At which age did you first drive?

Another forum topic about today’s work/wages/etc got me to thinking about older years back on our family farm when we kids would fight over who might drive. So at which ages did you begin driving? And what did you drive? Thanks for sharing.

Tractor; age 5, D17 series I.
Mower, age 7, Ariens Emperor 8hp
Pickup; age 8, 65’Chevy 292-4speed.
Combine, age 14, JD4400-wheat.
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Edited by AC7060IL - 03 Aug 2021 at 9:34am

I was 10 when dad got a B and fixed it up. Started pulling hay wagon with it then. Then he put a mower deck on it which was the only rider we ever had while I lived at home. Was 13 when he put me behind the wheel of 69 C10 in the hayfield. Was 14 the one and only time he let me run the Oliver 33 combine.

I don't remember how old I was but the first tractor I drove was my Grandfather's 1958 D17. I pulled a 3 section spring tooth drag and had to stand up to push the clutch all the way in. I used the power director clutch for starting and stopping and the foot clutch for changing gears. I learned to plow by my Dad with a 1959 Farmall 560. Dad would turn on the headlands get the wheel in the furrow ,slide off the seat,I would climb on and put the 4 bottom pull type plow in the ground and steer to the end of the field where we would switch until Dad felt I had the hang of it.But don't plow a crooked furrow or a deap dead furrow! I learned to drive truck by backing Dads blue 63 Chevy pickup with bagged fertilizer up to the planter. I would have been about 8 years old then but I drove tractor earlier.

I was 7 or8 dad got the C stuck in the pasture so he put me on the tractor and he pulled it out with the jeep when the tractor was unstuck he put me in the jeep to drive it out of the woods I couldn't reach th clutch so I had to shut it off when I got to the yard. Before that I had only drove the lawn mower.

Was 10 or 11 with dad letting us drive Grandma's 55 Chevy on back roads to 'Get used to driving', was 9 on farm at Greenville IL on the old Deere tractors with hand clutches, was 12 in the bale wagon truck on friends farm in Bachelor MO.  Was on dirt bikes before 11 cannot remember exactly what definite age anymore.

We had a Ford Jubilee I drove quite young.
First I remember was my dad working on a fence. He put the 4020 in gear, said don’t touch anything but the steering wheel and follow me.
I’ve often wondered what would of happened if he had tripped or something?
I remember at 8 driving his pickup following him on the combine and grandpa in the grain truck when we moved equipment.
He bought a 930 case for me at 9 and had me disking and pulling a rod weeder.
At 10 I was plowing with the 930.
Always remember years later. I was teaching a neighbor kid to drive. He was around 12 or so. I had a one ton Ford. He loved to drive and shoot my 22 rifle. He and I spent a lot of time together.
One day we went to town for a Sodie pop. Town was just a truck stop and PO. We had to cross the hiway to get to the truck stop. I told him go ahead you’ll do fine.
Just as we started in the parking lot a cop car came sliding around the back of the store with lights and sirens going. We were barely off the hiway. He slammed it in park and bailed out. He ran in the store and locked himself in the bathroom. The cop hit the hiway and left in a hurry. It took me an hour to talk the kid out of the bathroom and he didn’t talk to me for a couple weeks.😂

Land Rover, left with a flat tire on the army base. I was 8-9 I think. Started it in gea,r it caught and just rolled on forward, flat tire and all.

Neighbor has a picture of a D19 with no driver showing, pulling a manure spreader with my brothers and sister loaded in the back, going down the road. That was taken when I was 5 years old and I would have been standing on the right side holding the brakes working the power director at that stop sign in route to one of our rented farms 8 miles down road.
My first accident happened with our 1963 2 ton grain truck on a nearby road hauling round bales towing (2) wagons, (18) rounds total because one of my tie ropes came undone and dropped (2) bales on the road about 5 miles from the home farm. I was just turning 7 years old and my mother was very upset with my father. I had gotten home and asked her to help go back over to get those bales( needed the loader tractor & the truck). My father was still baling and I didn’t want him to know what happened.

Edited by allisbred - 03 Aug 2021 at 1:22pm

Was 8 I think disking with WD and a year or two later hauling feed and water a half mile down the road to the woods in a 1939 Dodge pickup. Gravel and dirt roads in those days. Would feed on the ground first then back in and dump up to 10 ten gallon milk cans in the 100 gallon water tank. Dad bought a JD A for second tractor with hand lift cultivators around that time and would have to hang off the long arm to get them locked down  and moving to get them up.

7 years old and running the WD pulling a ground driven NI manure spreader, 8 years old running the D17 disking corn stalks in the spring, 9 years old running the same D17 pulling the moldboard plow. Never got to run any of the combines over the years  until I was 40 years old and dad couldn't climb the ladder easily 

Iowallis, your story reminds me of a guy I knew years ago would do similar when putting hay out for cattle. When he got out, the dog would slide behind the wheel. Quite a sight. Don't know how old the dog was