The annual steam and gas engine show at Pinckneyville is on, RIGHT NOW! It is one of the premiere engine shows in the country, and you will see wonderful things there. Here is a 50 HP Bessemer oilfield engine that you will not see traveling to any other shows.
This year you will see an extremely rare 5 HP Falk engine that was rescued in the late 1960's and hidden away in a series of barns until this year, when our friend Gary Bahre put it back in working order.
Less rare, but interesting nonetheless, Gary has also revived our 9 HP Sears Economy that we collected in Eastern Kentucky some thirty-five years ago. He has completed the restoration and will be showing it for your engine-viewing pleasure.
This 1920 vintage Sears Economy engine powered a stone bur mill on Buck's Branch near Martin, Kentucky, providing a source of corn meal for the community of families living on that creek. It also cracked a lot of malted corn that was used for making moonshine locally. The millers who ground meal for folks would keep track mentally of the malted corn they ground and take the toll out of unmalted corn when the moonshiner came to have his cornmeal made. It is all fascinating history, and the mill and engine survive to this day. We have made cornbread for years with meal ground in the old mill, which is now in Southern Illinois.
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