Object Record
Images
Metadata
Object Name |
Model |
Date |
1946 |
Place of Origin |
Cooksville/Mississauga/Ontario/Canada |
Description |
A pressed-paper model of a farm tractor. It is entirely made of cardboard, application sticks, and straight pins and is painted black and red. It has moving wheels and axels. |
History |
This tractor model was handmade by William "Bill" Carr of Cooksville in 1946, for a school project, likely while he was attending Cooksville Public School. The Carr farm was located on Concession 2, Lot 16, at the northwest corner of Burnhamthorpe Road and Highway #10 (then known as Centre Road). The farm practiced mixed farming, though they were primarily dairy farmers. Square One now stands where their farm once was. Growing up during the Great Depression, Bill had very few toys. He explained, "There was no money, because I was a Depression child, and I guess I was like other kids—I wanted toys and trains and planes and trucks and this kind of stuff, and no matter what I wanted, I was told there was no money. And there wasn’t. You know, we could buy bread for four cents a loaf—and we didn’t have the four cents." Farming during the Great Depression was challenging, as everything was done by horses until they acquired a tractor, though even that was difficult. In the 1920s, "after my two [uncles] came home from the war, my grandfather bought the tractor for the three boys. They were to share it. He bought 'em a tractor and he bought 'em a truck." However, their farm remained quite rural. "The only modern thing we got was a tractor in 1944—a rubber-tired tractor. That was the first rubber-tired tractor we ever had because you couldn’t get tractors during wartime," Bill recalled. |
People |
Carr, William |
Search Terms |
City Centre Cooksville |