page_title: Caterpillar Inc.
section_title: Use in World War I
hierarchical_section_title: Caterpillar Inc. / History / Use in World War I
caption_attribution_description: Catapiller D2 at the Serpentine Vintage Tractor Museum
context_page_description: Caterpillar Inc. is an American Fortune 100 corporation which designs, develops, engineers, manufactures, markets, and sells machinery, engines, financial products, and insurance to customers via a worldwide dealer network. It is the world's largest construction equipment manufacturer.
  In 2018, Caterpillar was ranked #65 on the Fortune 500 list and #238 on the Global Fortune 500 list. Caterpillar stock is a component of the Dow Jones Industrial Average.
  Caterpillar Inc. traces its origins to the 1925 merger of the Holt Manufacturing Company and the C. L. Best Tractor Company, creating a new entity, the California-based Caterpillar Tractor Company. In 1986, the company reorganized itself as a Delaware corporation under the current name, Caterpillar Inc. Caterpillar's headquarters are located in Deerfield, Illinois; it announced in January 2017 that over the course of that year it would relocate its headquarters from Peoria, Illinois, to Deerfield, Illinois, scrapping plans from 2015 of building an $800 million new headquarters complex in downtown Peoria.
  The company also licenses and markets a line of clothing and workwear boots under its Cat / Caterpillar name.
context_section_description: The first tanks used in WW1 were manufactured by William Foster & Co. also in Lincolnshire and were introduced to the battlefield in 1916.  That company had collaborated with Hornsby in the development of the vehicles demonstrated to the British military in 1907, providing the paraffin (kerosene) engines.
  Holt's track-type tractors played a support role in World War I. Even before the U.S. formally entered WWI, Holt had shipped 1,200 tractors to England, France, and Russia for agricultural purposes. These governments, however, sent the tractors directly to the battlefront where the military put them to work hauling artillery and supplies. When World War I broke out, the British War Office ordered a Holt tractor and put it through trials at Aldershot. The War Office was suitably impressed and chose it as a gun-tractor. Over the next four years, the Holt tractor became a major artillery tractor, mainly used to haul medium guns like the 6-inch howitzer, the 60-pounder, and later the 9.2-inch howitzer.
  Holt tractors were also the inspiration for the development of the British tank, which profoundly altered ground warfare tactics. Major Ernest Swinton, sent to France as an army war correspondent, very soon saw the potential of a track-laying tractor. Although the British later chose an English firm to build its first tanks, the Holt tractor became "one of the most important military vehicles of all time."
caption: A Caterpillar D2, introduced in 1938, at the Serpentine Vintage Tractor Museum, Serpentine, Western Australia.
exif: {"Image Make": "EASTMAN KODAK COMPANY", "Image Model": "KODAK Z7590 ZOOM DIGITAL CAMERA", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "230", "Image YResolution": "230", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Centered", "Image ExifOffset": "504", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "3806", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "5026", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/60", "EXIF FNumber": "14/5", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Program Normal", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "140", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0221", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2006:04:17 11:18:33", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2006:04:17 11:18:33", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF ShutterSpeedValue": "59/10", "EXIF ApertureValue": "3", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "3", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF LightSource": "Unknown", "EXIF Flash": "Flash fired, auto mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "63/10", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "2576", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "1932", "Interoperability InteroperabilityIndex": "R98", "Interoperability InteroperabilityVersion": "[48, 49, 48, 48]", "EXIF InteroperabilityOffset": "3502", "EXIF ExposureIndex": "140", "EXIF SensingMethod": "One-chip color area", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF SceneType": "Directly Photographed", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF DigitalZoomRatio": "0", "EXIF FocalLengthIn35mmFilm": "38", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard", "EXIF GainControl": "Low gain up", "EXIF Contrast": "Normal", "EXIF Saturation": "Normal", "EXIF Sharpness": "Normal", "EXIF SubjectDistanceRange": "0"}