Super M history

[MILLARD HAYES]

Is there any known way to find out the background of my tractor. I would really like to know where it was shipped to after build. It was bought in Rutherford Tn. but would really like some info.

 

[used red MN]

All I know is if you give out the serial number through
the Wisconsin Historical Society website I can
probably tell you what month it was built. Beyond that
information is pretty bleak.

 

[BarnyardEngineering]

Unless things have changed you don't give them your serial number and get the month built. YOU have to find and pore through the documents they have on their website and find the information for yourself.

The only way to find the history of an IH is to trace it back yourself. Find the previous owner and hope to God they know who they bought it from. Then find that person and hope they know who they bought it from. Repeat until you find the old duffer that remembers the day they brought it home from the dealer, all shiny and new.

With a Super M the original owner is probably long since passed away, so you're out of luck UNLESS they passed along all the documentation, AND that documentation was kept with the tractor.... Since you're asking, you don't have that documentation.

 

[DR. EVIL]

I know the histories of my '51 M and '54 Super H mostly because like Barnyard Engineering said, I knew the
first or prior owner. Dad ordered the '51 M new, it was started down the assembly line at FARMALL on December
7th, shipped via rail the 25 miles to the dealer, it made about 3-4 stops before it got to Dad's dealer. It
was run the 8 miles to Dad's farm on Dec. 23, 1951. And on Christmas Day was the first time it wouldn't start
to grind cattle feed. Thankfully the '47 M started. Anyhow, in 2006 I brought the M to my place, first time
it was outside of Henry County Illinois since December 1951.
The '54 Super H was ordered by the same dealer Dad bought his '51 M from. It was built spring of '54, and
sold to a high school teacher to farm 80 acres, guy had several kids, wanted to be self-sufficient, a milk
cow or two, couple beef cattle, hogs, chickens, maybe a couple sheep and goats. A pretty complete line of 2-
bottom equipment delivered too. About late May the teacher couldn't make the payments and eventually
everything got repossessed. And sat on the dealer's lot. I think it was spring of '55 one of the local Big
Time Farmer's bought a new IH 4 row corn planter with all the options. The planter was delivered to the
dealer from IH 's East Moline Plant. The dealer had the planter all checked out for delivery, they hooked the
SH to it and ran it the 11 miles to the BTO's farm, they took it right out and started planting. Hour or two
later the salesman wanted to head back to the dealership, the BTO said, You ain't taking that tractor! I GOT
CORN to plant. The BTO kept the SH till about 1968, the SH was traded for a brand new 756 diesel, German
diesel, wfe. Not sure how Dad found out about the SH but about the day after the 756 was delivered to the BTO
the SH was delivered to our farm, a '39 H was traded in on the SH, a BUNCH of stuff had to be removed from
the H and put on the '39 H to go back to town. The doubled up horseshoe drawbar, my tractor radio, the big
tool box, grease gun, and the SH got hooked to our planter and I never even got to do chores with it. Today
the SH is my #1 snow mover all winter, and 55 years after it was delivered I still find excuses to run it in
the summer.
There's no book with the history of all 5 MILLION PLUS tractors IH built with detailed history like
above. IH was more concerned with building MORE tractors than writing dates down in books. Although Farmall
did have records, cards went down the lines with the tractors, mostly inspection records initialed by the
person who did the inspections. The Tennaco people filed them all in the local landfill when they moved in.

 

[redforlife]

Best way is to backtrack the ownership by
way of your own investigating. If bought at
a consignment sale, find out who consigned
it, etc. As you can imagine, you'll likely
hit a dead end someplace.

But you never know. It could be a 2 or 3
owner tractor, and you won't have to trace
back through to many people. If you run
into a situation of an owner being
deceased, this plan might not be completely
squashed. They might of had some kids. And
the kids might know some basic information.
Like as to where and when the tractor was
purchased.

If the tractor was ever traded back into a
dealership and resold, that might be
another dead end. Alot of dearships have
closed. Records not kept or lost. Probably
went through to many tractors for memories
to remember any one particular one. But,
... you might get lucky and your tractor
was only sold at 2 or 3 farm sales where
the known seller doubled as the previous
owner.

I have an F-20 that I am the 4th owner of.
I know it's history. But only because the
2nd owner purchased the used tractor at a
dealership because he knew the first owner
and knew that he had taken it back to the
dealership. That was one thing that kind of
influenced him to buy it. If 2nd owner
wouldn't of known this about the tractor
when he bought it, I would of never known
who bought it new. I'd of never found out
from the now non-existant dealership.

 

[Jim Becker]

(quoted from post at 20:29:43 03/21/23) All I know is if you give out the serial number through the Wisconsin Historical Society website I can probably tell you what month it was built.

(quoted from post at 07:08:44 03/22/23) Unless things have changed you don't give them your serial number and get the month built. YOU have to find and pore through the documents they have on their website and find the information for yourself.

I think used red was offering to do that for him.

 

[D Slater]

(reply to post at 13:30:13 03/21/23) SM were built two places, Louisville KY and Farmall works. Louisville ones have a L before tractor serial number. Other Has a F before number. First one built at Louisville 5-6-52 was 500001, first number recorded for following months in 52. 6-52 500162, 7-52- 500803, 8-52 - 500865, 9-52- 501093. Same serial was carried over to first built in 11-52. Think due to strike. 12-52- 501241. Months of 53, 1-501906, 2- 502549, 3- 503471, 4- 505143, 5- 507371, 6-509434, 7- 511730. Last built 512541 0n 7-10-53. May post the regular farmall works SM non diesel tractors numbers later.

 

[D Slater]

Probably some pre production SM tractors built. Think farmall plant SM serial number 502 is still around from 3-52. Start of month 4-988, 5-4714, 6-8271, 7-11745, 8-12251, 9-14736, 10- 14774, 11-15264, 12-17364. Jan. 1953- 21074, 2- 24700, 3-28111, 4- 31352, 5-34673, 6-37847, 7- 41166, 8-44897, 9- 46492, 10-48023, 11- 49137, 12- 50504. Jan. 54 -51977, 2- 52627 Supposed to be the last one, but someone claims to have one higher. Diesels and models like V type have different month start and end numbers.

This post was edited by D Slater on 03/22/2023 at 06:39 pm.