Heirloom Engines

I thought I was going to lose my husband today.  We had seen this display alongside the freeway yesterday.  Nothing doing, but that we go looking for it today.  The American Farm Heritage Museum is just outside of Greenville, Illinois.  It wasn't really open, but there were a couple of volunteers there working on Christmas displays.  They said many of their tractors and farm equipment were off at various area fairs right now. It's totally a volunteer run facility.  They have special Thrashing Days and Tractor Pulls.

We went into one of their large mostly empty buildings and that's where I lost Forry!  He spotted this rather strange engine and was totally fascinated.

It's a Reid Gas Engine made by the Joseph Reid Engine Company of Oil, Pennsylvania. It has a two pistons that drive these huge fly wheels.

Forry was puzzled as to how it worked and what it was for -- and so was the volunteer who was there.

He asked me to see what I could find out from Safari (Internet) on my iPhone.  Because of this brass plate on the side, I was able to find out!  It's an oilfield engine from the late 1880s.  The cylinder on the side is a pump that forced fuel and air into the working cylinder.

I think Forry did everything but crawl on top of it.  I have at least a dozen different pictures of it on my camera (that he borrowed).  He even called his friend Dennis to see if he might know anything about it.  Dennis had heard of Reid engines, but had never seen one.