Friday Feature: The History of Bobcat Loaders

by | Jul 28, 2023 | Ag History, Farm Equipment, Feature Video, General Agriculture, Innovation

This week’s featured video was published by Prairie Public Television to share the history of the Bobcat Loader.  Two ingenious brothers, Cyril and Louis Keller, grew up on a dairy farm in Minnesota.  Their father usually repaired broken machinery parts rather than purchasing replacement parts.  The boys learned to fix equipment and made their living as adults serving the local farms in their community, after returning from  service in World War II.  Their motto was, “We can repair, weld, or fix anything but a broken heart.”  A local turkey farmer came to them and said he needed a way to clean out barns quickly before the next birds were brought in.  The Keller brothers came up with an idea for a small, lightweight loader machine that could work in tight spaces and minimize the manual labor needed to clean out poultry barns.   In 1956, the Keller Brothers worked for six weeks on the turkey farm until they had the first machine completed.  The Melroe Farm Equipment Company heard about their machine and asked them to take their prototype unit to the Minnesota State Fair to see if other farmers were interested in buying this type of machine.  The interest was overwhelming, so Melroe bought the rights and started manufacturing their machine and called it the Bobcat.  Watch the video to see how this amazing machine evolved into one of the most popular farm machines still in use today.

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If you enjoyed this video, you might want to check out others from the video archives:  Friday Feature Archive

If you come across an interesting, inspiring, humorous or something new and innovative related to agriculture, please send in a link, so we can share it with our readers.  Use the share button from the YouTube or Facebook video you like and send the link via email to:  Doug Mayo

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