Bob,
Interesting you talk about the decades passing and the connections to the Wallis Bear.
It was 1992 and my very first trip across the pond for the 150th Anniversary of J I Case (Threshing Machine Company), the first show I visited was Portland Indiana who had a great feature for Case which I greatly enjoyed, but the icing on the cake for me was seeing the Wallis Bear for the first time, coming from our small island of rural England I had no idea how large that tractor is, it was a pleasure to just sit on it and admire the size, including how small the steering wheel is for such a large tractor! But then with power steering you don't need the big wheel.
Further trips across in 1997 saw it at the 150th Anniversary of M-H show in Wisconsin, the photo below shows the three UK collectors at the event, John Caudwell of Scotland now deceased, myself and John Farnworth. looking at these photo's we have certainly changed a bit over the decades.
1998 we visited the Scmidt family and Gene pictured with Fred gave us a superb morning, talking about their Wallis collection and sharing their stories, both John and I got to drive the Bear that day and that was something special leaving some long standing memories. Fred cranked it once and it started right up and ran so sweet.
Gene was a super gentleman who loved his Wallis tractors, he even gave me a NOS vaporisor for a 20-30 when we looked over his large piles of spares, it still sits on my shelf and always think of him when I look it over, it's too good to just put on a tractor.
Keep the Wallis memories rolling and well done Bob for reminding me to talk about them, keep a close watch on the Wallis Bear.
Malcolm.