NEW MAJOR TURNS 70

Ford’s new machine would keep the name of the current model; the Major, known internally by Ford as the E27N, although to farmers it was always the Major, or the “High Henry”, or sometimes something less salubrious when the old side-valve engine wouldn’t start on a frosty morning!

Stopgap

This original Major had been a stopgap measure introduced in 1945 to replace the Fordson Model N or Standard. It had been a great improvement over that machine with its all-new backend, including a much more advanced transmission. The old petrol engine was retained though, and this would be the Achille’s heel of the tractor, resolved from 1948 if you could afford it, by the fitting of Perkins diesel engines as a factory fitted option.

With the dawn of the Fifties, the agricultural world was recovering some sort of normality, and the manufacturing industries could now produce more after post-war materials shortages had eased. With the growing prosperity of the new decade, farmers were beginning to re-equip their farms, and mechanisation was now to the fore more than ever before. By the end of the decade, the horse would be almost completely ousted from the farming scene.