Yup. That was the old Johnny-popper, whose peculiar running style brought that fame... They mostly started out without a starter, and with a narrow axle in the front, in which the two front wheels were so close together as to be nearly one thing. Most of em that I messed with had been converted to 12v starter, and the wide-axle kit had been applied - a basically 3 wheeled tractor is near useless in the mountains. But even so, when they wouldn't start, the old crank was still there. I have hours of cranking time on a johnny popper.
Starting by turning the 'flywheel' you're talking about... I think that was actually the belt driven PTO. I have never tried to spin the tractor to life like that by hand, but no doubt you can start one tractor with another that way.
One of the saw mills I worked at was intermittent in use on a ranch. *Every time* we went to resurrect that old tractor that ran the mill, that was the way. Jump started it by getting it up to speed with the pto and eventually it would kick off and start going.
There's some very fond memories that you're draggin up. 
It was my grandfather's tractor, and like you said, the front tires were so close together, they might have been one. I did a search for the model, but could not find it. I distinctly recall turning that flywheel clockwise, on the right side of the tractor, but the models I have seen on the web started with flywheels on the left side, turned counterclockwise. We had other tractors around for cultivating and pulling carts loaded with hay bales or tobacco (smaller, with the wide front wheels), and those started with a hand crank (McCormick/Deering or IH, and those were my great Uncle's). Poppy used John Deere's and kept them in a shed open on one side, My Great Uncle used 'red' tractors IH, McCormick, and often left them out, with a can over the stack. Needless to say, Poppy's were in better shape. IIRC these were bought right after (or just before) WWII, and farming was important to feed the war effort and the folks at home. We got proficcient at starting them all and running them, and the fields we had in the tidewater were flat unless you were somewhere you were definitely not supposed to be (which meant other problems) so the bigger tractors (for there, then) were more tricycle arrangements. One had a PTO bet setup we would use to run a buzz saw on with a table on rails mounted to the front and we'd get together to fill the woodshed with stove wood cut to length from deadfall and seasoned wood (mostly oak) from the 25 acre woodlot planted in the 1850s. All the littler kids old enough would pitch in and fill the shed with cut wood, the older ones would drag the small logs and large branches to the saw, and our elders would do the actual cutting. Two generations making sure a third (older one) had wood to heat and cook for the winter. My grandmother used her wood stove until she was just too old to, well into her later 90s (she lived to 102).
Good times, and an idlyllic childhood, even though it seemed a lot like work at the time.
