This Company Customized Tractors – Then Went on To Build Amusement Rides

Описание: The W.F. Larson Ford 4000 high-crop is one of the strangest tractors you'll ever see — a machine that looks like someone put a perfectly good Ford on stilts. But the story behind these bizarre machines is even stranger than their appearance.

In 1967, Walter Larson founded a machine shop in Plainview, Texas, after selling his stake in a Massey Ferguson dealership. His first product? High-clearance tractor conversions that could straddle six-foot-tall crops without damaging a single plant. Using chain-drive systems and extended leg assemblies, Larson transformed ordinary Ford tractors into towering specialty machines for tomato growers, blueberry farmers, and vineyard operators across North America.

But in 1970, everything changed when another man named Walter walked into the shop with a prototype amusement ride called the Super Loop. That meeting launched W.F. Larson into the carnival and theme park industry — a journey that would eventually lead to acquiring Sellner Manufacturing (makers of the legendary Tilt-a-Whirl) and merging with Rocky Mountain Construction, one of the world's premier roller coaster builders.

This is the story of approximately 3,000 tractors on stilts, two entrepreneurs named Walter, and how a Texas fabrication shop went from farming equipment to building some of the most thrilling rides on the planet.