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This firm, based in Halberstadt, was founded in 1829 by Heinrich Dehne, an ironmaster. In 1853 his son, Friedrich, assumed control of the enterprise and began the manufacture of agricultural implements and equipment; in 1861 it introduced a seed drilling machine of its own design. By 1867 the firm had begun the manufacture of steam traction engines and mobile steam boilers, and had introduced a more extensive line of agricultural machinery, including such items as ploughs, cultivators, hoes, fertilizer spreaders, beet lifters, tedders, harvesters, threshing machines and food processing machines, all of proprietary and innovative design.

The firm moved to larger facilities in 1908, opening a factory in Quedlinburger Straße where more than eight hundred workers were employed. Following the Great War the firm concentrated on the development of potato harvesting machines, which it first introduced in 1924; this greatly relieved the labour burden in harvesting the potato crop and insured the firm financial success in the postwar period. It remains one of the larger and most innovative firms in the agricultural machinery sector to the present time.

When the Fendt brothers, under the guidance of their father Johann Georg, started to build tractors in a blacksmith’s shop, they could not foresee the tremendous changes in tractor technology that would occur during this century. But from the very start they knew exactly the direction they wanted to take: to impress the customer with new technical solutions, profitability and reliability. The year 1930 saw the introduction of the first European small tractor with a 6-HP engine, mounted plough and independently driven mower. With the success of this product they were able to obtain the backing of the Bayerische Vereins-bank to finance the venture and expand their factory and their product line. As the German economy improved during the middle 1930s the firm began to expand through acquisition of other firms. In 1931, it took over Epple und Buxmann of Augsburg, manufacturers of harvesting equipment. The purchase of the Bayerische Eggenfabrik, a manufacturer of harrows and tedders was accomplished in 1933. The firm’s acquisition of the factories of the firm of Joseph and Albert Eicher in 1936 not only increased the firm’s manufacturing base but also greatly expanded the firm’s overseas presence, as Eicher had a major share of the Bharat market for imported agricultural machinery.


Subsidiaries of the firm include:

Bayerische Eggenfabrik AG, Feucht (harrows and other agricultural machinery)
Eicher-Traktorenfabrik AG, Dingolfing (tractors and mechanical equipment)
Eicher-Traktorenfabrik AG, Forstern (tractors and mechanical equipment)
Epple und Buxmann AG, Augsburg (mechanical harvesting equipment)

This concern was established in 1919 to carry on the work of the firm Heinrich Dreyer und Compagnie, which had been founded in 1883 to undertake the manufacture of agricultural machinery. Its first plant was located at Hasbergen-Gaste near Osnabrück.

The first machines brought to production were grain cleaning machines, later plow cultivators, potato sorters and in 1915 the first fertilizer spreader was put on the market. Early on Dreyer began exporting his machinery; in 1906 the first grain cleaning machines were sold in Valparaíso, Chile. The company’s products have found widespread markets in central and eastern Europe and in South America.

In the aftermath of the Great War the firm was reorganised with financial support from several financial institutions and the current style adopted. The product range diversified into a wide variety of tillage machinery, tractors, and municipal machinery, such as street-sweepers.

In 1938 a second works was opened in Leipzig specifically for the manufacture of tractors.

This firm was founded in 1871 to manufacture agricultural machinery, originally harvesting machines, within the Austrian Crown Lands. Its products were well received, and the firm expanded production to include mills, presses, shredders, hay loader and mowers in addition to the more traditional farm implements. Its factory at Gieskirchen presently employs some two hundred workers.

This firm was founded in 1863, in the town of Plagwitz, by the industrialist Rudolph Sack and the entrepreneur Karl Heine. Sack had previously operated a workshop in Löben bei Lützen, manufacturing ploughs and drilling machines; with the move to larger facilities in Plagwitz the firm was able to expand both the range and quantity of its output. In the latter part of the Nineteenth Century the firm was one of the largest agricultural equipment manufacturers in Germany, employing more than two thousand. The disruptions of the Great War, during which the firm manufactured munitions (as did many factories in Germany), cost the firm its leading position, and by 1923 the work force had been reduced drastically. With the return of normal trading conditions the firm was able to recover lost ground, and adapted itself to the conditions of modern mechanised agriculture; by 1938 the number of workers employed had risen to more than 1,500. Its current product line includes ploughs, drilling machine, harrows, fertilizer spreaders and sugar-beet harvesters of proprietary design.

In 1867 Wilhelm Siedersleben established a factory for the production of seed drills in the Saxon town of Bernburg, which were marketed under the name “Saxonia”. In the following years the firm expanded and undertook the manufacture of beet lifters and harvesters, fertilizer spreaders, and other agricultural equipment, but seed drills remained its primary focus. Following the Great War the heirs of the founder converted the firm to a joint-stock company under the present style. It employs some 650 workers and has achieved significant success marketing its products in southeastern Europe.

In 1878 the Lanz firm of Mannheim, which had hitherto imported agricultural machinery such as threshing machines and harvesters, began the production of their first pieces of proprietary design – based upon the design of steam traction engines. In the years before the Great War the firm grew to be one of the largest Continental manufacturers of self-propelled agricultural equipment, winning more than seventy awards and selling more than seventy-thousand units. In 1909 the firm was employing more than four thousand workers, which would rise to more than five thousand during the Great War, during which the Lanz firm manufactured airships in addition to other munitions.

In 1921 the firm introduced its most well-known product, the Bulldog wheeled agricultural tractor, designed by engineer Fritz Huber using a glow-head ignition oil engine. In 1923 an improved Bulldog with all-wheel drive and articulated steering was introduced. This work-horse of the fields is marketed across Europe, in South America and elsewhere. The Lanz firm also continues to manufacture a complete line of agricultural machines, to be towed by tractor, to operate via power-takeoff from a tractor or stationary engine, or self-propelled.

This firm was established in the Swabian city of Leipheim in 1918 by Rudolf Wanzl, to manufacture agricultural implements and machinery, including ploughs, harrows, seed drills, reapers and harvesters. In 1932 it pioneered the production mechanical equipment for the spraying of crops. It presently employs more than one hundred fifty workers.

This firm was founded in 1876 as the ironworks of Epple and Buxbaum, in Wels, Oberösterreich, where the partners manufactured machine parts, cast iron and agricultural implements. In 1922 it was converted into a joint stock company and embarked on the manufacture of self-propelled agricultural machinery including tractors, threshers, harvesters, tedders, disc harrows and similar equipment.

This concern was founded in 1928 by the entrepreneur Herrmann Raussendorf in Singwitz, who acquired a disused paper-making factory and re-equipped in for the manufacture of threshing machines and mobile baling presses; in the first ten years of the firm’s existence it produced no fewer than one thousand of the former and more than six thousand examples of the latter. In 1939 it merged with the firm of Knauthe in nearby Bischofswerda, which gave the firm additional facilities and permitted it to begin the manufacture of combine harvesters, tedders and other agricultural machines.

This firm was founded in 1932 in Berlin by Johannes Köhler, an entrepreneur who set up a factory in the district of Berlin-Lichtenberg, with the intent of manufacturing road tractors. His early vehicles were powered by Deutz 22 PS diesel engines, and were aimed at the industrial market. In 1938 however, the firm introduced a simple, lightweight wheeled tractor for use on farms, which competed successfully with the Lanz Bulldog and similar models. Primus tractors have been exported in large quantities to customers in Eastern Europe, where their ruggedness and simplicity is appreciated. The current factory work force exceeds five hundred.

This firm, based in Ruhstorf an der Rott, is a leading diesel engine manufacturer, known for its light and robust small diesel engines. The low weight facilitates diverse applications in construction and agricultural machinery. The company was founded in 1880 by Mathias Hatz and began the construction of engines in 1904; in 1910 it began the production of ‘hot-bulb’ diesel engines for stationary use. Following the Great War, the firm resumed production of its light diesel engines, which found ready customers abroad. In 1936 it applied its engine to an agricultural tractor, full scale production of which began in 1938. The firm presently employs more than nine hundred workers.

In 1856 Gottfried Welger opened a locksmiths shop in Seehausen; later he expanded his works to begin the manufacture of agricultural implements and machinery. In 1890 his sons Carl and Emil Welger took control of the business, and moved the firm to larger facilities in the city of Wolfenbüttel. In 1901 the firm introduced one of the first mechanised baling presses for harvesting hay and straw; the firm subsequently developed other agricultural machines including fertiliser and manure spreaders, and specialised loader-wagons for the collection of bales and other harvested produce. The firm introduced its first vibrating piston press in 1932, and subsequently developed a series of stationary presses for industrial use. The firm presently employs five hundred workers.

In 1906 Bernhard Krone founded his workshop for the production of ironmongery and agricultural implements in Spelle, Emsland. In the years prior to the Great War the firm concentrated on the manufacture of hand implements and farrier’s equipment. The changed conditions following the conclusion of hostilities – shortages of agricultural labor and draft animals in the wake of war losses – drove the firm towards the production of labor-saving agricultural machinery, a growing trend in Germany at that time. In 1924, the firm introduced a new design of water pump for agricultural use, and followed this with straw cutting and pressing machines, beet cultivators, potato harvesters, tedders and harrows. In 1930, the firm received a patent for a fertilizer-spreader and in 1941 a patent for a centrifugal-slurry pump with agitator and galvanised shell. In early 1942 the firm moved to a new factory outside the town of Spelle featuring modern production workshops and an engineering centre.

Wilhelm Stoll opened his first workshop for the manufacture of agricultural implements and machines in 1878, in the town of Luckenwalde. In 1906 he opened a larger factory in the city of Torgau in 1906, at which time the firm was constituted as a joint stock company. It specialised in the manufacture of tillage machines for the beet industry, supplying many such farms in Silesia and Saxony; the firm also manufactured potato digging equipment and a general line of agricultural machines. It survived the financial turmoil of the Great War and expanded to meet the demands for farm mechanisation of the postwar period, developing rotary hoes drawn by tractors. The works presently employs more than nine hundred workers, with much of its output marketed abroad to Poland, Hungary and other nations of southeastern Europe.

This firm, based in the town of Wartberg im Mürztal, was founded in 1872 by Friedrich Vogel, Hugo Noot und Hermann Rührlein. Its first products were shovels and spades for the local farming communities of the region. In 1897 the firm began production of plowshares and other agricultural equipment, including harrows, tedders, seed drills and sprayers. In 1929 the firm began the production of heating radiators for home and commercial use, which it has pursued with considerable success.

This family concern was founded in 1871 in the town of Grieskirchen to manufacture agricultural machinery. Following the Great War the firm moved aggressively into power equipment for agriculture and today its product line included mowers, tedders, corn and forage harvesters, ploughs, harrows, seed drills, cultivators and wagons of several sorts; it is one of the larger agricultural equipment manufacturers in Germany, with manufacturing facilities at Grieskirchen and Bernberg, as well as a subsidiary factory at VodHany in Czechoslovakia.

This firm was founded in 1859 by Friedrich Ottomeyer of Wellentrup – an agricultural improver and entrepreneur who pioneered the introduction of agricultural machinery and introduced the first steam traction engines to the Eastphalian region in 1866. In 1874 Ottomeyer went into partnership with the merchant Lewi Emmrich to operate a mill complex at Steinheim, which became the centre of the firm’s operations from that time.

In its early years the firm was known for the development of the Dampfpflugbetrieb or large steam plough, used to break up the heavy soil of the region. These huge machines were constructed in the firm’s own workshops at Lügde/Pyrmont; with the introduction of the use of the internal combustion engine the firm has continued in the forefront of developing heavy ploughs suitable for the working of heavy soils and the conversion of wasteland to arable. Besides manufacturing such equipment, the firm operates a fleet of more than fifty such tractors which it operates on behalf of regional soil conservation organisations or farm cooperatives.

In the years before the Great War the firm diversified its activities to include the operation of a steam brick works at Meinberg, and in Detmold a factory for the production of machine parts and fittings as Ottomeyer Armaturen GmbH. Following the Great War the firm re-entered the field of general agricultural machinery and constructed a new factory for the production of diesel-engine tractors and other mechanical equipment at Horn.

In 1865 brothers Johann George Botsch and Johann Jakob Botsch took over a small engine works and iron foundry in Bad Rappenau to begin the manufacture of agricultural machinery. Harvesting and threshing machines were among the firm’s first output, but in 1876 the introduction of its patented mobile threshing machine set the firm on the road to prosperity. Other proprietary designs emerged from the brothers’ factory in the last quarter of the Nineteenth Century, including mobile pumps for water and liquid manure, brewing machinery, brick presses, fruit and wine presses and fruit mills. The demand for agricultural machinery was buoyed by the drift of farm workers to the cities during the course of the nation’s industrialisation. The firm’s products also found substantial markets abroad.

Following the deaths of the founders, control of the firm passed to their children, and the firm remained a private rather than public company. Expansion continued, with construction of an iron foundry in 1894 and construction of a power generating station in 1906. During the Great War the firm was forced by circumstance to convert its production to munitions but with the return of peace was able to resume manufacture of its lines of agricultural machinery – the demand for which had been increased due to the loss of manpower due to casualties incurred during the hostilities.