Collegedale’s Don Gettys is fired up about steam engines.
Collegedale resident Don Gettys displays the one-third scale reproduction of a 1918 Case model tractor with a steam engine he has been building in his workshop. The retired pastor has created hundreds of parts and other engines.The retired pastor has been building steam engines and machine parts for most of his life and hopes to soon complete one of his biggest projects yet. For the last six years he has been working on a one-third scale reproduction of a 1918 Case model tractor with a steam engine that weighs approximately 1,400 pounds.
“I’d estimate the project is about 80 percent complete,” said Gettys. “I plan to drive it in parades, but it will actually be used as a work engine too.”
Gettys, whose father and grandfather worked with machines, originally planned to study engineering, not theology.
“I started out to be an engineer but felt strongly called to be a pastor,” he said.