Triumphs and Wonders of the 19th Century: The True Mirror of a Phenomenal Era / A volume of original, entertaining and instructive historic and descriptive writings, showing the many and marvellous achievements which distinguish an hundred years of material, intellectual, social and moral progress

by James P. Boyd

II. IMPROVEMENTS IN FARM IMPLEMENTS AND MACHINERY.

THE COLUMBIA HARVESTER AND BINDER.

In writing on the improvements in agriculture one can scarcely fail to be impressed with the fact that whenever the human race comes to the point that it must have help and make a demand upon nature, she always honors the draft; and as the steps are portrayed by which the agricultural products of this continent have been increased a hundred fold, while the power of the individual worker has increased wonderfully, and the labor has been lightened by machinery, we can see that these inventions and improvements came just as fast as they were needed, and no faster. God has given to the human mind such power, and to the hands such skill, that whatever is necessary is soon provided when the want is made known. Perhaps there is no better way in which this can be traced than in the appliances by which the farmer feeds the world. It is an interesting study to note the successive steps in the improvement of implements for the work of the farm. In the beginning of the century the sickle and flail were all that were needed to cut and thresh the grain; and it was by a series of steps that the steam thresher and the combined mower and binder were evolved. The sickle was all that was needed until population increased and markets were made accessible; then the cradle was invented. With the former, an expert could cut an acre a day, and with the latter four or more acres; but all the work was done by human muscle. The man using a sickle must work with bended back all day. The cradle enabled him to work erect, and lightened the labor; but when the “Reaper sickle” was invented the labor was transferred to brute muscle. The first machines were clumsy and heavy to draw, requiring as much, or more, power to cut the grain as to cut and bind it with the light running modern binder. Now, the man who sweltered with bended back ten or twelve hours to cut an acre of grain with the sickle “drives his team afield,” and by simply guiding it cuts and binds ten or fifteen acres a day, and carries the bundles to the shock row.

IMPROVED THRESHER WITH BLOWER AND SELF-FEEDER.

The improvement in threshing machinery has been as marked as in that for harvesting the grain. In the first part of the century all the work was done with the flail, and on farms where a large amount of grain was grown it kept a man busy a good part of the winter to thresh it. The first improvement was in threshing the grain by tramping it out with horses, and with two men and four horses, under the most favorable conditions, from fifty to one hundred bushels could be threshed in a day. But by both these methods there was the disadvantage that in all damp weather the work must be stopped, as the grain would become so tough that it could not be threshed. Another disadvantage of these methods was that it took a long time to prepare the crop for market, and in case of a sudden rise in price the farmer could not take advantage of it as he now can when his grain is all threshed in a single day and held in the granary for sale. In the thirties, the first threshing machines were put in use, and were but little improvement over the method of tramping with horses. The machines were of small capacity, and simply threshed the grain, but did not separate it from the straw and chaff, both of which operations had to be done by hand; and if the straw was to be saved, either in the barn or in a stack, it had to be all handled with rakes and forks. The first threshing machine that the writer ever saw was one that was called “The Traveller.” This was followed by machines run by stationary horse-power. These were called “chaff pilers,” from the fact that they threshed the wheat but did not separate it from the straw or chaff. The first horse-powers were inclined planes, or endless chain powers, as they were called, and were run by the weight of the horses, the floor revolving under their weight as they attempted to go up the grade. These were soon superseded by lever powers, made at first for two or four horses, but afterward increased in size and power until ten or twelve horses were used; and about this time the machinery for separating the grain and chaff was added to the machine. It almost seemed to the farmers at this time that perfection had been reached when two or three hundred bushels could be threshed in a day and also cleaned; but the feeding of this large number of horses was a heavy tax upon the farmers, particularly when a rainy day would intervene before the job was finished, and they were obliged to keep the horses two or three days. The invention and introduction of the mounted steam-engine not only saved the farmer from this expense, but also increased the power and doubled the daily capacity of the machine. For a short time the farmers were satisfied with this; but the engine was heavy, and often the farmers’ teams were light, and as it was the rule that each man must draw the engine from his farm to where the next job was to be done, and often the distance was great and the roads bad, it was not long until he tired of this. Then came the traction engine, which not only transported itself but also drew the thresher and separator. About this time another difficulty arose; for now that the machine had been improved and the power increased so that under favorable conditions a thousand bushels could be threshed in a day, the handling of the straw became a serious problem, for it was impossible to build it in a stack suitable for keeping as fast as the machine would deliver it. The first step to lighten and expedite this labor was in adding a straw carrier, a kind of revolving platform, which was attached to the separator and would lift the straw some twelve or fifteen feet. For a year or two the farmers were satisfied with this help, but soon found that it was inadequate for the work. Then the stacker was invented, a separate machine which was backed under the straw carrier to receive the straw, and which had, mounted on wheels, an elevator which would carry the straw to a height of twenty-five or thirty feet; and not only could it do this, but it was the work of a moment, with a crank at its base, to raise it, and it could be run at any angle. When the machine first started, the straw carrier was placed horizontally, and as the stack grew in height, it was raised until in the finishing out of the stack it stood at an angle of forty-five degrees or more. The straw carrier could not only be raised, but by an ingenious arrangement of small wheels, it could be moved from side to side by a light pressure with one hand, or by a man on the stack pushing it with his fork. With this admirable machine for handling the straw, it seemed as though perfection had been reached, and that there was now practically nothing more to be desired. But it was not long until the farmer found that with the delivery of six tons of straw per hour it was heavy work for six men to build the stack, and that it was the most disagreeable work about the machine because of the dust. About 1890, some inventive genius produced the “blower” to take the place of the stacker. This is a long jointed tube, some sixteen or eighteen inches in diameter, mounted at the rear of the cylinder through which the straw is forced by compressed air which is furnished by the machine. It can be raised or lowered, turned to the right or to the left, so as to deliver the straw at any desired point on the stack. It is managed by a man standing on top of the separator near the rear end, does away entirely with any hands on the stack, and thus reduces the force about six men. Some other improvements which have been added are the putting of knives in the cylinder to cut the bands, thus saving one or two hands, for often it was necessary to have a man on each side for cutting the bands when the wheat was dry and the work was done with the greatest rapidity. Then a revolving platform, called a self-feeder, was added in front of the cylinder, on which platform the bundles could be thrown from a wagon standing on each side, and be carried automatically and dumped into the cylinder, doing away with the man who formerly fed the bundles to the machine. To some machines an automatic weigher has been attached, which does away with a man for measuring and keeping tally of the wheat. Compare for a moment this modern machinery which, with a force of twelve or fourteen men, will thresh and clean for market from 1200 to 1600 bushels of wheat per day, with the man with the flail laboriously pounding out ten bushels, and you will get a vivid idea of the progress in agricultural machinery. One somewhat curious fact must be taken into account in this, which is, that with some of these most wonderful machines the cost of labor is about the same it formerly was. But the advantage is that the work can be done in a few hours, and the farmer’s crop be ready for market to take advantage of increased prices, while by the old plan the work would reach almost through the winter.

AUTOMATIC MOUNTED STACKER WITH FOLDING ATTACHMENT.

In the cutting and handling of hay there has been as great improvement as in any portion of the farm. A first-class mowing machine, new from the shop, can now be bought for $40 or less, and with it the farmer can drive to the field after supper, in the cool of the day, and in an hour cut more grass, and do it better, than a man could with a scythe by working hard all day.

DISK HARROW.

Instead of shaking out the swaths slowly with a fork, with a single horse hitched to a hay tedder about two acres an hour can be shaken up and left in such shape that both sun and wind have perfect access to it and cause it to cure rapidly.

Instead of raking the hay laboriously by hand, a steel sulky rake does the work easily and quickly, doing more in an hour than was possible in a day with the hand rake. On farms where the acreage of hay is large, a self-loader attached to the rear of the wagon gathers the hay from the windrow and delivers it on the wagon. At the barn, instead of the slow and wearisome hand pitching, the hay fork and hay carrier deliver it in the top of the highest barns.

ACME HARROW.

The invention of the hay baler enables the farmer now to condense his crop, so that one third of the room for storage formerly required for hay will answer; and it also enables him to ship it to market by rail, where formerly it was necessary that it should be taken in wagons.

While the plough has not been improved to the extent that many of our farm implements have been, it is vastly superior to those used by the pioneers, and modifies somewhat the adage of “Poor Richard,” who wrote:—

“He who by the plough would thrive,
Himself must either hold or drive;”

for the modern ploughman must not only hold and drive, but drive three horses at that, and turn as many acres in a day. Another adage attributed to “Poor Richard” was—

“Plough deep while sluggards sleep,
And you shall have corn to sell and keep.”

But the modern farmer has learned that the depth to which he ploughs must be governed by the nature of his soil, and that deep ploughing on heavy clay lands, or lands with a crude subsoil, is often the cause of short crops and permanent injury to the soil.

It is doubtful if in any line of farm implements there has been more improvement than in that of harrows; and yet this improvement dates back but about a quarter of a century, as previous to that time the old “A” harrow or drag, which was hard on the team and did indifferent work, was the only one found on most farms. More recently the cutting and slicing harrows have been largely introduced, and many other forms of improved harrows have been put on the market. For the preparation of hard land for a seed bed, especially for small grain, the disk harrow cannot be excelled.

But for garden use, or for pulverizing sod land which has not been too much compacted, the slicing Acme harrow is the most perfect implement in use, it being of light draft, easily transferred from field to field, and capable of making the finest and best seed-bed.

The cultivators in use have been greatly improved. It is necessary to describe but two of them. The two-horse cultivator with fenders, which enables the farmer to cultivate both sides of the row at once, driving two horses in the field instead of one, as by the old method, has more than doubled the capacity of the individual; as by its use he is able not only to cultivate both sides of the row at once, but to dispense entirely with the man who, under the old rule, was obliged to follow the cultivator and uncover the corn. This “fender” is exceedingly simple, and the only wonder is that it took the farmer so long to find out its value. Costing but a few cents, it has saved the farmers millions of dollars, as previous to its adoption it was necessary to have one man follow each one-horse plow to uncover the corn. There are two forms of this “fender,” the simplest being a light piece of galvanized sheet iron attached to the cultivator or plow so as to come just between it and the row of corn; the other is in the form of a rolling cutter, and attached in the same way. With either of these the farmer goes into the field as soon as the young plants can be seen in the row, drives his team astride the row, and stirs every inch of the soil, putting a little fresh earth around each hill of corn or potatoes without covering a single plant. As a single State grows some millions of acres of corn, it can be seen that the saving from this little invention to the farmers amounts to millions of dollars in a single year.

The old idea of deep cultivation of most crops has been proven to be wrong, and modern implements are made to cultivate the surface to a depth of two or three inches rather than to tear up the roots of the plants; and one of the most perfect of all implements for this purpose is the “Planet Junior one-horse cultivator.”

Perhaps no other class of machines has relieved the farmer more than the ones for planting the grain; and with a modern two-horse corn planter two rows can be planted at a time in checkered rows, so that it can be cultivated both ways and with more precision, both as to alignment and as to the number of plants in a hill, than by the old hand method of planting. The small grain is sown by a two-horse drill arranged for not only the grain, but at the same time to deposit commercial fertilizer along the rows of grain, and with a grass seed sower attached. In the garden a hand drill is used. It is easily adjustable to any sized seed, from that of the turnip up to beans and peas, and the seed is perfectly distributed in straight rows, while the garden hand cultivator does away largely with the use of the hoe.

DOUBLE CORN CULTIVATOR.

One other modern implement, which promises to be very useful, is “the weeder,” and its value rests on two facts which it required the farmer many years to discover. The first is that the thorough pulverizing of the surface, even to the depth of an inch, breaks the capillaries and checks the evaporation of moisture; but to do this it is necessary that the work be done just as soon after a rain as the land will crumble, and since often if a drying wind blows the land gets dry in a few hours, a machine is needed that will enable the farmer to thus stir a large surface in a short time; and this the weeder does, as it is made to cover the width of three rows at once, and more than two acres an hour can be stirred with a single machine. The other fact which makes this implement of great value is that all weeds are easily exterminated when in embryo, and this stirring of the soil kills every one that is starting.

One other machine which has been greatly improved is the clover huller. Previous to its invention, most of the clover seed was sown in the chaff, and when clean seed was required it took several days’ work with four horses to tramp out three or four bushels, and then much of the seed was left in the chaff.

The modern huller is equipped with the blower and self-feeder, and with it from twenty to fifty bushels can be hulled and cleaned in a day, the amount depending on how well filled the heads are with seed.

It is quite recently that machinery has been invented that relieves the farmer of the hard work of planting potatoes by hand, and at the same time does the work better than the old way, as the machine drops the seed at a uniform distance apart and covers it perfectly. A man with this machine will do the work of eight or ten men dropping by hand. Several potato diggers, operated by horse power, have also come into recent use. They greatly lighten and accelerate the work, and the cost of growing potatoes has been reduced several cents a bushel by these inventions.