the BIG DIG
The blades on an installation of wind turbines were spinning for all they were worth when The Big Dig opened near Concordia, Kansas, on a hot August day in 2021. And as the state song memorably notes, “the skies were not cloudy all day.”
Hosted by Prairie Plowing Days, the Historical Construction Equipment Assn. (HCEA) held its 35th annual International Convention and Old Equipment Exposition at a one-of-a-kind event featuring a remarkable display of steam engines, antique tractors and tracked equipment – more than 540 pieces in all – on the Kurt Kocher farm southwest of Concordia in north central Kansas.
Postponed from August 2020 by concerns relating to the pandemic, the 2021 event seemed determined to make up for lost time. Some 7,000 people were on hand for two days (the show’s final day was rained out) to see an amazing array of antique equipment – steam engines, tractors, dirt movers, scrapers, haul trucks, shovels, cranes, pull and motor graders, elevating grader, drag line, dozers and
