I am from Tavistock, Ontario, Canada and grew up on a dairy farm there. My father and uncle farmed together, on separate farms, but shared the labour for farming tasks. My uncle lived two miles south of us, on the edge of a small hamlet named Cassel, Ontario. 

When I was a young boy, in the 1970’s, the only businesses left in Cassel were a corner store, and a local sawmill operated by an old bachelor named George. George and his brother Ed were custom farmers in the 1950’s, starting out with a John Deere R. In 1956, they bought a brand new 820, one of a very few that were sold new in Ontario, Canada. Most farms in Ontario were smaller operations that didn’t need that much horsepower. 

In the 1970’s, George was getting older, and the sawmill was his only line