Childhood memory becomes children’s book

One former Dalton native has brought a new twist to the theme of classic children’s books. “Jimmy John the Tractor” is a one of a kind tale of one man’s search for his beloved childhood tractor.

Though author Ken Hinman is a current resident of Henderson Nev., he is originally from nearby and part of his book takes place in Western Nebraska.

Though the publishing process was long, Hinman said he is glad that family and friends pushed him to make his story into a book.

“It just came to me,” said Hinman when asked about how he named the tractor in his book.

He said that he was about a fourth of the way down the first page when it hit him that his adored tractor was without a name.

“Jimmy John came up from sort of the sound of a tractor when you start it up. You have to have a bit of an imagination but children have quite the imagination,” Hinman said. “It’s an old John Deere tractor and with old tractors they have two cylinders so when you hear one you know what it is. If you are familiar with them you know that that is an old John Deere. They sort of sound like ‘jimmy-john, jimmy-john, jimmy-john.’”

The author said his book is about the 1944 John Deere that he farmed with growing up in Western Nebraska. It’s about how he used it, his father sold it and how he found it again and restored it to its original condition.

“It’s about myself, my father (Verner Hinman) and that tractor that I have sitting in my garage here in Henderson right now. I found it after he sold it many years ago,” said Hinman.

“It starts when the tractor was made in Iowa and then it was shipped to Sidney, Neb. where John Deere had a warehouse for tractors in Western Nebraska,” said the author.

Hinman said that his father then had bought the tractor and as a little boy Hinman had grown up learning to farm with the tractor.

He then left the farm, graduating from High School in 1953 after having attended public schools in Dalton, Hinman became a soldier in the U.S. Army. He served two years in Korea before attending Chadron State Teachers College.

Hinman said his curiosity as to what had become of his family’s tractor began about four years after his father had passed when he was living in Mississippi.

“My brothers and I talked about trying to find it and I was home pheasant hunting one fall and I just decided it’s time to quit hunting and start looking, so I started looking for it,” he said.

Hinman started his search at a company he had remembered in Northport, Neb. that had acres of tractors and farm machinery. Once he arrived a company representative asked him whether he knew the serial number on the old tractor that he was in search of.

He was told at the time without the serial number there was no way to verify whether the tractor had ever rolled onto the premises.

In the third year of his search, Hinman said he returned to the company and started talking once again with a gentleman about the tractor.

“He said well we would never know if we had it or not and if we did it’s probably shipped to Mexico by now. Why, I don’t know,” chuckled Hinman.

“As I turned to walk away I said well you know dad had told my kid brother he’s seen it out north of Northport. The man said hold it - there is a guy out there that has several old tractors sitting out in a pasture along the fence line and his property,” said the author.

Sure enough, sitting along the fence line was what appeared to be the old John Deere.

Not only were Hinman and his brothers sure it was the tractor because they had recalled the first four digits of the serial number, but also the tractor had a distinguishing mark that only one who had grown up around the machine would remember to point out.

“What really made me know that it was the tractor is on the left side hood of the tractor dad had drilled four holes to fasten an apparatus to put the grease can on when we went to the field to farm. That gave it away right there; I said that is the tractor.”

Hinman then took the tractor back to Mississippi with him where he restored it to full condition.

The story of this man’s search for his childhood tractor was not published as soon as pen hit paper however.

Hinman had started writing the book approximately 14 years ago and could not get it published at the time. The book was then passed on to his niece Susan, a writer, who also had no luck in publishing the child’s tale. Then the combined efforts of Susan, Hinman’s other niece who was an artist, and Hinman’s daughter brought the final story to print.

“Without me even knowing what was going on they somehow contacted a company on the Internet called Jumpstart and they got family and friends to donate money to get this started,” Hinman said.

The author said that he found out about the publishing a couple days before the girls presented him with the draft copy on his birthday. He had seen some relatives talking about the book on Facebook one morning and knew something was up.

“I was sitting here thinking they are talking about my book. What is going on?

The phone rang and my daughter said ‘Daddy, are you on Facebook?’ and I said yes and asked what was going on. ‘Well Daddy just act surprised. That’s all I’m going to tell ya,’” said Hinman.

“Well on my birthday she gave me a draft copy of the book and there were a few tears. The book was finally published just after the first of the year,” he said.

Hinman said that his book is selling very well around his current home in Nevada but one can also purchase the book on http://www.amazon.com or http://www.barnesandnoble.com.

He also said that a relative of his is still around the Sidney area and has some copies of the book. She will be selling them, along with her honey, at Octoberfest this year. Hinman says he hopes to attend the event himself this year to sign the books for the public.