1936 Silver King

1936 Silver King

When I research many of the cars and truck on the Internet and in publications that I can find sometimes there is not a lot of information about the cars, trucks or tractors. Hence the information maybe small and sometime there is a ton of information some interesting and some a long read. The silver king was one of those that there is a ton of information because of the avid collectors that are out there. So here is what I found.

The Silver King

If you were to look for the small town of Plymouth Ohio on a map it would appear no more than a small dot. But this little town would play a big part in American agriculture history. During the late 1800’s the community of Plymouth would attract the attention of a brickyard worker and a few business friend to their little town with a promise to help them bring jobs to the area by backing them in their ventures. So in 1882 J.D. Fate and his friend Gunsaullus (unable to find his first name) would start the Fate and Gunsaullus Company and they would build clay extruding machinery that would be used for making bricks. Fate would later go on to buy out his partner Gunsaullus and form his own company the J.D. Fate Company in 1892 and would continue to make clay machinery.

Advertising flyer for the Plymouth Locomotive

With the automobile industry beginning to boom, Fate decided to expand so in 1909 Fate would organized the Plymouth truck company. He would go on to build 200 trucks and made an attempt to build one car, but gave up after a fail business trip when the car develop an engine problem and they end up returning hope on the train. It wasn’t long before the truck company failed in 1915. It was not because of the trucks not selling, more due to the fact that Fate had been approached by one of his customer. Fate was asked if he could build a machine that they could use around the rail yard that could replace the mule teams being used at the time. So Fate went to work and developed a yard locomotive which proved to be a successful venture thus laying down the foundation of Plymouth Locomotives which would become his primary product his company would produce.    

Production was good and the company was growing J.D. Fate decided the company would succeed better if they could add more products and when he was approached by Root-Heath in 1919 the J.D. Fate company would become Fate-Root-Heath Company. 

Plymouth Tractor

Advertisement for Corn Sheller

Root-Heath Company was originally founded by Clayton F. and George A. Root in Medina, Ohio, they would manufacture and sold items like, shoe repair kits, horse harness, corn shelter, grist mills, cobbler tools and lawn mower sharpening machines. As the business grew they began to run out of room at their Medina Facility. The Root brothers had been buying casting from the foundry in Plymouth and decided to move their operation to Plymouth when they found a two story building next to the foundry. When the village heard the Root brothers were interested in a building in the village they offered the brother a few inducements to move their operation to their fair city. After deciding to take the village’s offer George A. opted not to make the move he would sell his share of the company to his nephew in-law Charles E. Heath who was married to the daughter of Clayton Root. They made the move in 1895 and change the name of the company in 1904 from the Root Brothers Company to Root-Heath Manufacturing Company and in 1919 joined forces with J.D. Fate to become Fate-Root-Heath. Business was good and the company was moving forward and prospering until the 1929 when the economy crashed.

Advertisement for Plymouth Locomotive

Sales and order slowed in the early 1930’s for the Locomotive, so in order to keep the production going Fate-Root-Heath needed to come up with a product that people could afford and buy in quantity and since the village of Plymouth was located in the middle of the Ohio’s prime farmland a farm tractor was the oblivious choice to add to their production. The company had the engineers and the production capabilities to build a tractor. So when Charles Heath, the General Manager presented the idea of building a farm tractor it would help get the company through the depression. So the Fate-Root-Heath Company set out to build a farm tractor. The first design the engineers came out with was a huge, heavy tractor which was powered by their Climax engine which was big and slow. Part of the reason it was so big and slow was that the engineers were use to building locomotives that were used in train yards. What they needed to build was a tractor that farmer were looking for a smaller, lighter with more maneuverability and inexpensive.

1936 Silver King Left Side View

1936 Silver King Right Side View

 So after their first attempt Charles Heath though some new blood would be needed to build their new tractor and with so many engineers coming from various parts of the country seeking employment and with each one of them bring new ideas with them on how a farm tractors should be designed. They would hire several new engineers and work would begin on a new design for their new tractor. As a result a new innovative tractor the "Plymouth" was born. The companies’ engineers had defined their niche in the farm tractor market. They had designed a machine that was built for a 60 acre or less farm. It also had a definite place as an auxiliary tractor on a farm that was much larger.

1936 Silver King Hercules Engine 

 The new tractor was light and it used a small high speed motor, with a four speed transmission and was powered by a Hercules IXA engine. It uses a one plow standard tread tractor and could plow 5 acres in a ten hour day. The four speed transmission would allow a top speed 25 mph which was unheard of in that day. The Fate-Root-Heath engineers also used a silver paint that would adhere well metal and would give great protection against rust, and they would use this paint on their other products too. All of the Plymouth tractors would be painted silver and were given blue wheels for contrast. The tractor weighed around 2100 lb. and could be ordered with two different tread widths, 38 and 44 inches.

After the new Plymouth was introduced Charles Heath was approached by a young farmer, Luke Biggs who had built a farm tractor using a car engine and the rear axle from a Ford truck. Biggs tractor featured a single front wheel. After Biggs show Mr. Heath a photo of his tractor he was hired on the spot and within weeks he was made superintendent of the tractor division. The Plymouth would be called revolutionary because it was the first tractor designed and built using rubber tires as it foundation. Steel wheels came standard on the tractor but when salesmen would deliver the farmers new Plymouth they would bring along a set of rubber tire then demonstrate the different between steel wheel and rubber. The demonstrations worked well because the salesman would always come back with the steel wheel and the rubber tires could only be purchased at an extra cost (according to Mr. Biggs in an interview) he may have been right because there was a large line up of steel wheel against the fence.

The Fate-Root-Heath Company started a tradition that would confound, confuse and mystify dealer, collectors and anyone else who shared interest in tractors. The first Plymouth would be given one of four model numbers, the R-38, the R-44, the S-38, and the S-44 and these models were solely determined by the tread width and type of wheel used. It was really a simple method the R-38 model was a tractor on rubber tires with 38 inch tread, an S-44 came on steel with a 44 inch tread so on and so forth. When the model line expanded, so would the quantity of model numbers until, at one time, there were be no less than ten model numbers to describe the two basic tractors that were sold. In the 1940's the model number would change every year even though the tractor did not change.

In 1934 the Chrysler Corporation decided they would fight over the use of the Plymouth tractor. Now they had been using the Plymouth name since 1928 as the trade name for their automobile even though they had no complaint about the Plymouth name being used on locomotives, they did have a problem seeing it on these little tractors that were buzzing down the road at 25 mph. This was too much for the Chrysler Corporation so they sent in their lawyer.   If not for the single car built in 1910 by the failed Plymouth truck company which help save the day Fate-Root-Heath would have lost. In the end Chrysler’s lawyers lost and went back home to Detroit dejected after being force to buy the Plymouth name from Fate-Root-Heath. It has been reported that Fate-Root-Heath sold the name for one dollar. Now that they could no longer use the Plymouth name the company would have to come up with a new name and since the tractor was silver in color and the guys who built the tractor thought it was the king, Charles Heath decided to name it the “Silver King” starting with the tractor serial number 315 it would forever be known as the Silver King.

1936 Silver King Front View

Business was booming and four to five tractors were going out the door by 1936. Biggs would lean heavily on his design from his homemade tractor they would be called model R-66 which came with rubber tires and the S-66 which would come with the steel wheels. This tractor would use a swinging drawbar that was attached to the frame eighteen inches ahead of the rear axles center line, this would allow the drawbar to pull the front wheel into a turn thus eliminating the need for turning brakes. It was designed as a row crop cultivator tractor, the three wheeled model featured a unique steering arrangement of levers and chains that formed a bulky appendage located out in front of the tractors radiator. This steering gear was ugly but it was effective, and would not cost as much to manufacture. They would use a cast iron frame on the first 1000 or so three wheeled tractor; later ones would use a steel plate frame along the sides of the engine.

Fate-Root-Heath would build their low but stable designed four wheel Silver King as part of a package it could be ordered with lights and a horn this tractor would become popular for many wide variety of uses. The W.P. A. (The Work Progress Administration) began paving highways and they would begin to spend more and more on keeping the ditch next to the highway mowed and the Silver Kings was the perfect tractor for a highway mower. This little tractor had plenty of power to do the job and with rubber tires and great high road speed; this little tractor could get to and from the work area quickly. With the optional bull and pinion gear sets this tractors could travel at or up to 45 mph. They became so popular in Hollywood that many of the movie companies would use them to tow movie sets around. Warner Brothers was just one of the many movie companies to use this tractor. The California vegetable growers loved them because this tractor could tow a wagon slow enough so that a picker to keep up with it and that was just using first gear. Then after the wagons were loaded the tractor could travel on the roads to collection points using the high speed gears thus wasting precious harvest time. Many manufacturing firms like to use the Silver King industrial tractor and one big company that did use the Silver King was the Willys Jeep plant in Toledo, Ohio.

By the late 1930’s the Plymouth engineers began working on developing live hydraulics, a three point hitch, and a completely hydraulic transmission and in the mean time this little innovative tractor began to attracting attention from all over. It had been said "The Silver King is the best tractor buy on the market.” and that said by Henry Ford himself who reportedly owned several Silver Kings. The plant in Plymouth would entertain many interested people, Harry Ferguson was just one of the many the engineers had the pleasure of meeting, it was also said that a John Deere sales manager was overheard saying that  the Silver Kings was, "The best made poorest sold tractor of its time."

Fate-Root-Heath’s factory fine tuned their assembly lines so it could turn out a tractor every thirty minutes by doing this it would keep Fate-Root-Heath out of bankruptcy. By 1937, the Silver King had its best production year yet, with over 1000 tractors being built. Unfortunately the company would not build that many tractors again in one year. Part of the reason was that the engines and many of the other items needed to build the Silver King were purchased from outside the factory. The stuff needed was bought ahead of time in large batches so that there would be enough to build 50 to 100 tractors at a time. Many times when parts were reordered many of the new item would be different from the one previously that had been ordered. Which would accounts for the many variety of wheels, air filters, and paint colors that are found on many of the tractors.

1938 brought changes to the appearance of the tractor since the name change from the Plymouth to the Silver King. They change the radiator grill to a rounded grill on the three wheeled tractor giving it a more streamlined look and they would make the same design change to the four wheeled tractor in 1939.

The year 1938 brought the first change in the appearance of the Silver King since the name Plymouth was removed in 1934. The three wheeled tractor was fitted with a new, rounded, radiator grill. In 1939 the four wheel tractor also received the new grill. Many manufacturers were streamlining their tractors at this time, and the new grill may have been an attempt to streamline the Silver King. Few would agree that it was much of an improvement on the looks of the three wheeled tractor, which still had the bulky steering mechanism out front. But the first major mechanical change would come in 1940 when they switch to the Continental built engine on the three wheeled tractor (serial #4320). The Hercules IXB-3 engine was put on the four wheeled Silver King for a short time (#4341 to #5319) before it to was refitted the Continental engine. The Continental engine was the engine that Fate-Root-Heath had designed and had the Continental Company build it for them.

By the time the U.S. entered World War II the War Department was making demands from Fate-Root-Heath to build more Plymouth yard locomotives and war materials the tractor production began to slow. Mostly due to the need for iron and steel products that could be use in building war material.

Even though America was at war a new line of Silver Kings were introduce and it would feature the new and improved  Continental F-162 engine with a newly designed sheet metal which was added to the tractor which really did make it look streamlined. They simplified the steering on the three wheeled model by replacing the chain and sprocket with a simple idler arm. Fate-Root-Heath continued with the three wheeled model as well as the four wheeled model with a limited number of special tractors built that include combinations of old and new parts.

After WW II many companies were racing to meet the demand for farm tractors. Fate-Root-Heath continued their production of the Silver King, they also saw the demand for their Plymouth yard locomotive and there was not as much competition and building the locomotive was their primary business. Part of the reason Fate-Root-Heath had entered the tractor market in the 1930’s was to keep the doors open through the depression now management was taking a second look at the tractor division and with demand for the Plymouth yard locomotive the tractor division was no longer needed. Several tractor companies approached Fate-Root-Heath asking for much needed help to meet the huge demand for tractors. Cockshutt was one of those companies and after buying several tractors from Fate-Root-Heath to assess they were impressed. They approached Fate-Root-Heath with a request to build some chassis and final drives for their tractor. Fate-Root-Heath showed no interest so Cockshutt request went unanswered. Harry Lowther would buy a few chassis and final drives for his companies Co-op B2 Jr. But those to would become short lived and fall to the wayside.

 Production would still continue and the engineers worked constantly at improving the Silver King, even though support from management was faltering. New models would see new hydraulics along with several other improvements. Even thought the Silver King had saved Fate-Root-Heath, management no longer support the tractor division so in 1954 Fate-Root-Heath would close the tractor division down. Mountain State Fabricating Company in Clarksburg, West Virginia, approached Charles Heath about purchasing the rights to build the Silver King, and in February of 1954 Mountain State Fabricating Company would begin production of the Silver King with parts and tooling that they had received.

I have not found a lot of information about Mountain State Fabricating Company other than they one of the many companies that came into being as a result of World War II and that they were doing work for the government and now they were struggling to keep their doors open. Unfortunately, they struggled even with Silver King; they would only produce 75 tractors before closing their doors. Being unable to produce the tractor they would send the remaining parts back to Fate-Root-Heath, where many of the parts were sent to the junk yard. It was then that Fate-Root-Heath would end their tractor business once and for all.

With Fate-Root-Heath out of the tractor business, the Silver King would become just another tractor lost to history. The Silver King that Mountain State produce had serial numbers that started at 50,000 and these 75 tractors would become highly collectable. Approximately 8700 Silver King and Plymouth tractor were produce by the Fate-Root-Heath Company and are highly prized by their owners. It was even said May West owned a fleet of Silver King that were used to work her vineyards.

Even today the Silver King tractors are fondly remembered by farmers who used them on their farms, also by the men who worked so hard to build them and also by the people of Plymouth, Ohio which this little tractor help sustain their economy through the depths of the Great Depression. Many of the records that existed where lost or destroyed and most of the information that I have found has been gathered from the Internet from interviews of past employees, Silver King owners, and articles written about the Silver King.