At tractor shows, pink tractors are often aligned with the breast cancer awareness symbol of a pink ribbon; at The Pink Tractor retail shop in Grand Rivers, Ky., the pink DC3

Case sitting outside has a story all its own.

 

On their Facebook page the shop shares its motto: “Every Girl Needs a Little Pink Tractor

Time.” The Pink Tractor shop includes friendly folk, lots of fun clothes and a neat interior,

along with the tractor outside. The shop is part of the Patti’s 1880’s Settlement that was started by Bill and Patti Tullar.

 

The Tullars were lured to the area by the beauty of the Land Between The Lakes area in 1975. They first opened a small six-unit hotel and in 1977, Hamburger Patti’s Ice Cream Parlor. While Bill and Patti have since passed on, the Tullar family continues. Since those early days, the complex has grown to a huge dining stop offering both great family-style dinners with Patti’s time-honored recipes, and a plethora of shops and garden area to cruise. At Patti’s vendors are famous for flower pot bread, mile-high meringue pie and more.

 

The settlement includes log cabin gift shops, an animal park for viewing, streams, fountains, 19th Hole Miniature Golf and Patti’s Mining Company (gold panning). Besides Patti’s, there is also Bill’s restaurant, which Bill Tullar once ran, but now it serves as an overflow for Patti’s. Together, they serve 350,000 people a year!

 

Jan Shipley, one of the retail managers at Patti’s 1880’s Settlement, said the building where The Pink Tractor is located once belonged to Bill’s mother. “This was what used to be Grandma Tullar’s house. She lived here, then the building was a shipping and receiving place.”

The tractor – which was on the grounds and nobody today is certain where it came

from, really – was manufactured by J.I. Case in Racine, Wis., and 54,924 models

were built. The DC3 is the narrow model and the DC4 is the wide front. The D

model was manufactured from 1939-53. They originally sold for around $2,600.

“We decided to do something with it,” Jan said. “It was an old rusty

tractor and it was going to go to market soon, and they told us we

needed to do something with it. We decided to paint it pink.”

When they told the maintenance gardener he had to paint

the tractor pink, at first he balked. “He said, ‘I can’t paint

that pink; it’s a good old tractor.’ Eventually he did, though,

and now it is one of the most photographed places on Patti’s.”

 

After the tractor was pink, it grew on them all – and when they considered

naming the business The Pink Tractor, it was a joke, but it just seemed to

fit. Now they have shirts with the pink tractor logo as well as bags and a whole

marketing package surrounding the once-rusty Case.

 

The Pink Tractor is just one of the things to do at Patti’s. While she was still living, Patti

wrote: “Patti’s has always been a family kind of place. We welcome the little ones and planned for their entertainment. Just as your children grow up, so too is our family evolving.”

 

Patti’s 1880’s Settlement has several agricultural components, like a water wheel on the side of the Grist Mill Café and pieces that remind visitors of the land and yesteryear. Located in Grand Rivers, they are at Exit 31 off Interstate 24. There is a hotel and a marina and lots to do; log onto www.pattis1880s.com for more information.

 

Readers with questions or comments for Cindy Ladage may write to her in care

of this publication. Learn more of Cindy’s finds and travel in her blog, “Traveling

Adventures of a Farm Girl,” at http://travelingadventuresofafarmgirl.com