Another AC history write up

When you don't have any money, you can't come up with new products. The D-17 for example, should have been out in 1953 or 54 instead of October of 1957. Trying to compete against a 450 Farmall with a WD-45...give me a break.       Edit: And when that D-17 came out, let's face it, the high pressure one-way hydraulic system that wasn't "live" was almost obsolete. Needed a series 4 from the beginning!!  The much needed D-19 was years down the road (again no $$$$$ to develop things) and it really was obsolete compared to the Deere 4010 which had already been out for nearly 2 years.

Edited by DrAllis - 21 Feb 2021 at 7:34am

Anyone familiar with how Robert Klassen’s High School promoted socialism during the 1950s? Was it accomplished by the local UAWs coming into the schools?

An interesting short article.  If you want the rest of the story, as Paul Harvey usedta say, link to the book, below:

If you recall in the early 80's inflation was running away and interest rates were 20%+ so no one was buying capitol equipment, that certainly contributed to Allis Chalmers downfall.

Remember, after the "80's" every farm equipment manufacturer went broke or were bought out, except Deere and Caterpillar.

I know my Grampa worked for Allis-Chalmers here in La Crosse during that time and he was really sore about the union at that time.  He was a company man, he did the books and payroll.  He never said much to anyone about it, but I know he HATED unions after that long year.  Those were hard years to feed a family and he had a HUGE garden and sold lots of produce to keep the family going.  He would never talk about unions to me after that.  He got $62 a month for his retirement.  He was bitter....

Thinking back, I agree with the statement.   Remember, we were coming out of WWII.   Farmers had MONEY and wanted newer equipment.  In 1946 my father's dealership got SIX TRACTORS - most of them C's.  We could have sold ANYTHING.  Our customers were loyal to a degree but when we could not deliver tractors they went elsewhere and got what they wanted.  Frankly, I could not understand how Pop got them back.

I forced my self to read Stalin over Wisconsin . Hard read to say the least . Lots of Acronyms , AFL ,CIO , NLRB , etc to sort through . After reading I wonder how they ever built a tractor between 1938 - 1950 with all the labor problems they were having . When both sides cannot see the other sides point of view and are not willing to budge , the result is anything but productive and efficient . Management should have been willing to compensate employees and workers should have seen that if their demands were met the company could never be competitive .This was a time when highly specialized jobs were being replaced with simpler assembly line work and workers understandably were upset with the reality of lower paying jobs . Things were definitely heated to say the least . If the union could have weeded out the communist that were present in the rank and file they could have avoided public backlash . This eventually was the downfall of union management and they eventually knuckled under .
Others have said it doesn't matter what they did back then because some idiots in the 70's were going to piss it away with terrible investments , Coal gasification for one .
Should have developed a larger round baler instead of giving the patents away to a company that is still in business today

Austin the name thing is just luck of the draw. Maybe if the top management of Agco had not died in a plane crash there would at least still be orange tractors. Because not really much of the USA is left in Case. But the Europeans running Case may have learned from Agco and left the one American name and a color. But the real IH lovers are no more happy that IH has about disappeared the same way AC has. And IH that was bought by the investment company that also just happened to own Case has become nothing much more than a memory just like AC. 

Ted J Id really like to hear more of your Dads experinence at Allis,, seems he was in the knowledge of the money movement then , just real curious