You are herePaul Watral Rare Spoker D
Paul Watral Rare Spoker D
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Paul Watral owns what he refers to as his missing puzzle piece. Paul had already purchased a tractor from the collection of Dr. Brent Leibert when he heard about this Spoker D in the same collection. The Spoker D began a new era of John Deere tractors; it was the first model produced after the Waterloo Boy. The odd name comes from the “spoked” flywheel that is unique only to early models; the later models were manufactured using a solid flywheel.
A 1925 John Deere Spoker D was like finding the missing piece to a puzzle since it completed his John Deere D collection. The tractor was in fairly good condition, and the seller had already completed the mechanical portion, cleaned it up and installed new sheet metal. Paul purchased the D and contracted Dan Peterman, as he does all of his antique tractors, to haul it to his shop and complete the restoration. For Dan this was a distance of one hundred miles so it was much easier for him to haul it than Paul.
Once Dan had the Spoker in his shop he completed the restoration, taking care to make sure all details of the tractor had been tended to. Resulting in this completely restored wonderful looking tractor shown here.
Paul said he enjoys just looking at the Spoker; because it is one “big beautiful tractor.” He is very grateful to Dan for letting him know about this tractor. It is on display with Paul’s other collection of antique tractors at his Long Island home.
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Paul, it says you live in Long Island? Is that New York? I thought that was all city. Where do you keep a tractor in the city?
Hi,
Im one of Paul's good friends from Long Island, NY. There have been many misconceptions about Long Island about it being all city. Actually Long Island has alot of farms still in working order. I am a farmer/JD collector from LI as well. The further east you go on LI, there is more open land. Long Island used to be very big with potatoes and ducks. Now it is mostly Sod, Nursery stock and Vegetables. It was a very big area for John Deere, Farmall and Oliver tractors as well. Come visit sometime.
Jeff Rottkamp
Hah.. wow that's a nice example of a pretty rare tractor.
"There have been many misconceptions about Long Island about it being all city. Actually Long Island has a lot of farms still in working order."
Very true, most people on think of New York as being the city. There's a lot of beautiful country as well!
Cheap Cigars
My Dad's first tractor was a 1926 Model D John Deere. It didn't look nearly as pretty as the one shown above.
I remember him putting on two pairs of overalls, a jacket, a long sheepskin coat, gloves inside mittens, 5-buckle overshoes, and a warm cap and going out to plow with that D. He'd put burlap bags or rugs on the seat and ride it until he got cold. Then he'd get off and walk along side the tractor and warm his hands on the heat from the engine as the tractor followed the furrow.