From Yahoo Early Rail group:

One of the most important collections of old internal combustion
powered commercial road and farm vehicles; as well as portable
powerplants used to power threshing machinery and a variety of other
rural industrial activities, will be dispersed at auction. Nixon
Auctioneers will sell the remainder of
this extraordinary assemblage of vehicles and petroliana June 29 and
June 30 at the museum site in Mason City, Iowa. For those of you who
have never had the pleasure of Mr. and Mrs. Van Horn's company , or
have never visited this collection ... you missed a grand experience.

The auction will draw hundreds, principally for the petroliana
items and automotive accessories, that are collectibles affordable
(generally, because things like the sculpted White Eagle Oil glass
pump light are not going to go for petty cash) by the mass of us. The
Nixon site does not do justice to the Abeling hand made large scale
big top, which is valuable as American folk art,as well as for its
grand scope as a scale model. Those of you familiar with the museum
know some of the most unique vehicles are gone , as part of the
process of spreading the proceeds across time a/c tax structure, but
if you have a camera and want to get up close to major artifacts from
before WW2 through 1890 , and have an interest in petroliana and old
advertizing materials ... you are in for a treat. Who knows? You
might find a new and rewarding hobby , like decorating with old
distinctive jack handles.

Good-Luck, Peter

For those of us who never had a reason beside Van Horn's to go to
Mason City, or measured progress on our way to other places (1/4 way
to NW) it will be a great loss. It also makes you wonder why Iowa
wouldn't have stepped in and spent the money to preserve the
irreplaceable. That will have to remain between Iowans and their pols.


trains@robertjohndavis.com

> It also
> makes you wonder why Iowa
> wouldn't have stepped in and spent the money
> to preserve the
> irreplaceable. That will have to remain
> between Iowans and their pols.

Like most states, Iowa is in a severe budget crunch. They've had a special session or two already to cut spending, lay off employees and force pay cuts on other employees. They don't have the money to spend on this collection; even if they did have the money lying around, it's unlikley they'd spend it on this.