(Radio Iowa) – Steam engines well over a century old are chugging to life in southeast Iowa as the annual Midwest Old Threshers Reunion gets underway in Mount Pleasant. Event spokesman Grant Davidson says the machines of yesterday that helped build Iowa into the farming giant it is today are all on display — and they’re still running strong.

The agricultural heritage event includes antique cars, tractors, vintage steam engines, and a steam-run railroad headed by a locomotive built in 1891.

(Midwest Old Threshers Reunion photo)

The five-day event draws tens of thousands of visitors to see the dozens of steam-powered contraptions that were once the latest technology for performing important chores in the field.