Iron Man of the Month: Harold Fleisch

(Page 5 of 5)

July/August 1971
Joe Fahnestock 
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“I’d like to go back to farming,” said Neff. “And if I did, I’d get me another team of horses. I love to pitch manure by hand. I still have my horse-drawn manure spreader.”

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Through the rear door of Pence Machine Shop, Harold Fleisch led me to where some of his prize antique monsters are sitting around, some under a pole shed, others out-pouring into the open air. There was an old engine with the name “Banting Manufacturing Co., Toledo, Ohio,” on the rusted smokebox front. Also an old Mogul tractor and a gaunt-looking International cultivating tractor, and a Titan all of various vintages crowded among the gaunt, towering silhouettes that almost hide a rear view of Pence Machine Shop.

And then there was Harold’s little masterpiece: a half-size model of an under-mounted Avery double steam engine, dubbed the Bull Dog.

“I built this model back in ’55,” said Fleisch. “It runs fine, and I’ve had several of the reunions around here.”

“You make everything from toothpick holders to the big, full-sized engines here, don’t you,” I replied. “Tell me, could you even make a wedding ring if someone needed one right quickly?”

“We can do about anything, but I don’t think we could make the wedding ring,” laughed he.

It was getting to be dinner time. As I passed from the portals of Pence Machine Shop, I noted Maurice Miller and Phil Price, their factory lunch pails propped up on the old Banting Machine Shop engine, munching their noon repast. Everything appeared turn-of-the-century still around Pence Machinery Shop. And I was happy it did.

And now, Harold Fleisch, you can return home to the “Missus,” only on the promise that you take her for a spin in your old 1919 Essex Sport Coupe as a sort of anniversary when you both took your honeymoon trip in the old vehicle.

To Harold Fleisch and old Pence Machine Shop at “West Aleck,” Ohio we doff the Iron-Man Derby in humble respect. For a great machine shop with its growing stock of tools and equipment, still run by the big flopping leather belts ever devoted to reclaiming the Age of Steam and the Era of Old-Time Gas Tractors for generations to come, we offer you an honored niche in the vaunted Halls of Iron Man Fame.
We can’t forget the Great Days because you won’t let us forget. IMA

Joe Fahnestock lives in Union City, Ind., writes for the Dayton Daily News and has the radio show “Joe’s Journal.”
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