This is an illustration of a hay loader from a copy of the 1949 John Deere "Farmers Pocket Ledger" (83rd Annual Edition) that belonged to my grandfather Irvin Henry Dietle. A hay loader picks up loose hay that has been dried in windrows in a field, and loads it onto a wagon that is towed behind the loader. I never saw a hay loader being used, but I remember seeing an old one in a sort of a "junk yard row" of old farm equipment along a wooded lane on the farm of my grandfather Allen Korns. By the time I was old enough to get involved with making hay, my grandfather Allen Korns and his son Melvin Korns were using a gas engine-powered hay baler that was pulled behind a tractor, and towed a hay wagon. When I talked to Melvin's son W. Korns, he said that they got the hay baler in 1957.
L. Dietle
