Naperville man wanted to ensure his tractor would be used for education and interpretation
Life on the farm isn’t as familiar of a concept today in Will County as it was several decades ago, when agriculture was one of the leading industries in the area, but antique farm equipment recently acquired by the Forest Preserve District aims to help bridge that divide and bring our region’s farm roots to life.
The new antique equipment, a 1939 Model B John Deere tractor and wooden grain wagon, will be added to the collection at Riverview Farmstead Preserve in Naperville. They were purchased from Naperville resident Bruce Roskens, who purchased the tractor in 1990 and the wagon a few years later and has since restored them.
The tractor and wagon were paid for with a $2,500 grant from Target awarded to The Nature Foundation of Will County specifically for the purchase of the equipment, said Tara Neff, executive director of The Nature Foundation.
Jen Guest, a Forest Preserve facility supervisor, said the opportunity to acquire these two new pieces came about when Roskens donated a 1940s International Harvester Little Genius plow to the Forest Preserve. At that time, Guest mentioned to Roskens that she was also looking for a tractor to add to the collection, and he offered up the tractor and wagon.
“What’s really cool is the donated plow and the grain wagon have been used with the tractor,” Guest said. “We ended up with a nice set of equipment on display that has agricultural ties together.”
Both the tractor and the wagon are particularly meaningful to Roskens, who grew up on a farm in northwest Iowa. The tractor is the same John Deere model as one owned by his father — and, in fact, is just a few serial numbers off from his father’s old tractor — and the wagon is the exact one once owned by his father, which he brought home in pieces and reassembled.
Roskens has worked on the pieces since acquiring them years go, and he has done much of the work with his two sons. He said the tractor engine and transmission were in surprisingly good shape when he purchased it. After replacing the spark plugs, fluids and some wires and giving it a good cleaning and fresh gas, it fired right up.
“I am happy to say I was able to get a picture of it running with my dad sitting on it before the restoration was complete,” he said. “Dad passed a couple of years later, but we often talked about it while he was still living.”
He originally purchased the tractor while living in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, where he worked for the Quaker Oats Company. Soon after purchasing and restoring it, he was transferred to the company headquarters in Illinois, and he relocated — with the tractor and another piece of farm equipment in tow.
In Naperville, the tractor became a familiar sight in the neighborhood and around the city.
“Our new neighbors in Naperville clearly thought I was nuts, but after giving many children — and some adults — rides around the neighborhood, it was recognized as a fun antique,” he said.
That first year, the tractor made an appearance at the Naperville Labor Day parade, and it’s been a part of many community events since then.
“I was able to give many, many rides for local schools, churches, birthday parties, swim teams, etc. over the years,” he said. “Even our two sons and daughter learned to drive it for parades and events and enjoyed discussing the history of the tractor and wagon.”
At Riverview Farmstead, the new tractor and wagon will be added to a collection of more than 20 pieces of historic farm equipment, some of them dating as far back at the late 1800s, Guest said. The equipment shows the evolution of the modernization of farming, with many of the earliest pieces being horse-powered.
“It’s very neat to see how early farmers and inventors found ways to make farming easier,” she said.
For Roskens, it was important that the tractor and wagon be used for education and interpretation. He serves on the board of the Friends of Danada, a DuPage County organization that promotes the history of the Danada estate. Friends of Danada sponsors educational programs for children, and over the years he’s noticed kids have become less aware of the area’s farm roots and even what farming means.
“During the course of conducting many of those field tours the past few years, it became clearly obvious that young urban children have little knowledge of how crops are grown and how food is produced,” he said.
Roskens also wants people to understand the value of the work farmers do and how crop production and machinery have evolved through the years.
That’s a goal of Guest’s as well. She hopes having these pieces will bring Will County’s agricultural history to life in a place that was dedicated to it for decades. Riverview Farmstead preserves what was the Clow family farmstead beginning in the 1800s. The farm was owned by the Clow family until 1974, and it was named a landmark by the Naperville Historic Sites Commission in 1991. The Forest Preserve acquired the property in 1994.
Guest’s hope is that the tractor and wagon, along with other antique equipment and interpretive pieces in the barn, limestone house and original settlement house, help tell the story of Will County’s agricultural past and that farms are still crucial today.
“Kids understand the static idea of a farm — a place where farm animals live with a barn, a farmer on a tractor and field of corn,” she said. “They don’t necessarily realize that someone is growing their food on a farm, that farming is a whole business that keeps our country viable.”
Having these real, tangible artifacts helps people connect with life on the farm in a way that pictures can’t, Guest said.
“You get a closer look at all the moving parts, the scale of the size of equipment and get a chance to ask questions about how it operates,” she said. “There is something magical about seeing something up close in person.”
The quality of the pieces also speaks to the workmanship that went into crafting them.
“This equipment is so well made it has lasted for decades and even over a century in some cases,” she said. “It’s cool to think these items were used on real farms.”
Guest said she appreciates that The Nature Foundation so willingly supports Forest Preserve initiatives and projects, assisting with funding for exhibits, programs and, as is the case with the tractor and wagon, interpretive pieces.
“They help us supplement our annual budget, filling in gaps while providing an opportunity to expand our services to visitors,” she said.
The grant that paid for the tractor and wagon was the second Target grant received by The Nature Foundation this year. The first, applied for in 2023 and received in 2024, was a $4,000 grant to support volunteer workdays.
Target grants are by invite only, and charitable organizations must be invited to apply. Neff said the opportunity for the grant came about because the Foundation and the Forest Preserve have an existing relationship with Target through a volunteer workday in the preserves that was coordinated for Target employees.