Right off the bat, veteran equipment writer Frank Raczon admits that the Caterpillar family tree, including the extended family of its capable dealer network, contains too many branches to appear in one book. However, he captures many of the earthmoving giant’s iconic machines in “Caterpillar: Modern Earthmoving Marvels.”
Published by Motorbooks, priced at $45 and containing many photos from historian Keith Haddock, the new 224-page hardbound book begins with the pedigree’s namesake: the tracked undercarriage. Caterpillar’s predecessor, California-based Holt Manufacturing Co., was not the first to arrive at the idea but improved upon designs in the works in 1904, when it built its Holt Road Engine No. 77, a ponderous farm tractor that ran on steam and lumbered on tracks 2 ft wide and 9 ft long. A photographer remarked that it looked “like a monster caterpillar.”