John Deere's Steel Plow

Edward C. Kendall

By Edward C. Kendall
John Deere in 1837 invented a plow that could be used successfully in the sticky, root-filled soil of the prairie. It was called a steel plow. Actually, it appears that only the cutting edge, the share, on the first Deere plows was steel. The moldboard was smoothly ground wrought iron.
Deere's invention succeeded because, as the durable steel share of the plow cut through the heavy earth, the sticky soil could find no place to cling on its polished surfaces.
They were used only for the first ploughing, in breaking up the wild sod woven into a tough mass, chiefly by the cord-like roots of perennial grasses, reinforced by the tap roots of oak and hickory bushes, called grubs, some of which were more than a century old and four or five inches in diameter.... If in good trim, the plough cut through and turned over these grubs as if the century-old wood were soft like the flesh of carrots and turnips; but if not in good trim the grubs promptly tossed the plough out of the ground.
The Author:
Edward C. Kendall is curator of agriculture, Museum of History and Technology, in the Smithsonian Institution's United States National Museum.

Figure 1.—New England Strong Plow, Mid-18th Century. Colter locked into heavy, broad share; wooden moldboard covered with iron strips. ( Cat. no. F1091 ; Smithsonian photo 13214 .)