STURGIS - They like doing things the old-fashioned way at the Black Hills Steam & Threshing Bee.

They seem to like the loud way, too.

Old engines were rumbling and popping and crackling and whistling Saturday as the Western Dakota Antique Club held the 40th annual gathering of old engines and their fans on 40 acres of club land just east of the Sturgis Airport on Hereford Road.

There's more to come today, if you're hankering to hear the hum of an old steam engine or catch a ride on an ancient Case or John Deere.

The gates open at 7 a.m., but the wood-fired saw mill won't fire up until about 10 a.m. Neither will the old wood-shingle mill that Bud Beug and his son, Martin, figure was made somewhere around 1880.

It was still cutting shingles Saturday, powered by a sputtering tractor.

"I bought it at an auction up in Custer back in the 1960s," Bud Beug said. "I got it for $7.50."

That made his son smile: "It's worth a lot more than that now."

But that worth at this show is measured in ways that dollars and cents can't quite define, at least not to people in love with the old ways of old engines and the chores they performed. Many of those people are gray of hair and long in experience.

But the group has its new blood, too, including 3-year-old Josh Taylor Jr. of Rapid City, who sat smudge-faced and comfortable in the wood box of the 1900 model saw mill as his dad, Josh, and Uncle Jacob helped slice up logs before a small group of spectators.

"Oh yeah, he's real comfortable," Jacob Taylor said of his nephew. "He's been around it since he was a baby."

Not far away, Enning rancher Darrell Mickelson was enthralled by the smooth hum of a massive coal-powered steam engine. As he tried to figure out all of the moving parts, he admitted that he does some farming with some pretty ancient machinery himself.

And it's not all for the love of history.

"I have to use them," he said. "I can't afford the new ones."

Sunday's schedule:

7 a.m. - Gates open

9 a.m. - Church services

10 a.m. - Saw mill and shingle mill start up for the day

10:45 a.m. - Dead tractor race

10:45 a.m. - Slow tractor race

11 a.m. - Tractor trophy pull (will break for parade)

1:30 p.m. - Parade

Immediately after the parade, the tractor pull will resume

Contact Kevin Woster at 394-8413 or kevin.woster@rapidcityjournal.com.