Midwest farmer Sue Illingworth was taken aback when her husband John suggested they take up a hobby together a few years into their marriage.
But instead of joining a sporting club or signing up to volunteer with a local charity, the couple decided to spend their weekends restoring tractors which would otherwise be left to rot.
Little did Mrs Illingworth know at the time that the hobby would turn into a 50-year labour of love and culminate in a collection of more than 150 items.
Mr Illingworth was one of the first farmers in Lancashire, in the UK, to acquire a tractor, demonstrating an uncanny knack for fixing any problem with the machinery.
The couple married in 1978 and established a sheep and wheat farm in Arrino, near Three Springs in Western Australia.
After they finished work for the week, they would get in the truck and pull discarded tractors from the earth.
From trash to treasure
Mrs Illingworth said farmers were often all too happy to be rid of the machines, which she would be tasked with cleaning.
“I was blasting them, and it was hilariously funny; I was covered in mud,” she said.
“We’d continue doing that for years, and I got a better angle with the jet so that I didn't have half the paddock on me.”
Once clean, Mr Illingworth would strip the tractor of parts before oiling them and putting the machine back together.
Mrs Illingworth says everything in the collection has character, but one of her favourite pieces is a 1928 Denis fire engine.
"The [owner] would only let us buy it if we rode around his district in it once on the road … and only if my daughter would ring the bell," she said.
"It was because all these ladies were gardening in his area ... and they were so focused on the garden, he wanted her to ring the bell, so they'd look up."
Mrs Illingworth said they were often met with strange requests while tractor hunting, with one man saying he was open to selling his machine, but he would not deal with Mr Illingworth.
"He would only talk to me, and my husband had to stand outside the door," she said.
"He just wanted to tell me why he felt he'd been treated badly ... he felt that he was selling tractors, but people cheated him."
After winning him over, Mrs Illingworth said he would sell her the tractor if she could have the money ready in cash the next morning.
"We got back to him, and he was as happy as anything ... he just had no-one to talk to," she said.
“They feel they’re not men if they have to talk about it.”
The couple were generous with their collection, with Mr Illingworth spending hours showing the tractors to friends, tourists and motorists passing through town.
Before he died, Mr Illingworth suggested the collection be sold, with all items to be auctioned on Sunday.
Donington Auction's Robbie Richards said one of the tractors — a 1904 Ivel agricultural motor tractor — could sell for a record-breaking price.
"The last Ival that sold two years ago was in the UK ... and I believe that one went for around $580,000, which set a new world record for it," he said.
"We don't see any reason that the tractors we have wouldn't set an Australian auction record."
The Ival tractor is one of only nine known to still exist.
Mr Richards said the Illingworth’s vintage tractor collection was the biggest he had ever come across.
“This one is a real specialty ... these things don’t come on the market very often and when they do, collectors do fly in from everywhere to be part of it because they realise that they may never get an opportunity to acquire some of these in their lifetime,” he said.
End of an era
Despite the lifetime of memories connected to the tractors, Mrs Illingworth says she will not be sad to see them go.
“It’s not a problem at all. We’ve had the joy out of it, we’ve worked really hard on them ... but it’s too much,” she said.
“So, it’s time for somebody else to do this, and there are a lot of collectors who, like John, like to go and tinker with them and they get a lot of pleasure out of that.”
Mrs Illingworth said her husband loved nothing more than passing on his skills to others, a legacy she hopes to continue by establishing a charity to help people overcome adversity.
“We were a good team, and the girls and I will carry it on,” she said.
