Reapers

REAPERS. Reaping by machinery is men tioned so long ago as the time of Pliny, the elder, or more than 2,000 years ago. This graphic writer says: In the extensive fields of the low lands of Gaul, vans of large size, with project ing teeth on the forward edge, are diiven on two wheels through the standing corn (grain) by an ox yoked in a reversed position with the machine forward of the ox. In this manner the heads or ears are torn off and fall into the van. Coming from Pliny's time, and through the dark ages, to about a century ago, u machine was worked in England, driven forward by a horse hitched in the rear, which, as it passed fomard, clipped the heads which fell into a box in the rear. When full this was hauled to the granary and deposited, and was the germ perhaps of the modern header. The great statesman of England, Gladstone, is credited with having taken out a patent in Eng land for a reaper which cut the grain and delivered the straw in gavels, to be bound by hand. Curi ous, is it not. that it should have taken over two thousand years to bring so useful and necessary a machine to its present perfection, and yet not more singular than the parallel history- of the perfection of the plow, that has been in use in some crude form since the days of the ancient Egyptians, if indeed they did not get their idea, probably, from the more remote civilization of the Chinese. To come down to the present time. To -Mr. Obed Hussey and to Mr. McCornaick, are due the merit of first elaborating ideas that have made reaping and mowing machines practi cable. Successive inventors have, with them, carried the improvements forward until, in 1878, niachines cut, hound, and delivered the grain ready for shocking far cleaner and better than it could be done by hand. In California, headers are still much used, that dry climate allowing the grain to stand until so ripe that the heads may be safely ricked, or threshed, directly from the machine. In self-binding reapers, their per fection by human means may be said to have been about reached. The history of reaping, and the laurels added from time to flu,. to American machines, have been thus tersely stated. The sickle, whicti was in almost universal use till within a very recent date, is undoubtedly one of the most ancient of all our farming implements. Reaping by the use of it was always slow and laborious, while from the fact that many of our grains would ripen at the same titne, there was a liability to loss before they could be gathered, and practically there was a vastly greater loss from this cause than there is at the present time. It is not, therefore, too much to say that the successful introduction of the reaper into the grain-fields of this country has added many millions of dollars to the value of our annual harvests, by enabling us to secure the whole product, and by making it possible for the farmer to increase the area of his wheat-fields, with a certainty of being able to gather the crop. Nothing was more surprising to the mercantile community of Europe than the fact that we could continue to export such vast quantities of wheat and other breadstuffs through the midst -of the late civil war, with a million or two of able-bodied men in arms. The secret of it was the general use of farm-machinery. The num ber of two-horse reapers in operation throughout the country, in the harve,st of 1861, performed .an amount of work equal to about a million of men. The result was that our capacity for farm production was not materially disturbed. The credit of the practical application of the prin ciples involved in this class of machines undoubtedly belongs to our own ingenious mechanics; for though somewhat similar machines were invented in England and Scot land many years ago, they had never been proved to be efficient in the field, and had never gained the confidence of the farmers, even in their neighborhood; while the patent issued to Obed Hussey, of Cincinnati, in 1833, and another issued to McCormick, of Virginia, in 1834, not only succeeded in the trials to which they were subjected, but in the face of difficulties gained a wide and permanent reputation. Many patents had been issued in this country pre viously, the first ,having been as early as 1803, but they had not proved successful. Hussey's machine was introduced into New York and Illinois in 1834, into Missouri in 1835, into Penn sylvania in 1837, and in the next year the inventor established himself in Baltimore McCormick's machine had been worked as early as 1831, but it was afterwards greatly improved, and became a source of an immense fortune to the inventor. He took out a second patent in 1845, fifteen other machines having been pat ented after the date of his first papers, including that of the Ketchum, in 1844, which gained a wide reputation. The first trial of reapers, par taking of a national character, was held under the auspices of the Ohio State Board of Agri culture in 1852, when twelve different machines and several different mowers were entered for competition. There was no striking superiority, according to the report of the judges, iu any of the machines. A trial had been held at the show of the New York State Agricultural Society, at Buffalo, in 184-8, but the large body of farmers who had witnessed it were not pre pared to admit that the work of the machines was good enough to be tolerated in comparison with the hand-scythe. Some thought they might possibly work in straight, coarse grass, but in finer grasses they were sure to clog. The same society instituted a trial of reapers and mowers at Geneva in 1852, when nine machines com peted as reapers and seven as mowers. Only two or three of the latter were capable of equal ing the common scythe in the quality of work they did, and not one of them all, when brought to a stand in the grass, could start again without backing to get up speed. All the machines had a heavy side-draft, some of tin m to such an extent as to wear seriously on the team. None of them could turn about read ily within a reasonable space, and all were liable to tear up the sward in the operation. The old Manning, patented in 1831, and, the Ketchum machines were the only ones that were capable of doing work that was at alIsatisfactory. One or two of the reapers in this trial did fair work, and the judges decided that, in comparison with the hand-cradle, they showPd a saving of eighty eight and three-fourths cents per acre. Here was some gain certainly. a little positive advance, hut still most of the reapers, as xvell as the mowers, did very inferior work. The draft in them all was very heavy, while some of the best of them had a side-draft that was destruc tive to the team. The inventive genius of the country was stimulated by these trials to an extraordinary degree of activity. Patents began to multiply rapidly. Local trials took place every year, in various parts of the country, to test the merits of the several machines. The great International Exposition at Paris, in 1855, was an occasion not to be overlooked by au enterprising inventor, and the American machines, imperfect as they were at that time, were brought to trial there in competition with the world. The scene of this trial was on a field of oats about forty miles from 1 'aris, each machine having about an acre to cut. Three machines were entered for the first trial, one American, one English, and a third from Algiers, all at the same time raking as well as cutting. The American machine did its work in twenty two minutes, the English in sixty-six, and the Algerian in seventy-two. At a subsequent trial

on the same piece, three other machines were entered, of American, English, and French man ufacture, when the American machine did its work in twenty-two minutes, while the two oth ers failed. The successful competitor on this occasion, says a French journal, did its work in a most exquisite manner, not leaving a single stalk ungathered, and it discharged the grain in the most perfect shape, as if placed by hand, for the binders. It finished its piece most excellently. The contest was finally narrowed down to three machines, all American. Two machines were afterwards converted from reapers into mowers, one making the change in one minute, the other in twenty. Both performed their task to the astonishment and satisfaction of a large con course of spectators, and the judges could hardly restrain their enthusiasm, but cried out, good, good! well done! while the excitable peo ple who looked on hurrahed for the American reaper, crying out, that's thc machine! that's the machine! The report of a French agricultural journal said: All the laurels, we are free to con fess, have been gloriously won by Ameri cans, and this achievement can not he looked upon with indifference, as it plainly foreshad ows the ultimate destiny of the New World. Five years after the Geneva trial there was a general desire to have another on a scale of magnificence that should bring out all the prom inent reapers and mowers of the country. The United States Agricultural Society accordingly instituted a national trial at Syracuse, N. Y., in 1857. More than forty mowers and reapers entered, and were brought to test on the field. It was soon apparent that striking improvernents had been made since the meeting at Geneva. The draft had been very mate rially lessened in nearly all the machines, though the side-draft was still too great in some of them. Most of the machines could now cut fine and thick grass.without clogging, and there was a manifest progress in them. but of the nineteen that competed as mowers, only three could start in fine grass without backing to get up speed. The well known Buckeye, patented only the year before, W011 its *first great triumph here, and carried off the first prize. Every year now added to the list of new inventions and improve ments. In 1859 the Wood mower was invented, and soon gained a high reputation. By the year 1864 there were no less than a hundred and eighty-seven establishments in the country devoted to the manufacture of reapers and mow ers, many of them very extensive, and com pletely furnished with abundant power, machinery and tools of the most perfect descrip tion while the work had become wisely and thoroughly systematized. The people directly sustained by these factories exceeded sixty thou sand, while the value of their annual product exceeded $15,000,000, the number of machines amounting to one hundred thousand. Nine years after the Syracuse trial, another exhibi tion of mowers and reapers, national in its char acter. was held at Auburn, N. Y., under the auspices of the New York State Society, in July, 1866. The nurnber of mowers that entered, single and combined, was forty-four; the number of reapers, thirty; or seventy-four in all. It was plain, at a glance, that a decided improvement had taken place in workmanship and mechanical finish. The mowers were more compact, simpler in construction, lighter, and yet equally strong; they ran with less friction; the draft was easier, and the machines gen. erally were less noisy; they cut the grass better, and were capable of working over uneven sur faces. The committee say in their report: Those who had been present at former trials were astonished at the general perfection which had been attained by manufacturers of mowing machines. Every machine, with two excep tions, did good work, which would be accept able to any farmer; and the appearance of the whole meadow, after it had been raked over, was vastly better than the average mowing of the best farmer in the State, notwithstanding the great difficulties that had to be encountered. At previous trials, very few machines could stop in the grass and start without backing for a fresh start. At the present trial every machine stopped in the grass and started again without backing, without any difficulty and without leaving any perceptible ridge to niark the place. where it occurred, thus leaving a clean cut. We may here note the rapid progress of these. most valuable labor-saving machines, for while, in the earlier trials, only one or two mowers met with any success whatever, no one doing what practical farmers could call good work, in this trial forty-two of the forty-four machines entered did their work well. In the early contests even a partial success was the rare exception; in the late, failure was the equally rare exception. In 1850 less than five thousand machines had been made and put to use, and few, if any of them, gave satisaction. Now there is scarcely a farm of any size in the country but has its mowing machine. It is one of the grandest agricultural inventions of modern times, and yet we see that it is less than twenty years since doubts were freely entertained as to whether it would ever become practically useful, whether the numerous mechanical obstacles would be entirely overcome. Its triumph has been complete. We have now many mowers that have not only a national but a world-wide reputation. The suc cessful introduction of these machines was an immeasurable step in advance upon the old methods of cutting grass. They come in at a. season when the work of a farm is peculiarly laborious, when labor is he/d at higher than the usual high rate of wages, when the weather is often fickle, either oppressively hot and trying to the physical system, or catchy and lowering, and they relieve the severest strain upon the muscles at the time of harvest. Our reapers are at the same time self-rakers. We can reap and gather from fifteen to twenty acres a day in the most satisfactory manner. This brings us up to 1870, about which time inventive talent was. earnestly directed to self-binding machines. The first successful attempt in this direction was the. Marsh harvester, which cut the grain and carried_ it to tables from which two expert binders would tie the bands as fast as delivered, working from eight to twelve acres per day according to the heft and standing of the grain. It will not be necessary to follow inventive talent further in the perfection of reaping machines, suit& it to say, the ideas of the earlier inventors have been improved on and elaborated. Lightness of draft. combined with great strength; the avoidance of undue friction, and last, motion; the power of starting with a clean cut in heavy, and, indeed, green and tangled bottom; automatic raking, and more later automatic binding, and the delivery of the bound sheaves in piles ready for shocking—all these points have been successfully elaborated within the last decade. Besides this, machi,ies do not now easily get out of order, so that from the perfectness of the working parts, twenty or more machines may be put to work in a harvest, working one after the other on con secutive cuts, as illustrated in Landed Estates and Farms, and with almost as much certainty of retaining their respective places in line as may a string of gang plows, as illustrated in the arti cle Plowing. In fact they can be kept as well_ under control, almost, as stationary appliances..