Ferguson Crosses All Frontiers! (Back in the day

supplied by Henry Pirie, a Member of The Ferguson Club

On Saturday the 24th June 2017, five Ferguson Club members gathered in the village of Pitmedden in Aberdeenshire with their tractors ready for a short road run to the nearby town of Ellon, where they had been invited to put on a small display for the annual charity fund raising day of the Ellon Fire Station and the Police Station. In the line up were Sandy Simpson with his 1947 TE 20 continental, Bob Shepherd and Douglas Scott, each with their TE-F’S, and Bill Beaton with his 1957 FE35, and lastly me, Henry Pirie with my TE-F towing a trailer loaded with my 1949 TE-D.

As we set off on our short six mile journey, Edith filmed our departure for an item on the Ferguson Club’s facebook page, which is a great medium for keeping the Ferguson name in the limelight. We were making good progress when halfway there we were overtaken by a motorhome, which promptly pulled into a lay-by right in front of us and out stepped a nice young lady who flagged us down. Not sure what to expect I opened the cab door, and here she was holding a picture of their beautifully restored grey/gold FE35. In spite of the language barrier, mostly on my part, I explained where we were bound for and invited them to tag along. Once more we set off, but this time with a motorhome bringing up the rear. On arrival at the venue we got all set up and had a lovely time with our new-found friends, who, as we discovered were on a touring holiday in Scotland and were from Luxembourg. The lovely couple spent a very enjoyable few hours with us, showing lots of photos of their tractors and also taking many photos of this memorable occasion. I believe they also managed to get photos of the pipe band, much to their delight. Before they left, we told them that the Ferguson Club stand was going to a rally tomorrow (Sunday) at Stonehaven, south of Aberdeen and invited them to join us there.

As Sunday dawned a nice sunny morning, I set off with the trailer again, but with the van towing it now for the longer 30 mile journey to Stonehaven, where we met up with Gladys Lindsay accompanied by Sharon and Emma, with the Club stand. With many willing helpers we soon had the stand up and running and the kettle on the boil, when, true to their word, our new-found friends from Luxembourg appeared. We spent a lovely few hours in their company and they bought quite a few items of merchandise from Gladys as souvenirs of their Scottish holiday. Before they left us, we exchanged e-mail addresses with the promise to keep in touch, so I am looking forward to learning a bit about the vintage tractor scene in Luxembourg, which we don’t seem to hear much about. Anyway, that ended a fantastic weekend all because of a chance meeting, which reinforces my adage,“A stranger is just a friend that you do not know” .