Jones’s keep up collecting hobby

Dave and Lisa Jones started dating as teenagers about 35 years ago.

That’s also when they gained a passion for collecting antique gas engines.

“When we first started dating, that’s what we’d do — he’d pick me up, and then we’d go to the engine shows,” Lisa explained.

They’ve been married for almost 30 years, and for 28 of those they’ve been coming to the annual Tri-State Antique Engine and Tractor Show at Jay County Fairgrounds. In the last five years, they also started showing a portion of their collection.

Now in their early 50s, Dave and Lisa, residents of Payne, Ohio, have amassed almost 200 small gas engines. Dave, who takes most credit for the hobby, explained that the smaller engines had different uses when they were produces in the early 1930s and ’40s.

Of the two small engines he brought to display at the show, one was used as a generator, and the other was used for lawn mowers.

They’ve also collected about 40 larger gas engines, which were often used as replacements for electricity in the countryside, Dave said. They powered grinders turning corn into feed, water pumps and washing machines.

The collecting hobby began when Dave started working on his grandfather’s small engine at 18 years old. He visited an engine show in New Haven to find a part and, after one of the vendors encouraged him, he decided to start collecting more.

“He said, ‘Nobody around here does this stuff (at) your age,’” Dave recalled.

Their display this year includes three International Harvesters, with two 1920s — one with one and a half horsepower and the other with three horsepower — and one 1923 with six horsepower.

A new addition Dave bought last fall is a 1913 New Holland from Pennsylvania.

“When I first got it, it was like filthy,” he said, explaining how he scrubbed the engine with Dawn dish soap. That’s when he discovered the original gold pin-striping.

“(I realized) wow, this thing has got pin-striping underneath all the goop and grime,” he said, noting that Dawn “even works for the ducks.”

The couple brought the New Holland this year instead of Dave’s favorite, a 1910 Buckeye Manufacturing engine from Lima, Ohio. He was told it was one of two known to exist. (The New Holland is Lisa’s favorite.)

It’s not just the engines that keeps them coming, though — it’s the connections they’ve made. Dave became friends with Mark Heine from Fort Wayne 10 to 15 years ago at an engine show, and now they always share a spot at the New Haven and Portland shows.

Lisa enjoys going to shows because she likes to teach others about old engines and get them involved in the engine community.

“That’s kind of something that I like — that way the younger generation can continue it on,” she explained. “And I get to spend time with (Dave on) something that he enjoys.”

Dave and Lisa also visit engine shows in New Haven and Paulding, Ohio. Nearly every other show was canceled this year in response to the coronavirus pandemic, Lisa noted.

“It really bothered him a lot — I’m glad this one’s still going on,” she said.

For some, vacation time means visiting the beach or big city. But not for Dave.

“Like I tell people I work with … A lot of people go to Cancun for vacation,” he said. “I said, ‘Dave Jones goes to (the) Portland, Indiana, engine show for vacation.’”