Jaques Frazer & Ottawa Mule Team

[oldiron613 583]

Hi Guys, 

 

I just thought I share some information behind a couple of short-lived, lesser known tractors that I've become pretty obsessed with. 

 

Jaques Power Saw company located in Texas started building their Mighty Mite garden tractors in 1946. This was a larger post-war garden tractor intended for truck farmers, large gardens, etc which were similar in size to a Pond lever steer or Ride Away Sr tractor. Most were powered by a Briggs ZZ engine with a Borg Warner T92 3-speed transmission.

 

Shortly thereafter, Gram Paige who made automobiles also wanted to get a piece of the small farm and victory garden market that was booming at the time. They developed the name of Frazer and sold the "Rototiller" which was name trademarked by Frazer. It was powered by a Swiss made, Simar single cylinder 2-stroke engine and that same engine, they put into a Jaques tractor chassis in 1948, painted the tractors yellow and rebadged it as their own. Unfortunately it was very short lived with only a few hundred model T tractors sold until they more or less closed down shop later that same year. Besides the bright colors, what really stands out is the rounded aluminum hoods they repurposed from WW2 aircraft drop-tanks. 

 

Ottawa who sold hit/miss engines, drag saws and other attachments since the early 1900's in Kansas purchased the Mighty Mite line of tractors in 1949 and marketed their own line of "Mule Team" tractors powered by Both Briggs & Stratton and Wisconsin engines until the owner passed away and then the factory flooded in 1951. Only about 250 Mule Team tractors were built. Most were outfitted with the same rounded hoods as the Frazers but there are currently 5 known, including my own that were fitted with older, Mighty Mite hoods, presumably because Ottawa ran out and had these available to use up. 

 

All 3 tractors with the same DNA were very short-lived, well built and in my opinion, really good looking tractors of the time. Due to file size, I could only post a couple of pictures, but pictured is our 1948 Jaques-Frazer T and 1951 Ottawa Mule Team 15 tractors. 

 

Thanks, Rob 

[elcamino/wheelhorse 9,291]

Two new tractors that I have never heard of . Thanks for the information and photos.

[slim67 2,735]

21 minutes ago, elcamino/wheelhorse said:

Two new tractors that I have never heard of . Thanks for the information and photos.

Google Rare Garden Tractors and check out his collection.

[oldiron613 583]

1 minute ago, slim67 said:

Google Rare Garden Tractors and check out his collection.

 

That's where these two tractors came from. Daryel, who owns that website has liquidated most of his large garden tractor collection. 

[AMC RULES 37,125]

Thinking it's all in a FB group now.

[oldiron613 583]

6 minutes ago, AMC RULES said:

Thinking it's all in a FB group now.

 

Yep, I recently started a FB group specific to Jaques Mighty Mite, Frazer, Ottawa and Farm King tractors in effort of sharing info on these tractors and having a centralized information repository. 

[slim67 2,735]

14 hours ago, oldiron613 said:

 

That's where these two tractors came from. Daryel, who owns that website has liquidated most of his large garden tractor collection. 

He had a real nice collection of tractors. I stumbled onto his website myself some time back and was very impressed .

[Pullstart 62,745]

Cool stuff!  It’s amazing that today, we need a new tool or gadget to do a certain job.  Back then, they built stuff in dirty old shops with limited tools and made masterpieces!