TRACTOR TRIVIA and other interesting stuff 5/4/2024

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Today’s tractor brand is a “B” and is somewhat of a bewilderment.

 

Blumberg Tractor

 

The Blumberg Steady Pull tractor is somewhat of a mystery. Very little reliable data can be found but it is a bit intriguing that company founder Hamilton Blumberg and the company he formed are an enigma. Old newspaper articles are the primary source of information for this post. Only one picture could be found as a part of parade coverage.

“Tractor Co. For Orange Planned”

read the headline of the July 2, 1918, Orange Daily.

“Through the influence of the chamber of commerce the Blumberg Motor Manufacturing Company of San Antonio has been practically induced to open a plant in Orange.” W.A. Barry of the company’s San Antonio headquarters was in Orange looking for investors. He said the town was perfect for manufacturing because of its railroad lines and port.

The company was also looking for investors. At that time, Orange would have been a good place to look for capital. The period was still during the heyday of the timber industries and the lumber barons looked for new opportunities to invest their new-found wealth.

On July 10, 1918, the Orange Daily newspaper had a half-page ad for Blumberg Motor which was seeking investors. The top of the ad had the words “Orange Chamber of Commerce Endorses Proposition.”  The ad touted how farmers would soon be relying on tractors and investors could buy a share for $100,00.

The paper on December 8, 1918, reported “A.D. Fisher and son of San Antonio are now unloading a railroad car of machinery at the Blumberg Motor Company. We have authority to state that the new motor company will begin active business by January 1.”

The founder of the company came to Orange and apparently had a house here. The newspaper in December 1918 reported “Mr. and Mrs. H.G. Blumberg and little daughter Minnie Francis returned from a trip to San Antonino last week accompanied by Miss Erin McGowan. The party spent several days at the New Holland Hotel but are now at their home on Ninth Street.”

 

The Texas transportation museum reports Blumberg was in operations from 1915-1922. The October 1920 edition of the publication Tractor Word says “The Blumberg Motor Manufacturing Company San Antonio is now in production on its Blumberg SteadyPull tractor, which is of the four-wheel type, 12-24 horsepower.”

The San Antonio Express in an article for an industrial show on May 22, 1920, wrote “The Blumberg Motor Manufacturing Company, manufacturers of the famous Blumberg Tractors, is a San Antonio company and has a branch plant at Orange, Texas.”

“The four years’ business career of the company has demonstrated its tractors to be the most popular on the market and to have features possess by no other tractors. Among these are: A perfected non-heating motor, a four-wheel drive tractor, especially adapted to rice fields and boggy ground, and a steady-pull tractor, which meets the needs of the farmers of Texas.

“The company is a going concern and has as officers and among its directorate some of the best known business men and bankers of this city.’

“The Blumberg Motor Company has at its door, so to speak, the greatest potential market for tractors in the United States and has orders booked to keep a factory twice the size of the present one busy for the next five years. “The motor, which is shown in the Industrial Exhibit, is manufactured by the Blumberg Company, which also manufactures all working parts in its tractors and is not an assembly proposition as is the case with so many tractor companies.”

 

Blumberg produced its own engines and had two models, the 9/18 which was a four-cylinder 166 cubic inch displacement engine and the 12/24 with a displacement of 251 CID. They may have had a good product but the agricultural depression following the end of World War One seems to have been the end for Blumberg Motor Company.

Where was the Blumberg Motor Manufacturing Company? Did it ever get off the ground here? Did anyone work there? These questions and more remain unanswered.