How This Collector Discovered His Passion for Oliver Orchard Tractors

Like many vintage tractor collectors, Jerry Luecke started with the type of tractors that he grew up with on the family farm. In his case, it was a dairy farm near Folk, Missouri, and the tractors were Olivers like the models 70, 88, and Super 77. Consequently, the first tractor he bought on his own was a Model 70 on steel wheels, even though his family’s model was on rubber.

Luecke doesn’t live on the farm anymore. After leaving home at 19, he settled near Bland, Missouri, where he started Luecke’s Roofing, a commercial and residential roofing business that covered an area roughly 80 miles in any direction.

Around 20 years ago, he moved to his current location, which he named Lazy Acres,and started collecting tractors in earnest. In the meantime, his brother, who recently passed away, took over the family farm, while Luecke kept the memories alive through his tractor collection.

“Back then, most farmers worked with whatever dealer was the closest,” he related. “Plus, I had an uncle who worked for an Oliver dealership. So, our family basically started with Oliver. Later, we started doing business with an Allis-Chalmers dealer and ended up having a D21 and a Model 200,” he added, noting that he has one of each of those in his collection as well.

“The first big tractor I bought was an 1850 Cockshutt, which kind of got me started on the higher-horsepower models. Then I got into the bigger tractors with front-wheel-assist, since we never had many of those in the area and I thought they were really cool.”

A Passion Discovered

However, it wasn’t until his wife, Mitzi, spotted a tractor on an auction that Luecke discovered his real passion. It was a 1965 Oliver Model 770 LP orchard tractor that Luecke ended up buying.

“I really didn’t know that much about it or how rare it really was,” he admitted. “But it was enough to get me interested in orchard models. Since buying that first one, I’ve added six more orchard models, including several that are LP models.”

The oldest is a 1930 Oliver/Hart Parr Model 18-28 orchard model. Others include a Minneapolis-Moline Jet Star LP orchard tractor and three more Oliver Model 770 orchard models. One of those is an LP model, like the one he bought for his wife, and the other two are diesel models. All three are currently being restored.

“I’ve since learned that there were fewer than a dozen 770 orchard models that were LP powered,” he said. “I feel fortunate to have two of them.”

His orchard tractors aren’t the only rare models in Luecke’s collection, though. In fact, he tends to gravitate to rare or unusual models of any size. There’s the 1941 Oliver 99 propane model, for example. Then there’s the 1960 Oliver 880 standard Wheatland model; the Oliver 1900 that’s been retrofitted with a 24-valve Cummins engine; the Model 1950-T (turbo) with a single air cleaner; the Oliver OC-4 with a V-8 engine; the Oliver road roller based on a Model 880 tractor; and the Oliver 1650 LP High-Crop model that actually belongs to his wife.

“That was another one of those that she saw on an auction and said, ‘I want this one’. So, I let her bid on it online and she ended up adding it to the collection,” Luecke recalled, noting that, in reality, they share ownership of most of the collection.

Other Rarities

Another rare model in the Luecke collection is a 1941 Cletrac Model M1 military crawler that was used to move aircraft during World War II.

“It originally had a winch on the front and an air compressor on the back,” he said. “But those were already gone when I bought it, and they’re not available anywhere. I saw one like it, which did have all the accessories, recently sold for around $44,000 and went to a museum. Unfortunately, you can’t find parts for it, so if it ever quits running, I guess this one will have to be used for display, too.”

Should anyone be interested, Luecke has it for sale, along with several other high-horsepower tractors. In fact, he has already sold an Oliver 2655 articulated 4-wheel-drive tractor and an Oliver 1550 High-Crop model that went to Nebraska.

It’s not that he has stopped collecting tractors. For one thing, he says the shed where they’re all stored indoors is getting full and his interest has largely focused on the orchard models. However, there’s another reason he’s liquidating some of the bigger tractors.

“Since I retired, and sold the business to my daughter, I could no longer deduct my flatbed semi tractor/trailer as a business expense. And I couldn’t justify the cost of insurance, fuel, etc., just to keep it for personal reasons; so, I sold it.”

That means he no longer has a way to haul the big tractors in his collection to shows. Don’t worry, though; Luecke still has a 30-foot gooseneck trailer that he can use to transport a couple smaller models. It also means he still has a way to get another orchard model back to Lazy Acres, should he run across another unique one.