. They faced one problem. They had no factory as yet to produce this tractor. The Waterloo Boy Engine Company owned a completely self sufficient factory, including a foundary, in Waterloo. It was for sale. John Deere bought it. They decided to scrap their own Dain design and go with the Waterloo Boy as it was cheaper to build and a proven tractor. Along with the deal came the plans and a prototype of what would become the model D. This was a bonanza for Deere. It put them into the tractor business big time. Getting back to color, it seems that the Waterloo Boys were green, yellow and red but that Deere had been using a green and yellow scheme on some of its equipment years before that. The Overtime versions in England used orange in place of the yellow and red. I wonder if anyone has one of those "duotoned" sales brochures for the intended Dain and I wonder what it would show?

 

[RandyB(MI)]

I also heard that they painted all the others bright colors so when the service man came out he could spot them quicker.