Photos: rust never sleeps

Photo by Chris Falk

The popular image of a farm has always included animals in the fields and seeds in the soil. But when you think of a modern farm you also envision machinery: tractors and conveyor belts and harvesters.

Kids are born with a fascination for farm machines. Even city kids want to drive the tractor. Some grow to realize this dream, working a farm with a variety of fantastic equipment, large and small. Farm labor isn’t always a dream, however, and the farmer and equipment eventually yield to its wear. The farmer might eventually retire to a front porch rocker and the tractor to a sunny patch of field.

Photo by Chris Falk

And so machines that once challenged Mother Nature now meekly submit to her, grass-covered and rusty. Far from useless, these plows and balers and spreaders now stand as monuments to Charlotte’s agricultural progress.