Steam Power on the American Farm [Reprint 2016 ed.] 9781512808469

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STEAM POWER ON THE AMERICAN FARM

PREPARED AND PUBLISHED UNDER THE DIRECTION OF THE AMERICAN HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION FROM THE INCOME OF THE ALBERT J . BEVERIDGE M E M O R I A L

FUND

FOR THEIR ZEAL AND BENEFICENCE IN CREATING THIS FUND THE ASSOCIATION IS INDEBTED TO MANY CITIZENS OF INDIANA WHO DESIRED TO HONOR IN THIS W A Y THE MEMORY OF A STATESMAN AND A HISTORIAN

T H E AMERICAN HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION

STEAM POWER ON THE AMERICAN FARM By

REYNOLD M. WIK MAY TREAT MORRISON PROFESSOR OF AMERICAN MILLS COLLEGE, OAKLAND,

HISTORY

CALIFORNIA

Philadelphia UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA PRESS

Copyright 1953 AMERICAN

HISTORICAL First printing Second

printing

ASSOCIATION

19)3 1959

M A N U F A C T U R E D IN T H E U N I T E D STATES OF AMERICA

Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 53-9553

Published in Great Britain, India, a n d Pakistan by the O x f o r d University Press L o n d o n , Bombay, a n d Karachi

With sincere appreciation to ERNEST S. OSGOOD H1STOIIAN

OF

THE

AMERICAN

WEST

PREFACE the nineteenth century was an age of steam power. Blasts from factory whistles in growing numbers announced this dynamic force in industrialization. Railroad locomotives and steamboats moving over the avenues of commerce thrilled millions of American people with their demonstration of speed and power. Captivated by a sense of the dramatic, historian and novelist have told well the significant story of the utilization of steam power in transportation, commerce, and industry. But steam was not limited to these enterprises. It was also applied to farm work where it provided the first successful mechanical prime mover to be used for agricultural purposes. T h e manufacturers who built these early engines and the farm engineers who operated them in the field were innovators endeavoring to make power fanning a reality. Although the achievements of these men may have been less spectacular than those of other pioneers traditionally associated with the growth of the nation, their work was significant. Unfortunately their contributions have too long been neglected. T h e following study of the farm steam engine describes the use of steam in meeting a power crisis in the major grain-growing regions of the United States and in helping conquer the agricultural frontiers of the expanding West. T h e benefits received from the first mechanical power units brought to the farm, the problems involved in the manufacture, distribution, and financing of these engines, and the part played by the men responsible for the successful application of steam power to American agriculture—this is the story related in the following pages. This study originated in 1946 as a research project for the doctoral dissertation in the department of history at the University of Minnesota. During the preparation of the manuscript, I received timely assistance from many people. I am most grateful to Dr. Ernest S. Osgood, professor of history at the University of Minnesota, who as my adviser provided expert counsel in solving the intricate problems of research and supervised the writing of the manuscript. I am deeply indebted to him for his constant enthusiasm and keen interest in historical scholarship. I am also very thankful for guidance in graduate studies given by Dr. A. C. Krey, head of the department of history at Minnesota. As the recipient of the Albert J. Beveridge Memorial Fellowship for 1950, I express my sincere gratitude to the American Historical TECHNOLOGICALLY,

vii

viii

PREFACE

Association and to each member of the Beveridge Committee. T h i s committee, consisting of professors Arthur P. Whitaker, chairrrnan, Dorothy Burne Goebel, Henrietta Larson, Philip Davidson, a n d C. Vann Woodward, made valuable suggestions for improving the manuscript. It was my privilege to receive helpful comments from the following historians: C. E. Carlson, Bethel College, St. Paul; Edward Everett Dale, University of Oklahoma; Fred A. Shannon, University of Illinois; and Earle D. Ross and Paul F. Sharp of Iowa State Colliege. Lucile M. Kane, curator of manuscripts, and June D. Holmquisit of the Minnesota State Historical Society gave the manuscript an editorial reading, as did Christine Mathias, librarian, University of Chicago. Without the cooperation of those who gave access to source materials in basements, attics, and vaults in a number of factory buildings, the writing of this book would have been impossible. For these services and friendly associations my appreciation is extended to the following officials: M. M. Baker, Caterpillar Company, Peoria, Illinois; Terry Mitchell, Frick Company, Waynesboro, Pennsylvania; William Robinson, Sayne-Robinson Company, Richmond, Indiana; R. J. Mohlie, Oliver Company, Battle Creek, Michigan; Pat Gifford, Huber Manufacturing Company, Marion, Ohio; F. A. Wirt, Elmer Durgin, Caleb Olson, and Arthur G. Kellam, J. I. Case Company, Racine, Wisconsin. I am grateful to Roy I. Case of Racine for permission to use the original letters of his grandfather, Jerome I. Case; to F. Lee Norton for his records as former vice-president of the Case Company; to Fred Smith, Dearborn, Michigan, for access to the Henry Ford files of the Edison Institute; to F. D. Sturgis, Port Huron, Michigan, for permission to use the Port Huron Thresher Company records; to H. R. Holton, Battle Creek, Michigan, for information included in the Gaar Scott financial records; and to E. W. Hamilton for an opportunity to examine rare threshermen's magazines at Madison, Wisconsin. In addition, Herbert A. Kellar of the Wisconsin State Historical Society directed attention to relevant fields of agricultural history, and Everett E. Edwards of the Department of Agriculture, Washington, D.C., discussed various guides for the study. Archival materials were revealed by Russell Anderson, Western Reserve Historical Society, Cleveland, and by V. L. Bedsole, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, Louisiana. F. Hal Higgins of Oakland, California, shared his historical and illustrative materials, and E. Roy Potter of Saskatoon, Canada, provided numerous pictures. Merrill C. Meigs of Chicago contributed interesting information, as did Franz Wood of Des Moines and Henry G. Bossman of Sheldon, Iowa. T h e friendly

ix

PREFACE

assistance and consistent cooperation of Hans J . Anderson of the Minneapolis Moline Company was extremely helpful. T o the officials of the J. I. Case Company of Racine. Wisconsin, and the Frick Company of Waynesboro, Pennsylvania, who generously provided the plates for many of the illustrations in the following pages, I express my thankful acknowledgment. T h e courteous aid given by staff members of state historical societies was most beneficial, especially those at Lincoln, Nebraska; Des Moines, Iowa; Indianapolis, Indiana; Columbus, Ohio; Madison, Wisconsin; and St. Paul, Minnesota. T h e reference departments of the Boston Public Library, the Bancroft Library, Berkeley, California, and the University of Minnesota located important data. For permission to use threshermen's record books, the writer is grateful to Edwin Haselhorst and Otto Wik of Norbeck, South Dakota; G. B. Gunlogson, Racine, Wisconsin; John Loffelmacher, Fairfax, Frank Gerold, St. Cloud, James Rosen, St. Paul, James Morrill, Mankato, and the Winter Brothers, all of Minnesota. Interviews with those who worked on steam threshing outfits proved helpful, and the scores of letters written by farm engineers are a prized possession. Some of these contributors include: Philip S. Rose, Ardmore, Pennsylvania; James Clarke, Madison, Wisconsin; Thomas D. Campbell, Hardin, Montana; Chris Nyberg, Battle Creek, Michigan; Floyd Fiscus and sons, Alden, Iowa; Ben H. Schoenmann, Worthing, South Dakota; Ed Olson, Loyalton, South Dakota; Arthur Young, Kinzers, Pennsylvania; Elmer Ritzman, Emola, Pennsylvania; and the following men in Ohio: A. D. Baker, Swanton; LeRoy Blaker, Alvordton; E. C. Foreman, Tacoma. T o each of the Wik brothers, the Stewarts of Norbeck, South Dakota, and the Bryan families of Silver Creek, Nebraska, all of whom know the life of a thresherman, the author expresses his appreciation for the many acts of assistance. For loyalty, encouragement, and participation in this effort to reconstruct the story of the agricultural iron horse, I express my humble thanks to Elsie Wik Johnson of Chicago, and above all, to my wife, Helen. Mills College Oakland, California April 1953

REYNOLD M .

WIK

CONTENTS PREFACE I II III

vii

STEAM P O W E R COMES T O T H E F A R M

1

T H E P O R T A B L E AGRICULTURAL STEAM ENGINE PORTABLE

STEAM

ENGINES

USED FOR

THRESHING

PURPOSES IV V VI VII VIII IX

15

45

S E L F - P R O P E L L E D AGRICULTURAL STEAM ENGINES

60

T H E STEAM-ENGINE BOOM, 1885-1912

82

T H E HEYDAY O F STEAM P O W E R ON T H E F A R M

108

DISTRIBUTION, FINANCING, TRACTION ENGINES

155

AND

SALE

OF

STEAM

T H R E S H E R M E N ' S ORGANIZATIONS AND SCHOOLS

188

T H E D E V E L O P M E N T O F T H E TRACTOR AND T H E DEC L I N E O F STEAM P O W E R

200

NOTES

215

APPENDIX

251

BIBLIOGRAPHY

259

INDEX

279

Chapter I STEAM POWER COMES TO THE FARM after spending two months in England in 1786, set down in his letters home some observations of the English countryside he was seeing for the first time. Although much that he saw fell short of his expectations and the towns revealed a style of architecture which was in his opinion most wretched, nevertheless he conceded that the British people had made significant progress along mechanical lines. After returning to Paris, he wrote to John Page on May 4, 1786, that "In the arts, the most striking thing I saw there, new, was the application of the principle of the steam-engine to gristmills. I saw eight pairs of stones which are worked by steam. . . ." 1 This demonstration proved to be of more than passing interest to the American statesman, for later in the same year he arranged a visit with Matthew Boulton when that famous inventor arrived in Paris. Boulton boasted that his steam mill in London could grind eight times as many bushels of flour in twenty-four hours as six horses could do.2 Although Jefferson hesitated to predict the future of steam as a moving power, he apparently realized its potentialities. He wrote to Charles Thompson in 1785 expressing the opinion that " T h e power of this agent steam tho' long known is but now beginning to be applied to various purposes of which it is susceptible. . . . " 3 Jefferson's letters suggest that the well-informed, at least, were vitally interested in the new developments in technology—especially in the building of improved machines for producing mechanical power. These were significant days in engineering. James Watt in 1782, profiting by the experimentation and accumulated experience of a score of earlier inventors, received patent rights for manufacturing double-acting steam engines. These stationary engines converted the reciprocating motion of the piston into a rotary motion capable of turning cranks, flywheels, and shafting. This feature, together with other refinements, made them more practical for industrial purposes than the earlier engines of the Newcomen type, which were limited to a vertical action for lifting water and coal from mine shafts. The increased adaptability of the Boulton and Watt engines encouraged their installation in practically all branches of industry. When 1 T H O M A S JEFFERSON,

2

STEAM POWER ON T H E AMERICAN FARM

the W a t t engines demonstrated the feasibility of substituting steam engines for water wheels in the growing textile business, a new impetus was given this phase of industrialization. By 1785, the orders for engines were so numerous that W a t t warned Boulton to curtail them because " W e have already more work in hand than we have people to execute it." 4 Although much of the pioneering work in the development of the steam engine occurred in Great Britain, the same enthusiasms fined the imaginations of American inventors. As the first successful Boulton and W a t t engines were placed on the English market, J a m e s Rumsey and J o h n Fitch began applying steam power to the navigation of rivers in the United States. 5 Perhaps the most illustrious American mechanic of the time was Oliver Evans, a millwright of Delaware, who proposed to move carriages over common roads by means of steam power. He applied to the Pennsylvania legislature in 1786 for exclusive rights to build such a carriage, but the committee receiving the proposal considered Evans insane in this regard and rejected his petition. They did, however, grant him patent rights to build stationary steam engines to drive flour mills, an enterprise to which he successfully devoted his energies for many years.® Conditions at the beginning of the nineteenth century were favorable for a more extensive use of steam power now that the fundamental principles of the steam engine were generally known. T h e Boulton and W a t t patent monopoly had expired in 1799, and mechanics were eager to capitalize on the new opportunities to build engines for a variety of purposes. 7 Within thirty years, crude locomotives were puffing their way over railroads, steamboats had started to carry cargoes, and factory smokestacks were becoming more numerous in many industrial cities. B u t the use of steam was not limited to industry, commerce, and transportation; it was injected into the cylinders of agricultural engines as well. T h e farmer, like the industrialist, needed work done in a more efficient and economical manner. Since it had been demonstrated that steam engines performed satisfactorily in mines and factories, there were strong reasons for believing that steam power could likewise be successfully applied to certain farm operations where the nature of the work was quite similar. In agriculture there were many fixed machines, such as threshers and gristmills, which could be driven by belt power provided by stationary steam engines. It is not surprising that steam was used for farm purposes in England and America several years before George Stephenson's locomotive, in 1829 clearly demonstrated the practicality of the iron horse on the railroads. As early as 1812, Richard Trevithick, a pioneer inventor of high-

STEAM POWER COMES T O T H E FARM

3

pressure steam engines in England, built a small four-horsepower threshing engine for Sir Christopher Hawkins of Trevithen. The engine threshed out fifteen hundred sheaves of barley in four hours, and observers agreed that its performance was better than horse power.® Trevithick advertised these engines for threshing and grinding corn, and sawing wood. They weighed fifteen hundred pounds and cost £63." W h e n J. Rawlings inquired about these threshing engines, Trevithick replied that they answered the purpose exceedingly well, that a farmer could thresh four times as much wheat in a day as could be done with heavy cart horses, and that they could be handled by the farm laborers who had never before seen an engine. 10 These early successes may have prompted Trevithick to write Sir J o h n Sinclair of the Board of Agriculture to express as he said a "few wild ideas." It is my opinion that every part of agriculture might be performed by steam. Carrying manure for the land, ploughing, harrowing, sawing, reaping, thrashing, and grinding, and all by the same machine, however large the estate. Even extensive commons might be tilled effectually . . . without the use of cattle. T w o men would be sufficient to manage an engine, capable of performing the work of 100 horses every twenty-four hours. . . . I think a machine that would be equal to the power of 100 horses would cost £500. . . . It would double the population of this kingdom, for a great part of man's food now goes to horses, which would then be dispensed with, and so prevent importation of corn, and at a trifling expense make our markets the cheapest in the world. . . . , l

Like most prophets, Trevithick failed to outlive his predictions. Although the Franklin Journal and American Mechanics' Magazine reported that there were enough steam engines in England in 1820 to build an Egyptian pyramid in eighteen hours, it appears that only a small percentage of this force of 320,000 horsepower was used in farm work. 12 For the most part, steam power was limited to the threshing of grain on some of the larger estates. 13 Much of British agriculture was too diversified to be performed by stationary engines. Plowing, harrowing, and cultivating the fields required a mobile engine which as yet had not been perfected. T h e n , too, there was not enough belt work to justify the cost of a farm engine. They were not adopted more rapidly because of the farmer's lack of engineering experience and the imperfections of the engines. Faced with this combination of circumstances, manufacturers catered to the demand for larger industrial engines in order to be more certain of larger returns on their investments. 14 A growing interest in railroad building also diverted attention to the manufacture of locomotives rather than agricultural engines. When the British Board of Agriculture in 1812 declined to promote the use of steam on the farms, manufactur-

4

STEAM POWER ON T H E AMERICAN FARM

ing concerns turned their eyes toward the new markets opening up in America. It was on the large plantations on the sugar islands in the Caribbean and in the southern agricultural regions of the United States that farm engines first had numerical significance. In these places, geographic and climatic conditions favored the growth of sugar cane, cotton, tobacco, rice, and other small grains. T h e increased production of staple crops necessitated the use of improved machinery for milling purposes. As the rice threshers, sugar mills, cotton gins, and sawmills increased in capacity, they required more rotary power for successful operation, and planters began to consider the purchase of stationary steam engines. Of course, the utilization of steam power in plantation mills was not the first attempt of planters to acquire a prime mover to supplement human strength. 1 5 Water wheels, tidemills, windmills, and animal treadmills had previously btíen introduced. T h e planter's choice of a power unit was usually predicated upon matters of practicality and economy, although precedent and personal prejudices affected decisions. Windmills were economical to operate, but since the moving air was intermittent and unpredictable they were often unreliable. Tidemills were limited to certain coastal regions. Water from streams provided economical power and was used extensively in the early mills, but many undesirable features were also associated with their operation. T h e building of dams on navigable rivers was frequently prohibited. T h e use of water was restricted by the riparian rights of those living above or below the mill owner; variable rainfall altered the water levels; streams could be too sluggish, and often the most desirable dam sites were expensive to buy. T h e less favorable sites were inconveniently located. Oxen, horses, or mules were used extensively to drive mill machinery, especially on the smaller estates. Although they could be used for field work as well, they were often too slow, too unwieldy, or too costly to maintain. In addition, the self-sufficient tendencies of their economy made plantations rather ideal for the application of steam power. Since planters were forced to process as well as grow many of their products, local mills were essential to the conversion of staples into more usable forms for domestic use or for marketing. Grains were ground to produce meal for human consumption as well as for the livestock. Rice was threshed, hulled, and pounded into flour. Sugar cane was pressed through rollers to extract the juices, cotton was ginned and compressed into bales, and logs were sawed into lumber for building purposes or were converted into fuel. These products were t u n e d out in greater quantity than could conveniently be handled by com-

STEAM POWER COMES TO T H E FARM

5

mon laborers equipped with handmills or other simple tools. The concentration of work involved in processing these products made mechanical power virtually imperative on many of the large estates. Fortunately the variety of milling work was usually sufficient to provide an engine enough working days annually to enable the owner to pay for such an investment. Since the planter possessed more capital than the small farmer, he could more easily add steam engines to his list of agricultural machines. Although it is impossible to cite the operation of the first farm engine in America, it is evident that by 1812 many of them were in use in the United States as well as in the West Indies. Oliver Evans, after driving his "Orukter Amphibolos," an ingenious road enginesteamboat-dredging machine, through the streets of Philadelphia in July 1805, evidently decided to abandon his transportation ideas and concentrate on the building of stationary engines and gristmills —a less exciting but more lucrative business. In 1808, one of his engines was sawing three thousand feet of lumber a day on a plantation near New Orleans. 16 Four years later a planter near Natchez wrote Evans: It is with the greatest satisfaction I take up my pen to inform you of the wonderful performance of our engine. We are driving at present three saws and millstones with ease; it does not appear to me that we use one-half it« power. . . . It is viewed with admiration and astonishment by every one who sees it perform.17

Meanwhile English manufacturers were shipping engines to the West Indies for use on sugar plantations. T h e Boulton and Watt engines were heavy, cumbersome, low-pressure engines which used 2,500 gallons of water an hour and cost £2,000.18 R. W. Pickwood of St. Kitts, in the West Indies, ordered an English engine in 1812 to replace the twelve mules used on his mill. In acknowledging the order, Richard Trevithick explained that his high-pressure engines were superior to those of his competitors because they were lighter in construction and more economical in operation." In 1838, Levi Woodbury, Secretary of the Treasury, made public a comprehensive survey which revealed a total of 1,860 stationary engines in the United States.20 In the aggregate this represented 36,319 horsepower, or approximately six times as much power as the 350 railroad locomotives then in the country, and equal to about two-thirds of all the power developed in the eight hundred steamboats owned in the United States.21 As might be expected, most of the stationary engines in the northeastern states were engaged in industrial work; those located in the Old Northwest region were used largely for driving saw and gristmills, while the majority of the

6

STEAM P O W E R ON T H E AMERICAN

FARM

585 engines in the South were employed in various types of plantation mills. Pennsylvania and Louisiana had the largest number of engines, 383 and 274 respectively. 22 T h e importance of the application of steam power to early American agriculture was demonstrated in the raising of sugar cane. T h e development of this industry in the delta regions of southern Louisiana paralleled the rise of the cotton industry in the tidewater of South Carolina and Georgia. Attempts to raise sugar were made as early as 1725, but it was not until the middle 1790's that Etienne de Baré, a prominent Creole near New Orleans, secured grinding and boiling apparatus and demonstrated that sugar could be raised profitably. 23 T h e embargo regulations and the War of 1812 boosted prices of sugar and encouraged the planting of this crop. 24 In 1817, Jean Jacques Corion introduced a ribb.on cane which ripened nearly a month earlier than the older varieties. T h i s reduced the risks in sugar raising and enlarged the area of sugar growing in Mississippi and parts of Georgia. 25 In 1830, 691 plantations in Louisiana supplied one-half of the domestic needs of the entire country. 28 T h e mill became indispensable on the sugar plantations. Since the raw cane had little value in itself, its conversion into marketable sugar products at the mill determined the annual profits or losses for the planters. For best results, the harvested cane was hauled di rectly to the grinding mill. A delay in the crushing process caused the cane juices to sour in the stalk and reduced the value of the crop. As harvesting and milling occurred simultaneously, inadequate mill facilities prevented completion of the work in proper season. T h e late maturity of the cane in the field made harvesting difficult. If the planter postponed the beginning of harvest, frost often cut short the crop; if he began too early, he received only the portion that was ripe. 27 Harvest, therefore, became a rush job and time was a precious element. T o accommodate the cane as it came from the field, the sugar mill was frequently operated night and day. T h e editor of the Southern Agriculturist visited several Georgian plantations in 1833 where Grinding and boiling is continuous from Monday morning to Saturday night. T o enable the hands to undergo the work, they were divided into three watches, one third going at each watch of 8 hours, so that each person works 16 and sleeps 8 hours in 24. T h e mill feeders are changed every 6 hours as their work is more severe. 28

T h e earliest sugar planters with limited acreages relied on custom milling to process the cane, but the shortness of the season and the timeliness of these operations encouraged most planters to enlarge their plantations and to erect their own mills. 29 By 1849, consolida-

STEAM POWER COMES TO THE FARM

7

tion reached the point where two hundred estates produced one-half the sugar grown in the nation. 30 Valcour Aimé, for instance, owned fifteen thousand acres near New Orleans in 1852 with buildings, machinery, land, and livestock valued at $700,000. A private railroad hauled cane from the fields and other supplies for the estate.31 Under these conditions, business affairs naturally gravitated into the hands of an enterprising class of people. More progressive planters replaced many of the middle-class farmers who were often prejudiced against new methods and were slow to adopt improved implements. The new owners' opportunities for travel and the perusal of agricultural literature broadened their outlook and made them more openminded about innovations. Frederick Law Olmsted described the Louisiana sugar planters of the 1850's as the "most intelligent, enterprising, and wealthy men of business in the United States." 32 Under such leadership, sugar-mill machinery was improved and the capacity increased.33 As early as 1818, planters were installing stationary steam engines to drive the grinding rollers which crushed the hard bark of the cane and extracted the juice from the stalks.34 Although these engines at first failed to displace water wheels, windmills, and tidemills, the use of steam power became increasingly popular among planters. By 1827, eighty-two steam-driven sugar mills were operating in the southern states.35 Edward Barnwell, after visiting many of the sugar plantations in Georgia in 1828, observed that it was die opinion of almost all gentlemen that "when cultivated as a large crop, the power of steam would be required for this essential purpose." 36 According to the New Orleans customs records, a consignment of 120 tons of steam machinery reached the city on September 29, 1829.3T In the early 1840's, steam engines were driving over half of die sugar mills in Louisiana which were producing seventy million pounds of sugar annually. =s In 1859, 987 of the 1,298 sugar plantations in the South utilized steam power.39 The first engines installed in the Louisiana sugar mills were imported by Fawcett and Company of Liverpool, England, a concern which Thomas Spaulding, a prominent Georgian planter, called "the greatest sugar-mill workers in the world." 40 At least ten of these engines were in use by 1823.41 They were of the low-pressure condensing type, averaged sixteen horsepower, and cost approximately seven thousand dollars each.42 During the 1830's, several American companiee were supplying this market, particularly W. T i f t and Company of Cincinnati, T h e West Point Foundry of New York, Holmes Hinckley of Boston, and John Allaire of New York. Ten years later the Tredegar Iron Works of Richmond, Virginia, one of the largest Southern foundries, was manufacturing steam sugar mills. Joseph R. Anderson, president of the company in 1849, with

8

STEAM POWER ON T H E AMERICAN FARM

understandable pride described these engines as the best known in Louisiana." These engines were stationary, with the boilers and fireboxes bolted down to solid foundations. They were bricked in to form a permanent location for the machine. Chimneys for the boilers were often fifty feet in height." T h e mill houses were usually of brick to avoid fire hazards and were from eighty to two hundred feet in length. An open shed extending beyond the sugar house at one end provided protection from the weather for fifty to one hundred cartloads of cane. 45 Once installed, the mill engines performed the belt work required on the plantations, such as driving gristmills, sawmills, straw cutters,

Steam power used for grinding sugar cane on a southern plantation, 1848. Courtesy

F. Hai Higgiiis,

Wahntt

Creek,

Cal.

fanning mills, cornmills, and cob crushers. If rice was grown, steam power was frequently utilized for threshing or pounding this crop. Although a Mr. Lucas attempted to use steam for threshing rice as early as 1817, the planters were unable to purchase a satisfactory rice-threshing machine until 1829. In this year, Calvin Emmons of New York perfected the earlier Scotch threshers by adding beaters to the cylinder which could comb the rice from the heads of grain 46 Dr. E. M. Elliot of Pendleton, South Carolina, in 1830 witnessed in attempt to thresh rice with a machine driven by horse power. After repeated failures, someone suggested that the threshing machine be belted to a steam engine. " T h e experiment," observed Elliot, "was completely successful, and it was manifest at once that the difficulties had not been in the imperfect construction of the thresher, but in the insufficiency of the moving power." 4T

STEAM POWER COMES TO THE FARM

9

By 1851, stationary steam threshers had been so improved that they could thresh one thousand bushels per day, but since the machines cost from three to seven thousand dollars, they were employed only by the largest planters. 48 The wheat crops of the upper South occasionally were hauled to a stationary threshing machine driven by steam engines. A large wheat farm on the James River in Virginia used steam in 1846 for threshing. 48 During the late forties, Solon Robinson, well-known farm journalist, visited a five-hundred-acre farm in South Carolina where the threshing was done by means of steam power. 60 Frederick Olmsted made this observation: On most large plantations, threshing-machines, much the same as are used with us, driven either by horse-power or by steam-power, have been lately adopted, of course, with great economy. Where horse-power is used for threshing, the wind is still often relied upon for removing the chaff, as of old; but where steam-engines are employed, they are often connected with the threshing-mill, very complete separators and fanners, together with elevators and other labor-saving machinery, some of it the best for such purposes that I have ever seen.· 1

T o secure the maximum number of days' work from the plantation engines, they were also belted to cotton gins, cotton presses, and cotton trashers. T h e effective use of cotton gins demonstrates that new ginning machines were often of little value unless the source of power to operate them was adequate. Even though Eli Whitney announced that his saw gin would "enable one man to perform the work of a thousand," M this was not achieved without access to animal or mechanical power. The earliest gins were turned by a hand crank or set in motion by a footboard acting as a pedal on a crank. However, one person could seldom clean over forty pounds of cotton in a day. Robert Chisolm of South Carolina recalled in 1840 that he never got over forty pounds of clean cotton from his foot gins per day even from his best workman." The manufacture of larger gins was followed by improved horse-power machines accommodating from two to six horses and capable of giving four hundred pounds of cotton per day.54 Steam power was applied to the cotton gins on some of the larger plantations around 1850." With an engine, three men could gin from one thousand to four thousand five hundred pounds of cotton daily or approximately a hundred times as much as with the old foot gin.®· Although the diaries of cotton planters and overseers contain few descriptions of the actual operation of steam engines, daily entries indicate that they were frequently used, especially on some of the larger plantations. Bennet H. Barrow, a plantation owner in Louisiana, on February 9, 1839, noted that he was "Very much plased [JÍC] with Wm. H. Barrow Steam mill. Ginning, grinding and sawing by

10

STEAM POWER ON THE AMERICAN FARM

steam. James Pattent Gins are ginning by steam from 5 to 10 bales a day. . . ." 57 An overseer on a Florida estate on August 15, 1856, recorded with somewhat typically faulty orthography that "the gin house will soon be compleated. The engin has com and I have got it in place. The engine room is not don so Mr. Cordy can put it up but I think it will be ready for him next weak." 58 One of the chief advantages in using stationary engines instead of horses for driving cotton gins was that the engine could be belted directly to the gin, thus eliminating the complicated gears which were an integral part of the horse-power machines. These gears were often the crude handiwork of local artisans and caused considerable

Stationary steam e n g i n e driving cotton gin a n d press in S o u t h , 1850. Courtesy F. Hal Higgins,

Walnut Creek, Cat.

trouble by breaking or wearing out rapidly. It will be observed subsequently that this same problem confronted the wheat farmers in the northern states who relied on horse-power machines for threshing. In the South, Ephraim Beanland, one of James K. Polk's overseers in Mississippi, described this problem in October 14, 1834: "I have got 11 bailes made and my runinge gear has broke. . . . My cotten is opning very well indeade and I canta get it out in time." 59 On another occasion he complained about the gears: "I would not give a dam for them for I tore them all to peases to pick last yeares crops." 40 De Bow's Review suggested in 1846 that steam or water was far preferable to horse power for running a gin because a more steady and uniform motion of the gin rollers could be maintained. 61 Perhaps this factor caused Professor Olmsted, during his trip through the South in 1847, to comment that the principle of Eli Whitney's

STEAM POWER COMES TO THE FARM

11

cotton gin had not been altered since the first one was put in motion, although "great improvements have been made in the application and direction of the moving forces in the employment of steam power." 02 T h e early steam engines, once installed, did not require unusual skill to operate. With relatively few moving parts to cause trouble, the engineer's chief concern was watching the pressure gauge and tending the fire. T h e United States Government survey of 1838 reported that the engines driving sugar mills, cotton gins, and sawmills in Louisiana were generally worked by slaves.03 T h e editor of the Southern Agriculturist in 1832 observed in Georgia a sugar mill which employed twenty-six laborers and boiled out ten thousand to fourteen thousand gallons of juice every twenty-four hours. T h e engineers were listed as two Negro men. 04 T h e skill of these engineers, however, is difficult to determine: T . P. Norton, a customs official in Louisiana, notified Lewis Woodbury, the Secretary of the Treasury, in 1838 that there were about thirty engines in operation in his vicinity, but no accident was known to have happened to any of them. "They are always conducted by temperate engineers," he added, "which is not often the case in regard to boats." ®5 However, mismanagement did occur. Workers were sometimes injured in the gears attached to the sugar mill, dirty water was added to the boilers, and maximum steam pressures were disregarded. John £vans, an overseer on a Florida plantation, wrote to George Noble Jones, the owner, in 1856 decrying the fact that the engineer put fire into the engine "without having the boiler filled with water and he has so injured it so that it leaks out the water and it cant run so they have not bin but 9 bales of cotton packed hear this year and 3 or 4 more gined in the lint room." He added that the slave engineer, fearing punishment, had run away but had fortunately returned. 66 T h e fuel used to heat the boilers of plantation steam engines varied according to local conditions. In the deep South, great quantities of wood were used in sugar mills. It was estimated that one cord of dry pine was required to grind and process one acre of cane.6T A common practice in procuring fuel was to have the slaves fish driftwood from the rivers and bayous. One of the most onerous chores of the Negroes was that of cutting wood for fuel in the swamps that invariably lay behind the sugar plantations. Some planters purchased coal to run the engines. In the 1850's, in a desperate effort to economize, many planters fired their engines with bagasse.®8 T h a t some difficulties were experienced in getting up steam is evidenced by Thomas J . Spear's attempts to sell a Hydrogen and Oxygen Gas Burner and Air Distributor, an invention for forcing steam over the flames in the firebox to increase the draft and combustion. T h e in-

12

STEAM POWER ON THE AMERICAN FARM

ventor boasted that this attachment permitted the planter to burn green wood, damp sawdust, partially dried bagasse, tan bark, or coal slack.6· The amount of steam power available for Southern planters in 1850 was limited in comparison to the total power required in agricultural work. T h e almost universal use of labor and work animals at this time dispels the notion that an era of power farming had arrived. The "man with the hoe" was still much in evidence. In 1838, there were approximately four hundred stationary engines performing work directly related to agriculture. Even if this number was trebled during the next decade, the total steam power utilized on the farm would amount only to twenty-four thousand horsepower. 70 Since all forms of prime movers in the United States in 1849 were equal to ten million horsepower, it is evident that only a beginning had been made in bringing mechanical power to the farm. 71 That greater application of steam power to American agriculture did not occur during the first half of the nineteenth century may be attributed in part to the apathy of many farmers in embracing new methods. Veneration for the horse was strong. Some farmers feared steam engines; others anticipated difficulty in keeping them in repair; and still others believed they would remain idle most of the year and that skilled engineers and expensive workshops would be required to maintain them. 72 Occasionally engines were sold which were faulty in design, workmanship, or material. Others not particularly adapted to the type of work proved unsatisfactory. John Carmichael Henkins, owner of 5,210 acres near Natchez, became dissatisfied with his steam-powered cotton gins in 1845 and reverted to horses in the belief that he would get better service. 73 The George Frick Company of Waynesboro, Pennsylvania, a prominent builder of stationary engines in the 1850's, received many complaints from owners, many of whom no doubt were incompetent operators. William Walker, who operated an engine on his farm near Gordonsville, Virginia, for sawing wood, threshing grain, and grinding grain, described his troubles in 1858: Monday we got down to the mill-house at daylight to fire up. In an hour the engine was hissing steam and belching forth a deep hollow cough from the stack like a huge animal panting for breath. But we soon had a pack of trouble. Our boiler flues gave out, the pump will not work and our governor is of no account. Fact is we are in more of a mess than we had reckoned. 74

Perhaps the inability of manufacturers to build an engine cheap enough to bring it within the purchasing power of the small or middle-class farmer was the most serious deterrent to the rapid application of steam power to agriculture prior to 1850. Engines in the two-

STEAM POWER COMES TO T H E FARM

13

thousand-dollar class caused even the wealthiest agriculturist in the South to hesitate before making such an investment. The Page Windmill Company in 1848 admitted that steam power had advanced almost beyond human calculation, but that the cost of steam was "all absorbing and increasing daily." 75 During the depression of 1857, some planters asked the manufacturers of engines to cut their prices 30 to 50 per cent.™ Others suggested that unless prices were reduced they would have their farm work done by water mills or else rely entirely on their horses.77 While much of the early experimentation with agricultural engines occurred on southern plantations, the American farmers in all sections of the country were learning more about the potentialities of steam power. Some technological knowledge could be attained by observing the steamboats on western rivers, many of which gave the frontiersmen their first demonstration of self-propelled machines. It was reported that a steamboat ascending the Illinois River in 1828 caused considerable excitement. One fanner, seeing the open fires under the boilers, which at night looked like the flashing eyes of some monster, turned out with dog and gun and chased the craft up the river. Another more pious family regarded the event as the millennium. 78 In the lower South, steamboats enlivened the forest with their steam calliopes and brightened the lowlands with cabin lights, as they hauled cotton bales down to Mobile, New Orleans, and Liverpool.™ The extension of railroad lines westward toward the Mississippi River likewise quickened interest in steam power. Doctor James Johnson, writing for the Mechanics' Register in 1838, described the locomotive as a magic automaton darting forward at thirty miles an hour dragging whole cargoes of commerce and sounding a whistle— an unearthly yell like the cry of some huge animal being gored to death.80 J . Allen Ransome in The Implements of Agriculture published in 1843 remarked that it was not surprising that farmers in the fields on seeing steam engines speeding over the rails should consider how valuable this power could be to cultivate the soil. He believed the time would soon come when every farmer with four hundred acres of arable land would be considering the purchase of a steam engine.81 Apparently the knowledge of steam power became fairly well disseminated during the thirties and forties. Daniel Webster in 1831 expressed his enthusiasm in oratorical fashion by asserting, "Steam is everywhere practicable . . . it will bear the toil with no muscle to grow weary, no nerve to relax, no breast to feel faint." 82 The Family Magazine of Cincinnati in 1836 concluded, "The nature and power of steam are now well understood." 83 Periodical literature

14

STEAM POWER ON THE AMERICAN FARM

kept farmers informed of the most recent developments at home a n d abroad. T h e New York Farmer and American Gardner's Magazine in 1834 reported that steam-driven threshers were gaining more favor in Britain because of their convenience. Many English farmers believed the expense in keeping horses was too high. T o maintain them required almost half the produce of the farm. 8 4 Niles' Weekly Register in 1836 predicted that "in a few years, steam power will be applied to such a variety of purposes, that the services of the horse, or the ox, will no longer be required." 85 T h e Monthly Journal of Agriculture concurred in this belief in 1846 suggesting that the American farmer should 'lessen the heavy labor on the farm by applying steam power for various useful purposes.8® N o d o u b t this anticipation of progress p r o m p t e d George W. Cutter of Covington, Kentucky, to write his "Song of Steam," a poem which Blackwood optimistically pronounced as the best lyric of the century. I've no muscle to weary, no heart to decay No bones to be "laid on the shelf" And soon I intend you may "go and play" While I manage the world myself. But harness me down with your iron bands Be sure of your curb and rein, For I scorn the strength of your puny hands, As a tempest scorns a chain.87

Chapter II T H E PORTABLE AGRICULTURAL STEAM ENGINE Horacc Greeley, well-known journalist and politician, stopped in Watertown, New York, on a lecture tour in 1850, he saw a small Hoard and Bradford steam engine driving a printing press. Impressed by the sight, he wrote to the New York Tribune expressing the optimistic opinion that, "The time must be at hand when every thrifty farmer . . . will have such an engine of his own. Chopping straw, turning grindstones, cutting wood, churning and thrashing will cease to be a manual and become a mechanical operation. . . . We have hardly begun to use steam yet. . . . " 1 Greeley's dream of more mechanical power in the predominantly agricultural states was neither original nor unique; it had long been a matter of speculation by farmers and the manufacturers of farm machinery. T h e considération of steam as a source of power on the grain-growing farms of the country resulted from conditions created by the constantly improved agricultural methods developed on the rapidly expanding agricultural frontiers. Following the War of 1812, a wave of migration rolled westward beyond the Appalachians and spread out like a huge fan to the Mississippi River. Although the trapper, lumberman, and real estate speculator were also on the scene, the majority of the emigrants were land-hungry people intent on making a living on the farm. There was much cause for optimism. The level land, the fertility of the soil, and the open stretches of prairie encouraged larger farming operations. T o pay for these lands, farmers sowed wheat, the best cash crop on the Irontier. This wheat was often used as a medium of exchange. 2 These settlers, eager to increase their work potential, purchased new implements which shifted more of the manual labor to the ox and horse. By 1845 the McCormick and Hussey reaping machines had begun to transfer the burden of harvesting from the backs of men to those of horses, and one of the serious labor problems of the prewar era was solved.3 More horse-drawn cultivators, drills, and harrows were "Mso used to facilitate the sowing of seed and the tilling of the soil. Meanwhile efforts had been made to improve the methods for threshing grain crops. T h e first threshing machines were designed

WHEN

15

16

STEAM POWER ON T H E AMERICAN FARM

to eliminate much of the tedious manual labor previously associated with it in the operations of flailing or treading out grain with animals. Although the invention of a machine which would thresh, separate, and clean the grain was the product of the combined efforts of scores of men working independently over a century, historians credit Andrew Meikle of Scotland with construction of the first threshing machine worthy of the name. Since these machines of the late 1780 s contained a drumlike beater revolving inside a set of concaves to knock out the grain from the heads, the basic principle of threshing by means of a whirling cylinder became the accepted standard of threshing-machine construction. 4 In general, most of the American threshing machines used during the 1830's were extremely simple in construction. T h e open-spiked cylinders were held in a boxlike frame, and were turned by a handcrank or pulley. T h e grain bundles were held against the revolving cylinder until the kernels were stripped from the straw. T h e cylinders were usually of wood. When out of balance they gave out a guttural bellow, which earned them the name "bull thresher." T h e Pitts Brothers, Hiram and John of Winthrop, Maine, made in 1834 the first practical threshing machines which separated the chaff from the grain. 5 T h i s type of machine became the original of a great family of "endless apron" or "grain belt" threshers. Although various changes were made in the details of construction by many of the companies, it is significant that the principles covered by the original patent of these machines were used by practically all of the prominent manufacturers during the next half-century." T h e successful introduction of the threshing machine to American agriculture, like that of the plow or reaper, depended on adequate power to drive the machinery. During the late 1820's and 1830's treadmills provided the power for threshing. These machines consisted of a chute mounted above an inclined platform built in the form of an endless chain. When horses were placed upon the revolving platform, their weight turned the chain as a stream of water turns an overshot water wheel. T h e treadmills, however, could accommodate only three horses. T o increase the amount of power, inventors designed sweep-power machines which could use eight to fourteen horses. These machines were similar to the horse-driven sugar mills where the teams were hitched to sweeps and traveled in a circle. T h i s force was carried through a set of gears to long tumbling rods, which in turn carried the rotary power to the cylinder of the threshing machine. During the 1840's and 1850's, constant improvements were made in the manufacture of threshing machines and sweep powers. T h e improvements increased the size and efficiency of the machinery, but

T H E PORTABLE AGRICULTURAL STEAM ENGINE

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these changes also made them more expensive. As a result it was usually necessary for two or three farmers to pool their financial resources in order to buy a threshing outfit. Some of these men, after threshing their own crops, used their machinery to thresh for their neighbors. Some bought machines to enter the field as professional threshermen. This marked the real beginning of the custom threshing business in the United States, a system which has become since that time a definite feature of this phase of agricultural work. T h e custom thresherman who moved from one farm to another each fall came to be recognized as a person with a special skill which distinguished him from the ordinary farmer. Because this work was important to the economic welfare of the community, he was regarded with considerable respect. In addition to keeping the machinery in repair, he often drove the horses on the sweep power. Since these-horses had to be managed without a touch of the reins, the duties of the driver were largely of a vocal nature. An extensive vocabulary rich in adjectives and expletives was at his command. Considerable versatility was essential in handling horses because their moods might vary from day to day. If the teams were in high spirits, the driver often talked to them in a succession of soft whistles and gentle croaks like the opening carol of an early robin or the distant sighing of the wind. At other times, he shouted loudly, as his black snake whip circled aloft or cracked sharply as it nipped at dilatory horse flesh. Toward the end of a long day's work the driver usually uttered a series of tranquilizing "whoas" and watched the teams stop in their tracks, as if they had promptly fallen asleep.7 In the gradual development of a better life on the farm, the introduction of horse-drawn machinery had reduced the amount of hand labor necessary in agriculture. Mindful of this progress De Bow's Review in 1846 suggested that the perfection of machines should be appreciated because now "Divine Providence has allowed us by intellect to work out our great salvation from the bitter curse 'by the sweat of thy brow thou shalt eat bread.' " 8 T o those possessing foresight, however, further improvements were expected and the future appeared most propitious. Meanwhile, some of the more alert farmers and businessmen realized that although new machinery had made possible the use of more horses in agriculture, there had not been a corresponding increase in the utilization of mechanical power. Aside from a few well-scattered stationary steam engines on Southern plantations and in Northern sawmills and gristmills, as previously mentioned, the average grain-growing farmer was still dependent upon the ox, the mule, and the horse. If animal power could reduce the amount of hand labor on the farm, why not utilize mechanical power to supplement or

18

STEAM POWER ON THE AMERICAN FARM

possibly supplant animals? Why not make steam power available to all farmers? Unfortunately the steam engines of the 1840's were stationary. T h e y were cumbersome and difficult to install. T h e heavy so-called " L o n g J o h n " boilers required masonry for solid foundations, special building for protection, and complicated machinery to connect the steam dome with the detached working parts of the engine. Since the work on the average farm was diverse in nature and located in many different places, this lack of mobility prevented the general introduction of steam engines on the grain-growing farms of the country. A correspondent writing to the Country Gentleman in 1858 complained that they "never were and in all probability never will be a suitable force or power for the use of cultivators of the soil." 0 Before steam engines could be used to advantage on the average farm, they had to be made portable. By attaching the steam cylinder and flywheel directly to the boiler, a compact power unit was formed which could be mounted on trucks and pulled by horses. T h i s mobility permitted engines to be used wherever belt work was required. T h e ease of movement and simplicity of operation appealed to custom threshermen who traveled from one farm to another to do their work. T h e editor of the Valley Farmer writing from Louisville, Kentucky, in 1858 stated that portable engines could be moved from one farm to another as easily as a wagon and that for persons "going round in threshing for farmers, they would be far better adapted to the purpose and more economical than horse power machines." 10 T h e first portable steam engines designed for agricultural purposes in the United States were manufactured in 1849. A. L. Archambault of Philadelphia built an engine mounted on wheels called " T h e Forty-Niner" which was in four, ten, and thirty horsepower sizes and ranged in price from $625 to $2,300. 11 T h e same year Charles B. Hoard and Gilbert Bradford of Watertown, New York, began manufacturing portable engines for farm use. 12 Since Watertown was located in the wheat-growing area of the Mohawk Valley, Hoard and Bradford were doubtless aware of the need for a more satisfactory power for threshing grain. Cognizant of the need for mechanical power for threshing and anticipating a growing demand for agricultural engines, at least twenty-two other companies built portables prior to the outbreak of the Civil War. 1 3 Many of the concerns manufacturing railroad locomotives, steamboats, or farm implements now added portable engines to their line of products. Geographically these companies were well scattered. As J . C. Hoadley of Lawrence, Massachusetts, manufactured engines in 1860 to meet the demands of Eastern wheat growers, Joseph Enright of San Jose, California, was engaged in the same enterprise

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to satisfy a similar market in the rapidly developing Pacific Coast regions. 14 T h e manufacture of portable sawmills and gristmills which could be operated without water power also created a demand for more portable steam engines. Water mills could be located only in places having adequate streams, but the boiler of a steam engine could be supplied from ponds or wells. In addition, the steam engines could be used the year around regardless of winter weather which often froze mill streams and rendered them inoperative for long periods of

First portable farm steam engine in United States. Built by A. L. Archambault of Philadelphia, 1849. From F a r m Implement News, Nov. 1886.

time. T h e committee which made the awards for agricultural machinery entered at the Ohio State Fair at Cleveland in 1856 observed that there was a rapidly increasing demand for portable machines of all descriptions. These men stated that the old gristmills and sawmills which depended upon water power were disappearing, and that the march of improvement had almost left the "old clacking mill as the exclusive property of a bygone age. Steam power has superseded the necessity of a waterfall as a motive power and now portable machines are obviating the necessity of large stationary structures. . . . " 15 T h e advertisements of the 1850's reveal the versatility of the engines. Harland and Hollingsworth of Wilmington, Delaware, claimed their portable engines were capable of driving threshing machines,

20

STEAM POWER ON THE AMERICAN FARM

circular saws, and water pumps. 1 · A. N. Wood and Company of Eaton, New York, recommended their engines for grinding and threshing grain.17 The Tredegar portables built in Richmond, Virginia, were purported to be ideal for ginning cotton and grinding corn. 18 George Page of Baltimore asserted that his engines and sawmills would cut from two to ten thousand feet of lumber during a ten-hour day, and that the engines were well adapted for all farm and plantation work. They were "emphatically portable calculated to be hauled by four or six horses over any road, through woods, or over any other place where logs can be hauled or a team travel." 19 The Owen, Lane, and Dyer Company of Hamilton, Ohio, exhibited at the Illinois State Fair at Centralia in 1858 an engine which drove a threshing machine and corn sheller.20 The F. W. Robinson Company of Richmond, Indiana, distributed catalogues in 1859 picturing portable threshing engines equipped with attachments for steaming food and vegetables for livestock.21 Although somewhat crude in appearance, the portable engines built in the 1850's possessed all the basic features necessary for successful operation. They were self-acting, with tubular boilers, governors, safety values, and a forced draft. Most of them were simple in construction and could be purchased with or without trucks. Their manufacture was encouraged by many of the state agricultural societies, which offered cash awards, diplomas, and medals at county and state fairs. The Hoard and Bradford engine received favorable comment from the judges of the New York State Fair in the summer of 1851. In awarding the company a medal, the committee remarked that the engine was built in portable form which could be as "conveniently removed from place to place and set up as readily as a common stove." 22 The Virginia State Agricultural Society held mechanical exhibits in Richmond in 1855, and premiums as high as one hundred dollars were awarded for the best farm engines.23 Even though it is impossible to measure the degree of interest taken by the general public in these early agricultural steam engines, it is apparent that the subject was given considerable attention by the newspapers and farm journals. T h e novelty of the use of steam as the first portable mechanical power on the farm was sufficient in itself to merit recognition by the editors of farm magazines, most of whom regarded steam power with much optimism. The magazines often featured the iron horse on the farm breaking the chains of bondage and ushering in the dawn of a new era. Perhaps this optimism was part of the practice of good business; certainly the happy future of power farming with steam made better reading than the description of hard times, low grain prices, and farm mortgages. Some of these predictions were expressed in an eloquent style. The

T H E PORTABLE AGRICULTURAL STEAM ENGINE

21

editor of Moore's Rural New Yorker exclaimed in 1851 that steam power would never tire nor brook any opposition. It would mean "peace, progression, civilization, education, and abundance to all." 24 The Indiana Agricultural Reports of 1856 stated: Agriculture by steam! What a change! Might not the question be asked. Does man eat his bread by the sweat of his brow? Indeed, it looks as though the ancient curse had been lifted from man, and he is allowed to eat almost the bread of idleness. . . . 2 i

Most of the farm periodicals, however, expressed more conservative opinions. The editor of the Country Gentleman in 1854 saw no reason why steam power could not be used profitably for farm purposes.2® Two years later he reported that the general farm use of steam power was only a question of time.21 T h e Prairie Farmer encouraged the introduction of steam power over a period of many years, and the editor anticipated a bright future for the steam engine in agriculture, especially on the western prairies. 28 The practical application of steam power to agriculture, however, was a slow process. Prior to the Civil War its introduction had scarcely gone beyond the experimental stage. The scattered sprinkling of a few portable steam engines over the farming areas was so thin that the average farmer remained almost untouched by the new developments in the field of mechanical power. He was scarcely aware of the innovation. T h e farm engines were still a luxury to be enjoyed by a few wealthy planters in the South and a handful of gentlemen farmers living on huge prairie domains in the Middle West. T h e average farmer apparently lacked capital to invest in steam engines, which he believed would only supplement not supplant horse power. An Illinois farmer in 1855 explained that there were not enough inducements to warrant the purchase of a steam engine, and that "horses are still almost universally preferred in this country. . . ." 28 Throughout the major grain-growing sections of America then, the use of steam power in agriculture during the 1850's was limited. T h e committee which judged the field trials of farm implements at Geneva, New York, in 1852 observed that although the farmers showed much interest in portable steam engines as a motive power, they had not as yet adopted them.30 A Kentucky wheat grower in 1854 remarked that he knew of no farm in his part of the country where the steam engine was at work.31 In 1855 a farmer in New York, writing to the Cultivator, observed that the only engine used in his region was owned by a custom thresherman who went from farm to farm doing the work usually done by the horse-power machines.32 When R. L. Colt of Paterson, New Jersey, used a thirteen-horsepower steam engine in 1854 for threshing, cutting stalks, and sawing wood,

22

STEAM POWER ON T H E AMERICAN FARM

the fact was noted in most of the farm journals of the country, indicating that the use of steam power on the average farm was not commonplace. 3 3 As might be expected, the actual sales of portable steam engines were very small. A. N. Wood and Company, one of the first companies to push their sales, sold only six agricultural engines in 1856,34 and the Welsh Company of Chillicothe, Ohio, d u r i n g its first three years of business from 1854 to 1857 sold only eight farm engines. 35 T h e use of these engines was such a rare occurrence that editors of the various magazines often made long trips to witness their performance and to interview the farmer who had m a d e the unusual purchase. T h e editor of the Cincinnati Gazette, after watching a Welsh engine drive a thresher in Ohio in 1857, reported that the "idea was new to me and is equally new to the public." 38 T h e introduction of steam power to agriculture in Great Britain bore a close resemblance to the American developments. Many agriculturists impatiently urged the adoption of steam for farm purposes in the same degree that intellect, skill, capital, and economy had been applied to the factory, railroad, and steamboat. A letter received by Lord J o h n Russell in 1849 suggested that the food supply of the British Empire could be increased by using steam power to supplement the 1,200,000 farm horses in England. T h i s would also relieve the monotony of agricultural labor and transform "clod-hoppers into skilful directors of steam-driven machines." 37 During the 1840's, portable farm engines were manufactured by T u x f o r d of Boston, England, and by 1855 at least ten companies were engaged in this production. Clayton Shuttleworth and Company built upwards of two thousand portable engines from 1845 to 185 5,38 many of which were for export. 3 9 The Proceedings o/ the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, which was published in 1856, reported that, although the application of steam power to agricultural purposes was of comparatively recent origin, this development h a d now become practical and a matter of great importance among mechanical engineers and agriculturists alike. 40 Although the general use of farm engines d u r i n g the first half of the nineteenth century was limited, the first feeble steps on the road toward power farming had been taken. From these faltering beginnings a steady progress was to be reflected during the following decades. In the 1850's the acreage of grain crops in the United States had increased, b u t extensive f a r m i n g in the late 1860's and 1870's developed on an unprecedented scale. In these large-scale farming operations all types of improved agricultural machines became necessary. It was during these years that the utilization of steam power by Ameri-

T H E PORTABLE AGRICULTURAL STEAM ENGINE

23

can farmers became practical, and the iron horse became a familiar part off the agrarian scene. Diuring this agricultural expansion, the settlers, encouraged by the homiestead and land-grant-college acts and by the railroad land grants, moved westward to acquire cheap lands. The Rochester Chronicle, an Indiana newspaper, predicted in 1865 that thousands of people wouild leave the crowded cities of the East to settle in the "brooding silemce of the wilderness of the West." 41 Although the exodus from eastern cities to western farms has probably been greatly exaggerated, yet iit is evident that favorable publicity sponsored by special-interest groups influenced the westward movement. The Iowa immigration boards in 1871 sent out forty-nine thousand pamphlets written in fouir different languages to encourage settlement in that state.42 A Missouri newspaper in the late 1860's exhorted, "Come West, a few dollars will place you in Missouri where all kinds of labor are in demand and high wages are paid." 43 In Dakota Territory, the Yankton Press in 1871 carried the banner line "Uncle Sam is rich enough to give us all a farmi" 44 Articles such as "Paradise Regained" described the excellent climate, the good crops, and the rich soil which would grow corn fourteen feet tall with five ears to the stalk.45 The Hebron Journal of Nebraska in 1877 suggested that anyone coming to the region would be thankful that he had cast his lot in pleasant places in a land "metaphorically flowing with wine and honey." 46 Spurred by these inducements, people moved westward looking for new opportunities. The Sioux City Journal announced that twice as many immigrants came to Iowa in 1868 as in the previous year, and added, "Our streets are daily crowded with the long lines of prairie schooners hailing from every section of the East on their way to the rich homes furnished them by the fostering care of our government." 47 T h e increased immigration from Europe added to this westward trek. Over two million foreigners reached the American shores in the period from 1861 to 1870." During the next twenty years an additional eight million people arrived.49 A newspaper editor in southern Minnesota in the early 1870's commented upon the influx of new settlers from abroad by announcing that four hundred Swedes, "fresh from the old country," had arrived at Portage Lake in one week.50 J . R. Dodge, statistician for the Commissioner of Agriculture in 1881, explained that "these foreigners came here not to become tenants but proprietors. They moved directly toward the free government lands which furnish vital inducement to immigration." G1 Wheat was planted more and more, until the wheat acreage in 1878 doubled that of 1866.52 Minnesota's wheat crop rose from two million bushels in 1859 to fifteen million in 1869, a seven-fold increase in nine years.53

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STEAM POWER ON T H E AMERICAN FARM

In 1862, Kansas farmers planted only nine thousand acres of wheat; in 1876 the total was over one million acres.54 During the 1860's and 1870's, improvements made in the flourmilling industry proved to be of great significance to American wheat farmers, particularly those living in the spring wheat regions of the middle-west and northwest states.55 Inventive minds in Europe and the United States devised the middling purifier to facilitate the separation of the bran from the flour. Hungarian iron rollers replaced stone grinders making gradual reduction, or the high milling process, more satisfactory.5® As a result, spring wheat could be ground into better quality flour, capable of commanding the highest market prices.57 T o secure premium prices, farmers increased production of spring wheat and helped make Minneapolis by 1885 the greatest wheat market in the United States.58 When the railroad trackage increased from about thirty thousand miles in 1860 to ninety thousand in 1880, transportation of grain from the farms to die mills was improved.5® New agricultural lands were brought within reach of grain terminals and, subsequently, the products of wheat farms poured into the world markets.90 Agricultural progress following the Civil War cannot be measured by statistics alone, for beyond these figures lie many factors— the part played by the individual, his hours of labor, his skill in using machines, and the utilization of animal and machine power. The ingenuity of the inventor, the skill of the mechanic, and the adaptability of the farmers themselves were all involved in this story of agricultural expansion. As the machines on the farm were improved and vast acreages were plowed, seeded, and harvested, more belt power was needed to thresh out the grain crops. The seriousness of this problem led to the increased use of steam engines on the farms. Prior to 1860, the use of horses on tread and sweep powers had worked fairly well. These horse-power rigs could thresh three to four hundred bushels a day, a capacity inadequate for the postwar farm. Speed in threshing was essential to good farming. If this work were prolonged, inclement weather damaged the crop and impaired the quality of the grain. T o complete the threshing in better season, farmers demanded larger threshers to replace the small prewar machines. A custom thresherman writing to the George Frick Company of Waynesboro, Pennsylvania, in 1869 complained: "Sir, these small threshing machines are wasting our time. We must have larger machines to do the job right. . . ." 61 Manufacturers responded by building machines which could thresh out nine hundred bushels of grain in a day's time.62 These machines necessitated the use of more power than could be supplied

THE PORTABLE AGRICULTURAL STEAM ENGINE

25

satisfactorily by horse powers. This inadequacy provided the strongest incentive for the introduction of steam engines for farm use. The largest sweep powers often proved inadequate because they could accommodate a maximum of only fourteen horses. Since these teams walked in a relatively small circle, their working space was limited. If more than fourteen horses were hitched to the horse power, the whole animal menagerie became cumbersome, unwieldy, and operated on a basis of diminishing returns. This lack of power was even more noticeable since the horses were usually small in size and light in weight. For many years American horse breeders had specialized in raising trotters, pacers, and coach horses rather than heavy draft horses. The American Agriculturist in 1865 charged that the country was overstocked with small Morgans and other trotting stock, because agricultural societies and the press had encouraged the breeding of a class of light, active horses for the road and had failed to recognize the need for heavier horses for draft purposes.®3 The editor of the Indiana Farmer in 1880 complained that stockmen still continued to favor the saddle-horse type, and that the agricultural societies gave first-class awards at fairs to horses with speed instead of size. "Would not a Spanish bull fight draw fully as well," he fumed, "and be no more demoralizing in the effect on the spectators. . . 84 T h e lightweight horses were at a disadvantage when hitched to a sweep power geared to a large threshing machine. When poor threshing resulted from this lack of power, salesmen for the various threshing companies invariably placed the blame on the light horses. Threshermen, on the other hand, complained that the horse-power machines were poorly designed and "ran hard." e s Perhaps both were right. Since only a limited number of horses could be hitched to a sweep power, each horse was worked to its maximum capacity. This constant overloading made threshing a horse-killing job. Each farmer was expected to add one or two teams to the threshing outfit when the custom thresher arrived in the fall. T h e farmer's horses were by then usually worn out from the summer's work of plowing, cultivating, and harvesting, and needed a rest. Instead they were hitched to the sweep power and forced to pull on the monotonous merry-goround in the heat, dust, and flies. With the horses pulling in the circle, they were under a constant side draft which forced the collar out at the tip of the inside shoulder and caused ugly sores." One farmer observed that "two or three days' threshing hurts my horses more than a month's ordinary work. . . . They are constantly pulling on a twist. This cannot be avoided." βτ A New York farmer in 1877, after describing the horse-

26

STEAM POWER ON T H E AMERICAN FARM

killing effects of the sweep-power machine, suggested that "it was about time that some agent of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals should intervene. . . ." 68 Horse flesh was not really expendable, because there was a scarcity of horses in the United States. T h e Civil W a r killed off large numbers of horses and mules at the very time that expanding agriculture had increased the demand for animal power. 69 T h i s scarcity was made more acute because horses were subject to ailments like "horse plague," "dropsy of the chest," and epizootic, which often broke out without warning in different sections of the country. 70 If these outbreaks occurred in the fall, threshing operations were interrupted. Some newspapers reported the number of bushels threshed " u p until the time of the horse epidemic." 71 An alert salesman for the Frick Company, observing that a certain thresherman's horses were sick, wrote almost enthusiastically to the home office in 1868 that "Now is the time to sell this man a steam engine." 72 T h e use of horse powers for threshing proved unsatisfactory on many occasions because of the difficulty in maintaining an even speed in the threshing cylinder and a steady motion of the moving parts of the machine. T h e horses sometimes walked too rapidly or too slowly according to their dispositions and moods of the moment. If the machine was driven too fast, the grain was rushed through the thresher without time for adequate separation of the grain from the straw. If the horses failed to maintain proper motion by walk ing too slowly, poor separation again resulted. One of the governors in this operation was the "driver," who stood on a pedestal above the horses and, like an animal trainer in a cage, attempted to keep them moving at the proper speed. An inexperienced team often tried to do all the work by itself, while some of the old plugs soon learned the trick of retarding their speed when ever the driver's head was turned. T h e second governor on the threshing rig was the "feeder," who pushed the grain bundles into the threshing cylinder. As the cylinder spun at a rate of 1,000 rpm with the teeth traveling at a rate of a mile a minute, it gave off a constant whirring hum. 7 3 T h e feeder was expected to have a good "ear for music," so that the cylinder became a speed indicator informing him how fast to push the straw into the face of the cylinder. If the feeder were not a good musician, grain would be lost, and the farmers would soon be complaining about grain in the straw pile. This rate of speed and motion had not been so important when the old prewar apron threshing machines were in use, because the separating process by means of the endless belt was not particularly sensitive to the rate of speed with which the machine turned. T h e speed of threshing machines, however, took

T H E PORTABLE AGRICULTURAL STEAM ENGINE

27

on added significance when John Cox and Cyrus Roberts introduced the new vibrating threshing principles in 1856.74 Their machines were constructed with cranks attached to the straw racks to toss the straw up and down within the thresher to facilitate the separation of the grain. This principle was very efficient, but it required a steady motion at a rated speed set by the manufacturers. Any variation, even as small as 5 per cent, in the speed of the machine was sufficient to reduce the efficiency of threshing operations.75 T h e added importance of a steady, even rate of speed created a prerequisite difficult to meet with horse power. A Pennsylvania thresherman in 1871 complained that, "My machine ain't run stedy a nouf. the folks growl a good deel about the horses waulking too fast. . . ." 76 This absence of a steady power became one of the best selling points of early steam-engine salesmen. If the horse as a source of power was often inadequate for threshing grain, the sweep power to which he was hitched also had a number of inherent weaknesses. A machine of this type was difficult to start rolling. For a horse to move from a dead standstill to a normal walk was a matter of taking two steps, but when hitched to a lever of a sweep power this meant that the whole threshing machine would have gone from a similar standstill to full speed in a matter of seconds. Since this was impossible, the horses had to be trained to "lean into" the power so as to exert a prolonged steady pull against a force that was almost a dead weight. An uninitiated team of horses would usually take one healthy lunge into the collar, get discouraged over the meager results, and seesaw back and forth in utter frustration. This was disconcerting to the horse and disastrous for the sweep power. Within a few moments castings would be cracked and cogs broken from the gears, leaving an unemployed threshing crew, an enraged farmer with a partially threshed grain field, and a cursing thresherman wondering how many days would be required to secure repairs from the factory. Through bitter experience the thresherman learned to carry along a wagon box full of spare parts. Even this was little consolation during the rush days of the threshing season when he desired a degree of dependability not to be found in the sweeppower machines. Home offices of direshing-machine companies during the 1860's and 1870's were usually swamped by telegrams and letters pleading for repairs and quicker service. The tone was almost plaintive. Within the trade area of Waynesboro, Pennsylvania, the George Frick Company received such urgent requests as, "We broke the spider and bevel pinion on the horse power. Send out parts at once. . . ." 7 7 "Hurry and send me a center bevel wheel and those parts that are most apt to break. . . ." 78 "We threshed five bundles

28

STEAM POWER ON T H E AMERICAN FARM

of wheat when three cogs flew off. . . . " 7 n In Wisconsin, farmers writing to J . I. Case stated that "the nuckle broke the first day i run the masheen. it was flawey. . . . " 80 and "can't you hurry the repair parts, everybody wanting threshing done. . . ." 81 T h e Upton Company in Battle Creek, Michigan, heard similar complaints: "Trouble, trouble, that's all I have is trouble—send out eight knuckle and eight pinions for my horse power, express. . . ." 82 Since the sweep-power machines transmitted the rotary power to the threshing machine through a set of tumbling rods fastened together with knuckle joints, exposure of the movable parts caused many serious accidents when the whirling rods and knuckles caught F A R M E R S ! HEBE

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This thresher in 1860 used eight men and eight horses to thresh 35 bushels per hour.

on someone's clothing. Shocking accidents caused by the tumbling rods or gears of the horse powers were frequently reported in the newspapers. Dr. W. W. Mayo of Rochester, Minnesota, performed many operations on these cases in the seventies. 83 These accidents occurred in such large numbers that some states passed laws requiring all the threshermen to "box i n " the tumbling rods and knuckle joints between the sweep power and the threshing machine. 84 Because of the unsatisfactory features of horse-power machines used for belt work, large numbers of farmers in all the major graingrowing areas of the United States began to turn to the portable steam engines as a solution. T h e Wood and Mann Steam Engine Company of Utica, New York, had sold over twelve hundred portable steam engines by 1868. 85 A Pennsylvania farmer stated in 1867 that his new steam engine had gained such a good reputation that all his neighbors wanted him to thresh for them, and that " T h e excitement over steam threshers in this country is up to the highest

THE PORTABLE AGRICULTURAL STEAM ENGINE 86

29

pitch." "We have no doubt at all of the practicability of our steam engine," wrote a Maryland thresherman in 1869, and he added that "most all the farmers here are threshing with steam power." 87 From the cotton-growing regions of the South reports were also favorable. An owner of a portable steam engine, who operated a cotton gin in Alabama, stated that it was "just the thing because it left the horses free to plow the soil." 88 During the late 1860's letters from dealers of the George Frick Company located in Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Virginia reveal the increased sale and distribution of portable farm engines. Excerpts from the following five letters are typical of this trend. "I know I can sell four engines at least." 89 "Mr. Busford wants a larger engine next year." 00 "The prospects are good for the sale of five steam engines to farmers in this county." 81 "Enclosed is an order for three threshing engines." 92 "Mr. Glaze wants another engine at once." 93 T h e horse was beginning to be challenged. In 1865 these engines were almost a novelty in many farming communities, but fifteen years later they had become rather commonplace, displacing the horse on most of the large threshing outfits of the country. The Ohio Board of Agriculture announced in 1871 that the use of portable engines in the country was constantly increasing.94 Three years later the United States Department of Agriculture disclosed that the steam engine was superseding horse powers in many places in the Middle West and that there was an increasing use of steam power in the West.95 This development had been so rapid that Professor Brewer, in writing his report for the United States census of 1880, remarked that "in all the greatest grain-growing states most of the threshing is done by steam, it is probable that not more than twenty per cent of the entire crop is threshed by horse power. . . ." 9 6 No particular state or section of the country can rightfully claim to be the birthplace of the agricultural steam engine. Unlike the railroad builders, who started operations from coast-line areas and then extended these lines hopefully toward the vast regions of the interior, the manufacturers of farm engines cannot point to the geographic progression of their products with any definite degree of finality. The introduction of a steam power to agriculture was not glued to the fixed points of a compass as a movement from east to west or from south to north. It did not possess the directional patterns so characteristic of the early frontier movements across the American continent. Although profoundly influenced by previous frontier movements, the introduction of steam power was essentially a development affecting the life of rural communities already established. Like the automobile of a later generation, steam power on

30

STEAM POWER ON T H E AMERICAN FARM

the farm emerged within a society facing the problems of secondary frontier settlement. T h e successful application of steam power to farming operations occurred almost simultaneously in all the cotton- and graingrowing states of the nation. W h e n the average farmer living in the valleys of Pennsylvania or Maryland began threshing with portable steam engines, his performance was duplicated on the prairies of the Middle West, in the rice fields of the South, and on the wheat ranches of the Pacific Coast. Manufacture of portable steam engines for farm use followed the general trend of industrial development. Whenever a new machine has proved practical and a strong demand exists for the product, a large number of companies usually enter into competition in an effort to make profits from the new business and to provide the buying public with serviceable goods. T h e producers of threshing machinery often sprang up like mushrooms on a spring morning; some of the companies took root and grew; others flourished for the hour only to wilt at noonday under the combined heat and pressure ot inadequate capital, poor management, impractical designs, and stiff competition. T h e portable farm engines of the 1870's were manufactured for the most part by companies which had been established earlier to build threshing machines. When the demand for steam engines arose after the Civil War, they were added as a new product to the companies' already well-established line of machinery. T h i s entry into the field of mechanical power was logical, because threshing machines were worthless without an adequate source of power to drive them. As a result, the custom thresherman usually bought a complete rig as one unit. 0 7 These companies owed much of their success to the hard work, ingenuity, foresight, and business acumen of a number of pioneering entrepreneurs. T h e men who became leaders in the steam-engine and threshing-machine business had much in common. Almost without exception, they began work in humble circumstances without access to reserves of capital with which to finance their industrial ventures. They all knew hard manual labor. As blacksmiths, millwrights, carpenters, and farmers, they were familiar with the sweat of the shop, the heat of the forge, and the manipulation of hand tools. Without access to higher education, they learned from the practical school of experience. T h e Pitts brothers, Hiram and J o h n , working as blacksmiths in Winthrop, Maine, built their first horse powers and threshers in the 1830's. Abraham and Jonas Gaar, sons of a log-cabin farmer in Indiana, labored as machinists in a small foundry shop before they

T H E PORTABLE AGRICULTURAL STEAM ENGINE

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went into the farm-implement business themselves. Jerome Increase Case left his home near Oswego, New York, and arrived in Rochester, Wisconsin, in 1842 with six crude threshing machines, all bought on credit. He sold five of them, and with the sixth machine he did custom threshing. He improved his machine, and later rented a small shop in Racine where he began to build his own threshing machines.88 Many of the other companies were also founded by men who worked with their hands to make their first machines. John Nichols started his business in Battle Creek, Michigan, by building his first threshing machines with his own blacksmith tools.89 Meinrad Rumely in similar fashion chipped out by hand the parts for his first threshing machine at La Porte, Indiana. 100 George Frick constructed his first steam engine in 1850, making his own patterns. All flat surfaces were hand-chipped with hammer and chisel and then hand-filed.101 A. B. Farquhar began work as a machinist's apprentice in the Dingee shops of York, Pennsylvania, where he worked with hand-drill presses, forges, and planers. Later, he secured an interest in the Dingee Company and was successful enough to entitle his memoirs The First Million Is the Hardest,102 T o make the climb from blacksmith or day laborer to internationally known manufacturer placed many demands upon the individual. An inventive mind, unusual versatility, and a capacity for plenty of hard work were some of the prerequisites of success. Before the Civil War, the founders of many of these companies built their houses next to their factories in order to room and board the apprentice workmen. The owner usually did the office work at night and spent the day working with his men in the shops. In the absence of artificial lighting, the length of the working day varied with the season. A. B. Farquhar recalled that he usually wound up his office work before the men arrived at seven o'clock in the morning. He often worked beside his men in the shops where he was hardly distinguished from the rest of the factory hands. Many of the orders for farm machinery required a custom-built job. The farmers with crude pencil drawings sketched the alterations they wanted made in the manufacture of their particular threshing machine or steam engine, and the owner of the factory, as his own production manager, worked out the proposed changes in design and supervised the construction to suit the fancy of the customer. Although the manufacturer may have preferred the smoky atmosphere of the machine shops, his duties often called him out of town. If business was slack, he hitched up a horse and buggy to look for new orders, often remaining away from home for weeks at a time.

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STEAM POWER O N T H E AMERICAN FARM

When farmers complained that a given machine failed to perform as warranted, the manufacturer often made another trip into the country to repair the threshing rig. T h e matter of collections usually called for more hard traveling than any other phase of the business. Unfortunately, financial obligations were easier to assume than to meet. T h e manufacturer soon learned that to engage an indebted thresherman in a personal interview produced a more effective response than an itemized statement of particulars tucked away in a carefully addressed envelope. After all, letters could easily be mislaid, and in addition, the old thresherman who spent his waking hours eating the flying dust from a separator and combing chaff out of his beard was never noted for his fine penmanship nor for his promptness in answering business correspondence. During the years when Jerome Case was establishing his threshingmachine business, he spent much of his time traveling through the midwestern states. He traveled by horse and buggy, stagecoach, river boat, and at times he walked across country. He experienced all the hardships of pioneer travel—poor roads, absence of bridges, flooded river valleys, sick horses, uncomfortable accommodations, and the general loneliness caused by inadequate and irregular mail service. Case recorded observations of his travels from 1848 to 1856. In his letters to his wife, still preserved by his grandchildren in Racine, Wisconsin, are revealed the problems experienced by the founder of a successful threshing-machine company. He referred to the difficulties of traveling over the unimproved roads of the 1850's on several occasions. In Rodiotes, Illinois, in April 1852, J. I. Case wrote: This morning I started by stage for Galena, arrived at Rockford about five, changed horses and proceeded with two open wagons, eight horses and thirteen passengers. Drove at a rate of two miles an hour until we arrived within 30 rods from this place where our wagon is stuck in the mud. Horses mired and fell, harness broke and we could go no further. It was dark, as well, and mud, mud on all sides of us. We tore rails from the fence and laid them down for the ladies to walk on to the fields. Finally we reached this house. T h e ladies and two children were given beds. T h e rest of us are sitting up and enjoying ourselves the best we can. I assure you I am heartily sick of this way of traveling, and when I next leave home it will be in my own conveyance. . . . It is now Saturday morning well past one a.m. My comrades have stretched themselves out on the floor trying to sleep. I am acting as fireman. 103

From other cities he made similar observations. In Whitewater, Wisconsin, in December 1851, the roads were beautifully soft with no bottoms in places. 104 In April 1852, he arrived at Galena, Illinois, after a long and tedious journey in which he rode in an open wagon

THE PORTABLE AGRICULTURAL STEAM ENGINE

S3

on top of a chest with no place to put his feet.105 At Platteville, Wisconsin, during the same year he wrote that "As I ride over these wild prairies all alone together with my horses, all I have to do is to think and hang on to the buggy to keep from blowing out." 106 T h e difficulties encountered in collecting money caused considerable comment. At Janesville, Wisconsin, in 1851 Mr. Case was unable to secure payment on a three-hundred-dollar debt because the man made away with the property and went east.107 After visiting customers in Spring Prairie, Wisconsin, the following spring, he wrote, "cash is what I am after and I must have it if I have to go to California to get it. . . ." 108 With a dry sense of humor, he related from Platteville on the same trip that "I keep taking cash so fast I think I will have to get an extra team of horses to haul it for me. I think you would like to know how much I have received. Well, when all is counted, that is, if I have spent none, $26,741 Is not that a muckle pie? I have the blues bad and can't help it. . . ." 108 T h e work on collections was usually unpleasant. In good times most farmers borrowed heavily at whatever rates of interest were asked of them. They bought more land, planted more wheat, and went into debt for harvesting and threshing equipment. When prices began to drop, alarmed creditors took steps to recover their investments. Financial panics with the curtailment of the currency and the subsequent hard times were the ugly consequences. In addition, hailstorms, drouth, floods, chinch bugs, flies, and rust sometimes destroyed the crops; poor roads prevented the marketing of grain; unreliability of currency and bank failures intensified the difficulties. One thresherman, when unable to pay his note in 1871, wrote, "I am so disgusted and mortified, I wish the engine was in Texas." 110 And a collecting agent in Illinois dolefully wrote to his home office that he had seen all the men and received the best of promises—but "no money." 111 During these days of depression, manufacturers were hard pressed to secure capital with which to pay operating expenses in order to continue in business. A business friend wrote to George Frick in 1868, "Money matters are very close in this vicinity. Our banks won't discount paper of over thirty days and business seems to be very much oppressed in consequence of the depression." 112 On many occasions the companies accepted wheat or horses as part payment for machinery. Lumber, produce, and other goods were often received in lieu of cash. Since the continued existence of a large business enterprise depended upon the confidence and good will of the buying public, advertising became an important part of the administrative policy

34

STEAM POWER ON T H E AMERICAN FARM

of threshing-machine companies. W i t h a large n u m b e r of firms competing for the trade, the financial life of each depended u p o n its ability to secure a reasonable share of the total business. Newspapers afforded an excellent means of carrying the sales arguments of the various companies directly to the people. In the 1860's, long descriptive advertisements r a n in the local papers with frequent "cuts" to accompany the written material. Farm magazines and trade journals also served as an advertising medium. Companies also used hotel registers, business directories, a n d telephone books in efforts to advertise their products. Wall hangers and posters featured large pictures of steam engines, with a commentary relating the special advantages which would accrue to the lucky customers who had the intelligence and foresight to purchase a particular machine. Large circulars included sales talks, price lists, a n d testimonial letters. O u t in the field, the company agents usually carried a pocketful of "cards" to be passed out rather promiscuously to the general public. Some of these cards bore a touching seasonal motif—a Santa Claus on the seat of a steam engine with a huge bag of "best wishes" tossed over his shoulder. Advertising ethics had not yet reached very high levels. O n many occasions deliberate attempts were made to ridicule a competitor's machinery by means of cartoons, poetical couplets, caricatures, and illustrative buffoonery. Not satisfied to relate their own good points, advertisers went on to tell how insufferably bad their rival's products had become. T h e most consistent and reliable advertising technique, however, was incorporated in the company's a n n u a l catalogues. From the rather modest beginnings in the early 1860's, these "wishing books" were enlarged a n d improved to include at least fifty pages. T h e y sparkled with illustrative materials, clever slogans, price lists, engineering tables, testimonials, a list of satisfied customers, the financial status of the company, and a classified index. T h i s entire collection was sent free on request. T h e r e can be n o d o u b t that the early steam-engine catalogues conjured u p happy dreams in the mind of the reader. A. B. F a r q u h a r on many of his travels frequently found farm libraries that consisted of the Bible, an almanac, and his steam-engine catalogue. Since the machines themselves could speak impressively, manufacturers soon found ways to display steam engines to the public. Instead of following the policy of inviting customers to visit the factory, the company brought the machines directly to the people, displaying them at fairs sponsored on a local, state, or even international basis. A steam-engine dealer writing to George Frick urged him to be more energetic in getting his farm engines before the public. He recommended a demonstration at the Baltimore fair of 1869,

T H E PORTABLE AGRICULTURAL STEAM ENGINE

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because it would be "seen by persons from all parts of the country and it is the best advertisement we can possibly get. . . ." 115 Since fairs provided opportunities for the actual demonstration of farm machinery, they made a great contribution to the popularization of portable steam engines and the more rapid application of steam power to American agriculture. The bitter competition among companies to win the prizes awarded by the judges increased the interest of spectators and enhanced the advertising possibilities of the winners. T o make a favorable impression on the public and to influence the judges, some of the manufacturers of threshing machinery built models especially designed for exhibition purposes. These machines were dressed u p for the occasion by special paint jobs and the use of highly polished metals like nickel or silver. C. W. March, the famous farm-implement inventor, visited the Philadelphia Centennial Exhibition of 1876 and observed that the manufacturers of farm machinery "vied with each other as never before or since, in the fine finish of their exhibits. Gold and silver and nickel plating was common." 114 Aware that the eyes of the judges may have been blinded by silver plating and extra finish to the real merits of the machinç, the malcontents and disgruntled groups voiced their protests. A contemporary salesman complained, "I would not give much for Talbott's fine, fancy engine that took the premium. He had his engine painted u p and decorated in fine style and it looked so nice that the committee thought 'fine feathers made fine birds.' " 115 Anxiety to prove the superiority of their steam engines led numerous companies to participate in field trials similar to those held for reapers and plows in an earlier era. The engines were belted to threshing machines which operated under ordinary conditions for a specified length of time. A corps of judges checked the amount of fuel burned, the pressure of the boiler, the consumption of water, the number of rpm developed, and the general efficiency of the engine. A comprehensive written report accompanied the decision. As many as nine engines took part in some of these trials in the 1870's.lie Occasionally, a contest was held between two engines of rival companies, with the understanding that the prospective customer for whom the contest was held would purchase the machine which won the judges' decision. The whole affair became a community attraction. Handbills were circulated announcing the details of the contest, and the amounts of money that had been wagered by the respective sides. 1 " In spite of vigorous advertising, it is evident that this phase of

36

STEAM POWER O N T H E A M E R I C A N FARM

the business was not overemphasized. Because farmers after the Civil War were still rather conservative in their attitudes toward the adoption of new agricultural methods, they needed enlightenment along mechanical lines. In some, the rugged individualism of rural life had congealed into a form of stubbornness which rebelled against innovation and sudden change, while in others an attitude of skepticism prevailed toward the novel and the unconventional. Regardless of the extremes of opinions, the average farmer was realistic enough to demand that the "proof of the pudding was in the eating of it." "Will it work and will it pay?" was his stock question. It may be also that farmers as a class possessed a physical apathy which retarded introduction of steam power to the farm. This may explain, in part, why steam came last to agriculture. As is to be expected, within every society there are a few progressive individuals who through irttuition, courage, or fortune appear in the vanguard of the search for new approaches to old problems. In the field of agricultural history these leaders protested against the obsolete and the archaic, and looked hopefully forward to the better days of power farming. One of these farmers expressed his contempt for some of his reactionary neighbors by exclaiming that the old horse power would be used only by men characterized as: a few incorrigible, old fogies, croakers, whose feelings and prejudices, in spite of reason and the evidence of their senses incline them constantly to regard progress and improvement as uncalled for innovations, wild experiments, a sort of extravagance which results from a desire to get rich too fast. . . . I find our so-called plain common sense practical farmers have so perfect a mortal dread of a steam engine for farm purposes, they look upon it as a thing of destruction. Fire and water and the dreadful explosive effects of steam are terrors to which they are not easily reconciled. . . . 1 U

T h e United States Commissioner of Agriculture, Augustin L. Taveau, admitted in 1874 that the use of steam power had not made as great advances as it should because the farmer himself had clogged its wheels with incredulity and prejudice. 119 Despite the frequent barbed and trenchant accusations of prejudice and "old fogyism" there were many factors which prompted some farmers to proceed with caution down the unexplored path of mechanical power. T h e very sight of a portable steam engine at work was not an object to instill confidence into the hearts of the timid or the uninformed. These iron and steel contraptions, loaded with a bellyful of fire, and belching forth smoke, steam, and sparks, tended to command respect. Even when the engine stood idle, the escaping steam from the hot boiler sizzled out through leaky valves and pumps in an ominous manner. It is not surprising that the in-

THE PORTABLE AGRICULTURAL STEAM ENGINE

37

experienced person held it in mortal dread as, "an infernal machine of death and destruction." 120 If the farmer was rather hesitant about embracing this monster, the paramount reason lay in the fact that he was alive and preferred to remain that way. He saw no particular virtue in tempting the gods of fate by associating with an unholy machine known to explode without warning. The thought of sudden death was disconcerting, and the idea of being first scalded and then dismembered in mid-air was a rather unpleasant reflection. T o allay the farmer's fear of boiler explosions, many steam-engine manufacturers inserted a soft metal plug in the crown sheet above the firebox. If the water became dangerously low, the soft plug would melt, permitting the water that remained to run into the firebox and extinguish the flames. Some of the companies made the soft plug optional, and advertised that it would be provided for "nervous customers" who desired this added protection. At best, some people regarded the steam engine as a sort of dangerous beast, very useful to those willing to go patiently through the process of partially subduing it to their will, but always unsafe and treacherous. If a beast must be tamed, many reasoned, why not stick to the horse whose reactions and reflexes were more predictable. The Cultivator and Country Gentleman in 1869 admitted that the prejudice of farmers had some justification, stating that there was great need for a perfectly safe and easily managed farm engine.121 If a farmer's greatest fear was the loss of life caused by boiler explosions, his next greatest concern was the possible destruction of his property by a fire started from the steam engine. This fear of fire on the farm continued in spite of the comforting assurances given by the manufacturers that their "fire proof champions" were absolutely safe from all fire hazards. That steam engines could and did start fires was an inherent weakness of these machines which was never successfully eliminated. As long as steam engines carried a fire, they possessed the potentiality of spreading that flame by accident, faulty design, or carelessness of the engineer. Since the steam engines were used in the barnyard or out in the dry stubble fields, the danger of communicating fire to the highly combustible material proved a constant menace. T o be sure, measures were taken to reduce this risk. One of the first safety devices was a spark arrester designed to extinguish all sparks in the smoke before they could leave the smokestack. Ingenious screens and deflectors were invented for this purpose, while some engines forced a stream of steam into the smokestack to extinguish the sparks. Because of these fire hazards, insurance companies at first canceled

38

STEAM POWER ON T H E AMERICAN FARM

die policies of farmers who used a steam threshing o u t f i t . 1 - After a time some of the companies did insure steam threshing owners u p o n payment of an extra fee, which often ran as high as one hundred dollars for two days' threshing. In addition, extra regulations were imposed, such as that requiring threshermen to have a pit of water under the firebox of the engine a n d a barrel of water standing nearby. One insurance company insisted that a special fireman stand on duty every minute of the day a n d night. 1 2 3 Finally, under the pressure of public opinion and the competition of rival insurance companies, threshing was insured without extra premium charges.

L a r g e n u m b e r of Frick portable engines were used on f a r m s of Virginia and Pennsylvania in the 1870's.

Protestations of various kinds, some based on prejudice a n d others on observation a n d experience, continued against the use of the early portable agricultural steam engine. At times rumors circulated that the engines were too heavy to be hauled over the country roads. Some complained of unreliability, saying the engines were subject to mechanical failures and costly breakdowns, or that they " p u m p e d a n d thumped too m u c h . " 1 2 4 A Maryland farmer remarked that "they take too much fuel and steam and d o not have enough draft, so I will not get one." 1 2 5 T h e same charge that had been made against the railroads of an earlier generation was repeated: that the steam engines were undesirable because they would drive out the horse and rob the farmer of his faithful friend. 12 ® T h i s indictment became part of a series of debates, the horse versus the steam engine, in the meeting of agricultural societies a n d in the press. T h e pro-horse crowd argued that steam engines were too expensive, unreliable, dangerous to life and

T H E PORTABLE AGRICULTURAL STEAM ENGINE

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property; that horses would still be required for hauling purposes, that the maintenance of two sources of power on the same farm was impractical, and that steam engines were unnecessary because the horse-power machines were adequate for all belt work. T o each of these arguments the anti-horse enthusiasts answered that steam power was more desirable because of its greater power, its smoothness of operation, and its tireless performance in the field. The prices of portable engines varied according to their size and style of manufacture. Most of the threshing engines in the 1870's were ten-horsepower models costing approximately a hundred and twenty dollars for each indicated horsepower. Farmers estimated the initial cost of an engine as about a thousand dollars.127 Since a complete threshing outfit cost almost two thousand dollars, most farmers, unable to afford such an investment, came to be more dependent upon custom threshermen. The owners of horse-driven custom threshing outfits operated on less capital, because they could solicit four or six horses from each farmer threshed. But these outfits could not compete with the speed and efficiency of the steam-powered threshers. As a result, the professional custom threshermen became more prominent. Frequently two or three men pooled their financial resources to buy the machinery. T o make a profit, they increased the number of farms in their annual threshing circuit until it was not uncommon for one outfit to serve the needs of forty farmers each fall.128 T h e manufacturers' access to Bessemer steel and better workmanship improved the quality of the farm engines in the late 1870's, although the basic principles of design underwent little change. As in the early railroad locomotives, tall smokestacks were attached to the boilers to improve the draft. Most of these were so tall that they had to be hinged at the base to permit the stack to be folded back over the boiler to prevent breakage in moving. Portability was made easier by larger iron wheels, and a seat was bracketed to the smokebox, giving the driver of the horses an ideal vantage position on the road. Since trees were usually plentiful, and the ax and the woodpile were commonplace on the rural homes of the middle-western states, it was taken for granted that individual farmers would furnish wood as fuel for the portable steam engines during the threshing season. This was not an expensive item because a ten-horsepower engine could be fired all day on one-half to one and a half cords of wood. In spite of low fuel costs, there were always a few farmers, much to the exasperation of the custom thresherman, who carried the matter of saving fuel costs to the point of doubtful economy. Many of the old custom threshermen, after spending years in the business, insisted that they could determine the character of any farmer in ad-

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STEAM POWER ON T H E A M E R I C A N F A R M

vanee simply by taking one good look at the kind of wood he hauled out at threshing time. Self-respecting farmers in Michigan and Wisconsin usually delighted the thresherman by providing neat piles of dry beech or maple wood cut in convenient lengths of eighteen to twenty inches. On the other hand, a few impecunious or parsimonious farmers sometimes brought out huge chunks of swamp elm so d a m p and sour they defied both the ax and flames in the firebox.123 Since these steam engines could be operated at less than four dollars a day, with no expense involved when they were not in use, steam threshermen invariably insisted that steam power was more economical than animal power. 130 A Michigan farmer boasted in 1868 that he could do one-third more work with his portable steam engine than with the best horse power made and at a lower cost of operation. 131 T h e editors of the Northwestern Farmer reported in 1870 that a portable ten-horsepower engine cost much less than ten good horses, and that it would do the work at one-fourth the cost and scarcely a tenth of the wear and waste.132 T h e successful use of portable steam engines on the American farms was dependent, in large measure, upon the mechanical skill and intelligence of the engineers who operated the engines. Under their supervision, lifeless iron and steel were transformed into machines alive with energy, pulsating with power, unaffected by the length of the day, and impervious to the ailments and frailties common to man. Prompted by the knowledge that the application of steam power to agriculture was a venture of considerable significance, the engineers took unusual pride in their mechanical ability. T o p u t a hand to the throttle valve was to many the fulfillment of a lifelong dream, an elixir to their senses, a matter of sheer ecstasy. A Pennsylvania thresherman recalled in 1871: . . . buying an engine was quite an era in my life. Ever since I was a boy I have wanted an engine. I have stood for hours watching the motions of those ponderous creatures that move the commerce of the world on sea and land and thought it was every intelligent man's education to understand an engine. After six months of careful study and comparison, I at last, with some trepidation, gave the order to have one shipped to me. . . . 1 3 3

Another thresherman, after ordering a steam engine, wrote to the manufacturer in restless animation, "I can hardly wait for my new engine to arrive. T o be the first one to pull a steamer into this section of the Cumberland Valley will be the biggest thing in my life. . . ." "« T h e engineer's pride in his work was reinforced by the keen interest taken by the public in the operation of the early portable steam

T H E PORTABLE AGRICULTURAL STEAM ENGINE

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engines. When the engine actually arrived at the nearest railroad station, it was not unusual for an unorganized reception committee of townspeople to turn out for the occasion. This event often became a rather lively affair, creating something of a holiday mood among the citizens. Children left their play to watch it; storekeepers dropped their work momentarily to view the events from a distance, and folks pushed and elbowed each other to get a better view of the first imported steam engine. After unloading the machine, the engineer with the help of an assistant or two would hitch a team to the wagon trucks and begin to move through the streets of the town in the direction of his home. The triumphal procession moved briskly along led by the horses with nostrils flared by the pull of the tugs. On the cast-iron seat, mounted high on the boilers, with the reins firmly in hand, the engineer sat enthroned. T h e local newspapers carried frequent announcements of the arrival of these farm engines, as well as the names of dealers who sold the machines. One observer in the state of New York reported that the first farm engine in town was such a novelty that it "not only excited much neighborly comment and interest but brought examining committees from agricultural societies and numerous letters (with unpaid postage, I presume) from many inquirers at a distance. . . ." 135 Rural folks also made frequent visits to farms to see the iron horse at work. Some came seeking further information, others to satisfy their curiosity. One owner of a portable steam engine living near Hell Gate, Montana Territory, in writing in 1870 to the Wood, Taber, and Morse Company of Eaton, New York, reported that he had threshed forty thousand bushels of grain during the season. He added that since the railroads had not yet readied that section of the country "your engine is a rare sight in these mountains. Some of the old mountaineers have come down the valley and camped for two or three days to see the engine, and to hear the steam whistle. . . ." 13e When working on the job, the farm engineer held an envious position in the eyes of all those associated with the threshing operations. Cast in a somewhat greasy role, he became a romantic idol to the youngsters, who saw in his activities the fulfillment of their own desires. He was unquestionably the "boss" whose words carried the weight of law. He set threshing rates, hired and fired members of the crew, collected money, and arranged the itinerary of the threshing "ring." He was consulted on a hundred matters of the work-a-day routine. Mingled with this element of envy, there usually existed a certain amount of respect for the engineer. This was based primarily upon his mechanical ability. Quite frequently he was the only man in the

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township or county capable of operating a steam engine. E. W. Hamilton, for twenty years editor of the Canadian Thresherman, in discussing the early farm engineer, states that these men possessed a special skill as unique as that of a doctor, lawyer, or veterinarian. Since they controlled practically all of the mechanical power in their various communities, the farmers were absolutely dependent upon them when it came to processing the small grain crops. 137 T h e amount of skill required to operate the agricultural steam engines is a matter of conjecture. Because an engineer's ability included, in addition to this mechanical aptitude, such subjective characteristics as foresight, versatility, sound judgment, and good business sense, these qualities are difficult to measure. T h e problem of evaluation is complicated by the fact that in the 1870's there were no schools granting degrees in farm engineering, no qualification tests or license requirements for prospective farm engineers, and no inspectors to pass judgment on their respective abilities. In fact, anyone who felt inclined to buy a steam engine and seemed to be a fair financial risk in the estimation of the manufacturing companies could purchase one of these portable engines. Evidently, the early corps of farm engineers included men of all grades of skill, ranging from the most inept barnyard mechanics to the most able operators. Some observers looked upon the early engines as playthings requiring little skill in handling. "Any young boy can manage one of these engines," stated Moore's Rural New Yorker in 1875, "and nine out of ten boys j u m p at the chance. . . ." 138 These opinions, however, were not shared by all farmers, most of whom held the iron horse in more respect. Some hesitated to buy one because they doubted their ability to handle it. T o overcome this timidity most manufacturing companies emphasized the ease of operation of their engines. T h e A. Gaar Company catalogue of 1869 insisted that its engines were so safe that farmers could run them easily.138 Many of the advertisements pictured the engines at work driving cotton gins, sawmills, and threshing machines with no attendant around the engine to supervise it, implying that they needed very little attention. T h e Indiana State Board of Agriculture in 1868 reported that the portable steam engines were very simple in construction and could be operated easily by any person who "has had experience in running engines of any kind." 140 T h e farm engineers who lacked experience learned their steamengine mechanics largely by correspondence. For many the printed page constituted their only course of instruction. By securing a large number of catalogues from various manufacturing companies, the prospective customer was able to gain some knowledge of the fundamental principles of operations from the enclosed rules of instruc-

T H E PORTABLE AGRICULTURAL STEAM ENGINE

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tion. 1 4 1 Some information was secured secondhand by talking to men who had operated steam engines. T h e inexperienced engineer usually received some valuable lessons in practical engineering when his steam engine arrived from the factory. A representative of the company often followed the new engine to the farm to supervise operations until satisfied that the farmer was competent to manage the situation without committing serious blunders. 142 Apparently the only experienced farm engineers were those who had previously handled stationary steam engines in city factories or who had operated locomotives on railroads and steamboats. W h e n some of these men took u p farming for themselves, they often turned with a natural interest to the running of steam engines on their farms. O n e of these men, after threshing over seven thousand bushels of grain in 1869, wrote a testimonial letter explaining, "I have r u n engines on railroads and steamboats, but your portable engine is as good as any I ever saw." 143 I n spite of the fact that some of the farmers could boast of being experienced steam men, their numbers were not sufficient to meet the growing demand for competent engineers. Complaints were frequently made that good engineers were scarce and that too many of the farm-engine operators were not able to satisfy their threshing customers. Many of the agricultural engineers were accused of being careless. T h e Indiana Farmer in 1879 commented editorially that boiler explosions were caused by engineers who failed to clean o u t the lime and incrustations from the boilers. 144 I n a similar vein an Ohio farmer remonstrated: There are a great many engineers that should never be allowed to turn a throttle, for they couldn't explain the first principle of an engine. A great many of them know just enough to fill the boiler and build a fire and when they get up forty pounds of steam to blow the whistle and start the engine. Farmers, when you engage an engineer to do your threshing, be sure that there is a good competent, experienced engineer in charge of the engine. 145

When threshing accidents occurred, the engineers were often the first to be criticized as incompetent and irresponsible rascals. At such times, one of the accusations often made was that the engineer suffered from an acute dryness of the palate and had, consequently, during the course of the day, made a few too many trips to the old cider barrel.14® A dealer of the George Frick Company in 1869 wrote that he found a threshing engine in bad condition because the operator had hammered and tinkered with it until the machine looked worse than it would have if it had been r u n two years. T h e dealer laid the blame on the engineer who was "drunk much of the time." 147 Engineers were often the victims of jokes and jibes which made

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the rounds among people of the threshing community. Some of these attempts at humor cast reflections on his intelligence. On one occasion a dealer, after vainly trying to pound a few instructions into the head of his latest customer, finally exclaimed in exasperation, " T h e next year's engines will be better because the manufacturing company is installing brains in them." 148 Another engineer was so naïve that the first time he wanted to determine the amount of water in the boiler he ran a wooden pole down the smokestack as a measuring stick. One operator was reported to have fired u p an engine for the first time. When the men arrived for work he had a fine train of smoke coming from the stack, but no steam pressure was registered on the gauge. It was discovered that the engineer had built the fire in the wrong end of the boiler—in the smokebox instead of the firebox.

Chapter III PORTABLE STEAM ENGINES USED FOR THRESHING PURPOSES THE use of steam power on American farms for threshing grain varied in the different sections of the country according to the size of farms, climate, and the prevailing customs of the locality. As a result, the threshing operations of the East were not duplicated on the prairies of the Northwest or in the river valleys of the Pacific Coast. Differences were so striking that travelers going from one section of the country to another frequently wrote to their relatives and newspaper editors back home describing the novel features that met their eyes. In some of the eastern states, especially in New England where the land was cultivated in small patches, the harvested grain was usually hauled into the barn where farmers could thresh it at their leisure during the fall and winter months. The demand for large threshing rigs capable of performing mechanical miracles was nonexistent, and farmers were slow to change their methods of threshing. As late as 1875, the threshing near Norfolk, Massachusetts, was done almost entirely by flail.1 The Threshermen's Review reported in 1899 that in New England and parts of New York and Pennsylvania small threshing outfits driven by treadmills could still be seen.2 In these areas, the average day's work seldom exceeded a hundred bushels of wheat.8 The grain crops in Ohio, Illinois, Indiana, and Michigan were too large to be hauled into the barn to await the arrival of the thresherman. In these states, some of the grain was shocked in the field and the rest piled up in stacks.4 Threshing directly from the shock meant less labor and was therefore a more economical method of handling the harvested grain. These economies, however, were often nullified by heavy rains that bleached out the kernels of wheat, lightened their weight, and materially reduced their market value. An Ohioan, in 1879, after having his shocks in the field drenched by six inches of rain, lamented, "It did 'hang on' and off and on again and the threshers left the engine here and came and went and started and stopped and boarded here and at home by turns for a full week till we got sick of the very sight of the old engine and folks thought I had bought it. . . ." ® 45

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STEAM POWER ON T H E AMERICAN FARM

T h e threshing was followed with great interest by the members of the farm family. After seeding the grain in the spring and following its growth, after hopefully scanning the skies for rain, and after buying expensive harvesting implements to be used for a few days and then relegated to the back yard to be about equally covered with roosting fowls and mortgages—after all these anxious days, these people sensed fully the significance of the threshing season which would determine the degree of success or failure of their entire year's work." Once the threshing machinery was in position, the engineer got u p the steam pressure, shook down the ashes, cleaned off the dust and dirt, and oiled the bearings. T h e best grade sperm oil was applied to bearings, and pure beef tallow was used for the valves and cylinder. 7 T h e lumps of tallow were usually placed in a tin can or small coffee pot and put on the steam chest where the heat would melt the tallow and keep it hot enough for pouring into the tallow cup which served as a lubricator. 8 In starting the engine, care was taken to open the throttle valve slowly to avoid throwing the drive belt from the flywheel. Under a normal rate of speed, the engine settled down to a steady rhythmic beat which was relatively quiet and smooth. No longer was the air filled with the shouting at horses, the cracking of whips, or the growl of gears from the old sweep horse powers. As the engineer put the engine in readiness for the day's work, the separator man went over the cylinder to check loose teeth, set the sieves, unfold the straw carrier, and tighten the belts. Occasionally, a bar of laundry soap fortified with powdered resin was used for belt dressing.® When everything was in readiness, the go-ahead signal was given to the engineer by the feeder, who mounted a platform where he bent over to feed the whirling cylinder. His task was performed in a fog of dust and flying kernels of grain which caromed off his face like sleet in a driving storm. T h e dust was so dense, especially when threshing musty oats or smutty wheat, that a mask to filter the air was sometimes worn. T h e American Agriculturist in 1876 recommended that a piece of mosquito netting folded several times around a wet sponge be tied over the mouth and nose of the feeder. 10 T h e trials of a thresher feeder were recalled in 1891 by one of them who made this complaint: I found it impossible to hand bundles with regularity and "precision where Tom, Dick, and Harry pitched them, especially when T o m was some callow boy, Dick his playmate and Harry some steady old codger who had pitched bundles for lo, these many years, but knew no more about it than his wife. . . . After trying with patience and meekness to point out to these heedless, pigheaded and obstinate fellows the proper way to pitch to the hander but

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without success, I refused to hand unless I knew the pitchers to be human beings in full possession of their faculties. 11

If the work of the feeder appeared undesirable, the men who stacked the straw as it came from the machine fared no better. They were usually buried under a constant stream of chaff, choked by the heat, and needled by sharp beards and cockleburs. This job was sometimes turned over to boys or womenfolk. Bascom B. Clarke, for forty years editor of the American Thresherman, enjoyed describing some of his Indiana experiences in the straw pile where he claimed he swallowed enough dust to fertilize a turnip patch. He recalled working in the straw stack one hot afternoon when the operators refused to stop the machine long enough to give the men a drink of water. When unobserved, he deliberately ran the tine of his fork under the chain of the straw carrier to throw it off its sprockets and thus secure a brief rest from his labor. 12 T h e threshed grain fell into a measuring box located near the rear wheels of the threshing machine where it was measured, bagged, and tallied. Since the cost of threshing was usually based on cents per bushel, it was important that an accurate count be made of the number of bushels threshed. This number was recorded on a "board of pegs" fastened on the side of the threshing machine. By moving the wooden pegs along the board, each bushel was recorded. T h e man responsible for measuring had to be acceptable to both the thresherman and the farmer. T h e r e were occasions, as Clarke observed, when both the farmer and thresherman slipped the pegs a dozen holes one way or the other when the tally man had his back turned. 1 3 T h e prices charged by the custom threshermen for their work in the Middle West during the 1870's varied somewhat, depending upon the market value of the grain, the condition of the threshing machinery, and the percentage of the total labor furnished by the thresherman. T h e average steam outfit usually threshed for five or six cents a bushel for wheat, four cents for barley, and three cents for oats. These prices prevailed when the custom thresherman furnished the machinery and paid the wages of the engineer, machine feeder, and one or two other men. T h e farmer hired the rest of the crew or exchanged labor, furnished fuel for the engine, and provided board for the entire threshing crew. 14 These prices were very reasonable, considering the thresherman's responsibilities and the amount of money invested in the machinery. "Let it be said to their credit," stated E. W. Hamilton, "that those early operators were more than fair in the matter of prices charged for the work which they did. In fact, the charges were unusually low for the services rendered." 15

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T h e a m o u n t of grain threshed in twenty-four hours varied, b u t in a good day's work a ten-horsepower steam threshing outfit could thresh a b o u t eight h u n d r e d bushels of wheat, with a crew of seventeen to twenty men. 1 ' T h r e s h e r m e n f o u n d it difficult to maintain this average, however, because unfavorable weather conditions and mechanical breakdowns caused frequent interruptions. According to the Prairie Farmer of 1871, an Illinoisan using an Ames portable engine and a Chicago Pitts separator threshed o u t 15,957 bushels of grain in seventeen days, a "record that is ahead of anything in threshing ever d o n e in this part of the country." 17 As the farmers of the East and Middle West bought agricultural machinery to meet their needs, a similar a d j u s t m e n t was taking place in the f a r m regions of the great plains area beyond the Mississippi River. O n the western prairies where almost u n l i m i t e d acres of fertile grassland awaited the early settlers, land booms occurred which encouraged immigrants to make settlements a n d to cultivate this vast wilderness. T h e development of these agricultural areas depended, in a large measure, u p o n the extent to which new f a r m implements could be p u t to practical use. T h e grain production on the bonanza farms of the R e d River Valley of the Northwest also demonstrated the importance of applying steam power to agriculture on the American frontier. In spite of good soil, the valley of the Red River in 1868 remained an expanse of uncultivated land, reserved to all appearances for the bison a n d the Sioux. 1S T h e fertile valley, covered with heavy prairie grass, stretched o u t like a level floor with no hills to break the vision of the occasional traveler. In 1869 two men riding across this area on horseback wrote of looking out over a broad, unbroken prairie where their "own voices arid the song of the meadow lark . . . alone broke the solemn and oppressive stillness of the solitude." 10 T h i s solitude was subsequently shared when a few pioneers v e n t u r e d into the valley as the vedette of civilization and established themselves in isolated settlements along the river. These settlers, like their forefathers farther east generations before, t u r n e d to the sowing of wheat, a good cash crop in regions where land was cheap and labor was scarce. Seed wheat was hauled into the valley in sleds during the winter of 1871-72 a n d distributed to the farmers; threshing machinery was soon introduced; and in 1873 the first carload of wheat was shipped from the valley by rail to Duluth. 2 0 Years of h a r d s h i p and disillusionment came d u r i n g the early seventies. In the summers of 1872 a n d 1874, hordes of grasshoppers flew i n t o the area and damaged the crops seriously. T h e panic of 1873 pushed the value of wheat down f r o m an average price of $1.45 a bushel for the years of 1863 to 1870, to 94¿ a bushel in 1874. 21 T he

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hard times, poor crops, and low prices drove many pioneers to despair. In this atmosphere of general misfortune, a western farmer in 1873 expressed this opinion: The basest fraud on earth is agriculture. She has made me a 1,000 promises and has broken every one of them. . . . No wonder Cain killed his brother. He was a tiller of the ground. The wonder is that he didn't kill his father and then weep because he had no grandfather to kill. . . . The fact is, agriculture would demoralize a saint. . . . I fight pigs, chickens, the moles, the birds, the bugs, the worms,—everything in which there is the breath of life. . . . I fight heat, the frost, the rain, the hail. In short I fijrht the universe, and get whipped in every battle. 22

During this depression, real estate in northern Dakota Territory became a drug on the market. The officials of the Northern Pacific Railroad Company were unable to sell their lands even when they offered them in small lots on easy terms calling for a 10 per cent down payment with seven years in which to pay the balance.23 In spite of these inducements, the sales were so small that the railroad company considered its land in Dakota worthless.24 Meanwhile, George W. Cass of Pittsburgh, president of the Northern Pacific Railway, Benjamin P. Cheney of Boston, prominent member of an express company, and the Grandin brothers, bankers of Tidioute, Pennsylvania, all held large blocks of the railroad bonds. When their bonds depreciated to ten cents on the dollar, they exchanged their depreciated bonds for large tracts of the railroad company lands lying in the Red River Valley.25 In an area lying eighteen miles west of the site of Fargo, Cass and Cheney owned 12,240 acres.2* The Grandin brothers in 1877 held title to forty thousand acres in Trail County, about thirty-five miles north of Fargo.27 In 1875, J. B. Powers, land commissioner of the Northern Pacific Railroad, satisfied that the soil in this region was valuable for wheat growing, persuaded Cass and Cheney to undertake an extensive experiment in large-scale farming. 28 Embodied in these plans was the idea of a bonanza farm in which thousands of acres of prairie land in the Red River Valley would be broken up and sowed to wheat. Agriculture would be reduced to a system of mechanical precision, with large gangs of men handling horse-drawn machinery to plow, drill, and harvest the grain. Since the success of this system of extensive farming depended upon exceptional skill and experience in management, Cass and Cheney invited Oliver Dalrymple, owner of a two-thousand-acre wheat farm near Cottage Grove, Minnesota, to manage the organization with the privilege of buying a half interest in the Dakota farm when he was financially able to do so. 2 · Excellent supervision, adequate capital, and fertile soil made the enterprise a success from the very beginning. In the summer of 1875,

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plow gangs broke up 1,280 acres from which the first harvest the following year yielded 32,000 bushels of excellent spring wheat. 30 Dalrymple and his associates were able to hire more men, buy new machinery, and increase the wheat acreages on the farm until the crop in 1879 measured over 162,000 bushels.31 Portable steam engines were used to power the threshing machines on the bonanza farms of the Red River Valley.32 During the rush threshing season, it would have been managerial folly to force the long, tough wheat straw through small threshing machines driven by obsolete horse powers. Any power short of steam would have crippled the entire system of large-scale wheat fanning, a move inconceivable to the bonanza farmers. They knew that profits were not assured until the wheat was sold at a grain terminal. With a large financial stake represented in their thousands of acres of wheat shocks in constant danger from heavy rains, hailstorms, or fires, every hour became a matter of utmost importance. Even if the crop escaped the violence of nature, wheat prices tended to decline during the threshing season when the increased grain supplies were dumped on the market. 33 Marketing in August rather than November was almost always advantageous to the farmer. The United States Department of Agriculture report for 1875 stated that where wheat was the great money crop "its early marketing is often one of the pressing necessities of the farmer " 34 Under these circumstances threshing began early. Before the harvesting had been completed on one section of grain, threshing crews would move on to a corner of the same field and begin work. Since speed of operation was essential, the ten-horsepower steam engines and small threshing machines in general use in the eastern wheat belts of the country were rejected as too small. They were replaced by powerful, sixteen-horsepower engines belted to large separators. In 1878, Dalrymple, after using fifteen Wood, Taber, and Morse portable steam engines, appropriately named "Hercules," reported that "They handled my forty-inch cylinder separators easily. . . . I used them for many years and I like an engine with plenty of power that goes right along and makes no trouble." 35 The large steam engines increased in direct proportion to the amount of land brought under cultivation each year. In 1877, the Dalrymple and Grandin farms used five steam engines for threshing; 38 the number reached twenty-six in 1880.37 Four years later, Dalrymple claimed to own thirty thousand acres of crop, eight hundred horses, two hundred binders and thirty steam engines.38 When John L. Pennington, Governor of Dakota Territory, visited the Dalrymple estate near Casselton in 1879, he saw eight steam engines at work driving threshers.38 Five years later, a storekeeper in

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the same town counted fifty-three steam engines at work in the nearby fields turning out number-one hard spring wheat. 40 T h e threshing scenes of the Red River Valley were an impressive sight. The steam rigs were scattered across the wheat fields, each set in the center of congested grain shocks. From the sucks of the steam engine, the smoke on a still day would rise vertically, pause momentarily, and then slowly drift off into the distance merging en route with similar smoke trails to form a thin veil streaming out beyond the horizon. In the early morning stillness, a burst of white steam from the engine sounded the whistle, and a few minutes later the hum of threshing floated across the prairies on the billows of wheat. T h e big cylinders of the threshing machines devoured the amber wheat as fast as seven teams hauled in the shocks. As the bundles disappeared into this rapacious maw, the grain spout poured out the cleaned wheat at a rate of twelve hundred bushels a day. 41 The wheat was hauled to elevators in wagons drawn by four horses and holding as much as 125 bushels. From there it was shipped by rail to grain terminals at Duluth. 42 T h e fame of the bonanza wheat farms of the Northwest spread rapidly across the country. Newspaper editors writing in glowing terms often failed to make a distinction between facts and fond hopes. It was reported that forty-six stalks of wheat would "stool out" from one planted kernel and that big yields and huge profits were inevitable. 43 Occasionally a tacit implication was made that the grasshoppers were harmless, Indians were docile, and buffalo steaks were plentiful. 44 As the Dakota boom gathered momentum, W. H. H. Beadle in a speech at Grand Forks declared that "the story of Dalrymple wheat has been printed once or more in half the papers of the Union and is bringing more men and money into the valley." 45 Passenger trains were crowded with "comers" and "lookers," and hotels were unable to accommodate the immigrants. They came, they saw, they located. By 1880 there were eighty-two farms in the Red River country, each including more than one thousand acres.44 Although the use of steam power on the smaller farms in the Red River Valley was less spectacular, the same intensity of operation prevailed. These farmers were not strangers to work, nor were they slow of foot during the threshing season. Mary Dodge Woodward, who lived on one of these farms during the early 1880's, kept a diary which reveals some of the activities during the busy threshing season. The steam threshing outfit looks very picturesque among the shocks of wheat . . . the country teems with threshing machines. I could see eight this morning, each with a crew of from twenty to thirty men which makes lively times. . . . Walter flies all the time. . . . He wants to be several places at once. . . .47

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STEAM POWER ON T H E AMERICAN FARM

Although the more dramatic features of bonanza farming in the Northwest might suggest that this kind of life was most pleasant, many grim realities faced these pioneers. In some quarters a common fear was caused by the practice of burning the piles of straw which had been pulled away from the threshing machine during the day. These burning straw piles, like a thousand flaming faggots, lit up the night skies in lurid red hues, and filled the air with dense smoke. Aside from endangering property, the nocturnal fireworks were regarded by many as wasteful. One farmer protested in 1877, "As I look across the prairie each night, I see the folly of our threshermen in burning to ashes their straw heaps. It appears to me shameful, wicked, and wasteful. . . ." 48 As in the more eastern sections of the country, heavy rains often plagued the threshermen. One of them.claimed that during the threshing season of 1880, he ran into a stretch of fifty-three consecutive rainy days. T h e ground was so soft that the engine had to be moved on skids. T h e r e was so much water that the engineer could refill the boiler by throwing the hose out into one of the pools surrounding the engine. 49 Since threshing outfits were scarce in the Northwest during the early seventies, the machines were often closely guarded to prevent theft. Koran Kroneberg, one of the first steam threshermen in western Minnesota, slept with his machine in 1873 to guard it, even when the ground was covered with snow. He used ox teams to haul bundles and to pull his steam engine from place to place. 50 Because of the shortage of threshing rigs, the work often continued into late November and December until the men bundled u p in buffalo-skin coats to keep out the cold which sometimes dipped to twenty degrees below zero.51 Not all of the fabulous stories on the West Coast concern the intrepid forty-niners and their feverish quest for gold in the streams and river valleys of California. T h e men who discovered wealth in the golden wheat along the banks of these same streams wrote by their efforts a saga of supermechanization which in many respects is an incomparable chapter in American agricultural history. T h e value of California's grain crops, multiplying its gold production many times, reflects credit upon the farming methods of this area which made use of some of the world's largest farm machines, many of which were driven by steam power. 52 During the gold rush days of 1849, only seventeen thousand bushels of wheat were raised on the so-called worthless soil of the California river valleys, an amount far below the local consumption of this cereal. 53 T h e urgent demand for food, the high cost of imports, and the profits to be found in wheat raising were soon recognized, and crop acreages were annually increased. T h e two hundred thousand

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acres of wheat in 1856 were more than trebled d u r i n g the next ten years. 54 I n 1869, the editor of the California Farmer, j u b i l a n t over the b u m p e r wheat crops, wrote in a spirit of typical California enthusiasm that "California is now esteemed the granary of the world." 66 T h e climate and geographical conditions of California were largely responsible for the use of unique methods of harvesting a n d threshing the local grain crops. Since these farmers lived in an area where n o rain was expected from the tenth of May until the first of November, they were able to harvest, thresh, and sack the grain in the field without fear of loss from rain. 5 6 T h e dry, hot summer m o n t h s cured the wheat as it ripened, so no "sweating" took place a f t e r threshing. As a result, the grain could be transported long distances without spoilage, or ground into flour immediately. Many Californians vouched for -the story that an army officer one morning h a d some wheat threshed, sacked, ground at the flour mill, taken to his house, and made into biscuits for breakfast, all within a twoh o u r period. 57 I n addition, the dry summer season permitted the farmers to let their wheat stand in the fields for weeks even after it was dead ripe. T h i s lengthened harvesting season made possible the raising of wheat on enormous wheat ranches unsurpassed in size in their day. 58 By 1872 there were three ranches in the San J o a q u i n Valley which ranged from seventeen to thirty-five thousand acres in size.59 T h e Glenn wheat ranch in Calousa County included, in 1880, a solid block of sixty-six thousand acres which extended u p the Sacramento River Valley for over sixteen miles. 60 Some suggestion as to the size of this field can be seen in the fact that plowing teams starting o u t in the m o r n i n g could travel down the furrow in a straight line all day without turning around. Lunch was served midway across the field, while the drivers camped at the far end of the field before making the return trip the following day. Similarly the dry weather during the a u t u m n season made possible the introduction of the new header-threshing system of h a n d l i n g the ripe grains in the California wheat fields. T h i s innovation combined the harvesting and threshing into one big operation, with both processes carried out simultaneously. T h e header cutting the grain was pushed through the field by four or six horses. T h i s machine elevated the straw into a header-box or barge which accompanied the header instead of tying the grain into bundles. W h e n the barge became full, it was hauled directly to an ordinary threshing machine powered by a portable steam engine. T o locate the threshing rig to best advantage, the headers first entered the wheat field and cut out a circle of several acres in the center of the field.

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T h e engine and separator were drawn into the circle, and the work of threshing was carried on in this central hub, with the headers cutting the grain in an ever-widening circle until the entire field was harvested. One of the men working on a header-thresher crew wrote to the editor of his home newspaper in Nebraska that if he swept the horizon with a field glass he could see the steam engines with their broad-shaped funnels and the awkward-shaped separators being pulled into the little three- to five-acre circles which had been cut out by the headers. After the threshing rig had been lined u p and belted, the barges moved in to unload the grain. T h e headings were first pitched upon the ground where they were elevated into the separator by a conveyor. " T h e n there ensues a strange combination of tremendous noises, a sound of grinding, a sound of bruising, a sound of thumping, a sound of roaring. . . ." 61 Although much of the California wheat was grown on ordinary farms, it was the large-scale harvesting and threshing equipment used on the large Pacific Coast wheat ranches that amazed the farmers living east of the Mississippi River. T h e size of these machines and the significant role played by the utilization of steam power is best illustrated in the operations of Dr. Hugh J. Glenn, whom the Californians in the late seventies called the greatest wheat farmer in the world. 82 Dr. Glenn, born in Virginia in 1824, moved to Paris, Missouri, studied medicine, served in the Mexican War, got his M.D. from Missouri University, and with a hundred dollars in his pocket migrated to the California gold fields. After realizing good returns from a freighting business, he began buying land along the Sacramento River where he and a score of other big operators started plowing u p the pasture land and sowing wheat. 63 In 1876, he had 45,000 acres under cultivation." By constantly expanding these operations, he was able in 1880 to raise a million bushels from his 66,000 acres. 65 His investments represented $125,000 in farm machinery, $185,000 in horses and mules, and $100,000 in buildings. Machinery included six steam threshing outfits, sixty headers, and 180 header-boxes. T h e r e were thirty-two houses and twenty-seven barns on the wheat ranch. ββ T h e blacksmith shops were equipped with boring, turning, planing machines, and buzz saws enabling the mechanics to manufacture their own wagons, headers, and other horse-drawn farm implements. 87 Liverpool was the leading wheat market of the world during the 1870's, and its market quotations made front page news in the San Francisco and Sacramento newspapers. Improved steamboat transportation increased the exports from grain-producing areas in Australia, South America, and Russia, driving wheat prices in California down to a dollar a hundredweight. T h e depression years following

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55

1873 contributed to this decline. Under these conditions it was questionable whether California wheat growers could afford to pay the freight charges on their surplus crops shipped to England. Dr. Glenn studied the Liverpool markets in 1880, then chartered twelve ships to transport his wheat to Europe rather than sell it to the wheat speculators in San Francisco. By selling direct from farm to Liverpool he secured a reasonable profit. He invested in larger farm machines and hired men who knew how to use them efficiently.63 Since the imported threshing machines were too small to satisfy these western agricultural tycoons, one of Glenn's blacksmiths, George Hoag, built a mammoth separator, thirty-five feet long with a forty-eight-inch cylinder and modeled after the Geiser, Pitts, and Nichols and Shepard machines. This machine, driven by a big twenty-five-horsepower Enright portable steam engine, threshed 5,779 bushels of wheat on August 8, 1874, a remarkable performance in a day when a thresherman in the Ohio Valley considered nine hundred bushels an exceptionally good day's work.69 This threshing record was broken five years later when Hoag, using his twenty-five-horsepower Gaar Scott engine and forty-four-inch threshing machine of the same make, established a new world's record. The Willows Journal described these efforts in 1879: All the necessary arrangements were consummated one Tuesday evening. Every man was alloted his particular station and informed of the duties expected of him from which there should be no deviation. At sunrise Wednesday morning the whistle from the ponderous engine sounded the signal for the grand onslaught upon the sea of yellow grain; ten headers and thirty-six header-wagons and an abundance of willing hands moved simultaneously with the machinery and nought could be heard but the hum of the massive separator and the rattle and noise necessary among so many men, mules and headers. Four spouts poured out a continuous stream of golden grain. Four men attended to the sacks and four did the sewing. Extra men were always on hand to relieve those who might wish to rest, thus avoiding any delay that might occur. . . . At sunset, the official count of the sacks was made, the total being 6,183 bushels of wheat cut, threshed and garnered from sun to sun. This showing we believe is unprecedented in the annals of farming in the civilized world. . .

This record was written into the United States Census Report of 1880 by Charles H. Fitch, who stated: "In California, one twenty-five horsepower thresher has threshed over 6,000 bushels of wheat in a day, requiring thirty-six header wagons and keeping four men busy filling and four sewing the sacks. . . ." 71 The labor required to operate the machinery and handle the grain on the California wheat ranches called for large gangs of men.72 These hands came from all parts of the country, a motley

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STEAM POWER ON T H E AMERICAN FARM

crowd strongly resembling the constituency of the nearby mining camps. Many were veterans of the Mexican, Civil, and Indian Wars; most of them were crack shots, skilled horsemen, and as rugged as the country in which they found themselves. Chinese workers also joined in the hot work of the wheat fields. During the fierce heat of the day the temperature sometimes went u p to 110 degrees in the shade, and the sun burned its way into the ground till the dust rose like flour at the lightest step. T h e California skies were light and almost colorless. They gave no relief to the aching eyes of the field hands, who often turned in vain in all directions seeking some bit of color besides the omnipresent gray dust and yellow straw. Everyone around the threshing outfits was covered almost constantly with the penetrating dust which was blown away in clouds by the breeze that occasionally found its way into the hot valley. 73 One of these men working on the Glenn wheat ranch in 1877 remarked in a letter to his family living in Thayer County, Nebraska: At present the mercury stands at a hundred degrees in the shade and I long for a Nebraska thunder-storm to break this monotonous weather. Mr. Glenn, the man I am stopping with this summer has a harvest of 45,000 acres of wheat. H e is running eight steam threshing rigs with about sixty men working on each outfit. H e is the heaviest ranchman in northern California and considered the greatest wheat grower in the world. I will admit that this is not home sweet home and that Nebraska is far ahead in point of soil and climate, but we must consider that if we were in Mr. Glenn's position with from 400 to 600 men in our employ, that we should not feel like furnishing them with female society nor allowing them to repose in peaceful tranquility on the soft side of a board very late in the morning. Wages by the year are $360. Wages in harvest time are from $1.50 to $2.50 per day. It is so hot I can't get my thoughts so I remain without a struggle. . . , 74

T h e recreation of these men was as unrestrained as that of the mining, lumbering, or railroad camps. On Saturday nights several header-wagons from the Glenn wheat fields dumped the ranch hands on the streets of the nearby town of Willows, where they proceeded to relax with uninhibited gusto. T h e main street of the town ran along the railroad tracks with twenty-five saloons located on one side and seventy-five women on the other. By Sunday night, when the header-wagons returned to pick u p the men, the alleys usually held most of the celebrants. T h e ranch foremen walked along and picked u p the men and stacked them into the wagons. As they did so they checked each name against their lists—"Missouri Pete," "Texas Slim," "Tennessee Jack," and so on through the list to make certain that all the men were back on the job for Monday's threshing."

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57

As one might expect, the bunkhouse poker game was the great indoor sport with an occasional cardsharp showing up to make off with the threshing wages. Guns lay beside the chips. On one occasion, a misdeal resulted in a murder. T h e killer listened to the erection of the gallows outside the Calousa County jail as he awaited the rope. In this case, the governor pardoned the killer on the grounds that he had rid the state of a crooked gambler. 7 8 One of the colorful activities associated with the Glenn wheat farm was the work of a corps of forty men who patrolled the property day and night armed with shotguns and firing their weapons from horseback to keep the myriads of wild geese moving off the crop. Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper reported in 1882 that the air on the ranch resounded with the clatter of guns and the frightened cries of the persecuted fowls as these men attempted to save the wheat crops." Large-scale wheat farming on somewhat more modest proportions was extended into the agricultural sections of eastern Washington and Oregon. Here steam engines were also used for threshing purposes. T h e farmers in the Walla Walla region of Washington in 1879 were heading and threshing out from m o to three thousand bushels of wheat per day. 78 On the smaller farms of the Pacific Coast, steam power began to be utilized for belt work in much the same fashion as in the more eastern grain-growing states. T h e Pacific Rural Press stated that in 1861 Joseph Enright of San Jose built the first portable steam engine to be used for threshing in California. 7 0 T h e following year, Eastern manufacturers began shipping portables around the Horn to the San Francisco Bay area to meet the ready demands of implement dealers. Companies such as Hoadley of Lawrence, Massachusetts, and Ames of Oswego, New York, advertised their large "California style" engines of twelve and fifteen horsepower equipped with broadfluted smokestacks, designed to reduce the danger of fire from flying sparks. 80 These imported machines were sold in competition with those built in the local factories of J . L. Heald of Vallejo, Brown Brothers of Salinas, H. W . Rice of Hayward, and Enright of San Jose. Since engines and threshing machines manufactured in all parts of the United States appeared in California, undoubtedly the farmers in this area used a greater variety of machines than could be found in any other state of the union. Eastern-built engines drove California threshers, and California-designed engines powered the separators built in the eastern shops of J . I. Case, Gaar Scott, Pitts, C. Aultman, and Russell and Company. Since threshed straw had little value in large wheat-growing regions, portable straw-burning engines were designed to utilize this

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source of cheap fuel. On the California farms, as on the vast steppes of Russia, Hungary, southern Italy, New Zealand, and the Argentine, the use of steam power d u r i n g the early I860's had been limited, not because its advantage over animal power was denied, b u t because of the prohibitive cost of obtaining wood or coal as fuel for the engines. 81 H. W. Rice of Hayward, California, began building strawb u r n i n g engines as early as 1863.82 T h r e e years later the Pacific Rural Press observed that straw had become a p r o m i n e n t fuel in steam

R e t u r n - f l u e Case e n g i n e s p e c i a l l y d e s i g n e d to b u r n s t r a w oil f a r m s of M i d w e s t a n d Far W e s t , 1870's a n d 1880's.

treeless

threshing. 8 3 By 1876, Ransomes, Sims, a n d H e a d of Ipswich, England, was exporting straw-burners to the European continent, Egypt, T u r k e y , South Africa, a n d South America. 8 4 T h e Agricultural Gazette of St. Petersburg, Russia, in 1875 described the use of one of these engines on the Alexaievsky steppes: As this engine is of the very highest importance for our farming, I procured a 10 horsepower engine and thrashing machine of Messrs Ransomes manufacture. At the end of July we began to thrash rye. W e worked with 35 lbs. of steam and a peasant woman was employed to feed the straw into the firebox. . . . T h e straw burning apparatus renders the introduction of steam power practicable wherever grain crops are grown. 85

T h e ability of straw-burners to live off the land, like wood-burning engines in tree country, increased their popularity on the Pacific Coast wheat ranches and in the prairie states of the Midwest. A

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Dakota thresherman estimated in 1879 that burning straw saved two hundred dollars in his annual fuel bill. 86 It was also argued that the fireman could leave the engine when it was not working, knowing that the steam pressure would not rise to the danger point. When wood or coal was used, however, the fire required checking the drafts or removing the burning slabs of wood from the firebox.87 T o burn straw, most manufacturers believed it was necessary to build engines with return-flue boilers, which mounted the smokestack above the firebox instead of in front as on the standard locomotive-type boilers. By doubling the lengfh of the flues in this manner, it was thought that the water could be heated more uniformly and the danger of sparks from the stack could be reduced. Whether return-flue boilers were superior to the locomotive boilers became the basis of arguments among steam engineers which lasted over a quarter of a century.

Chapter IV SELF-PROPELLED AGRICULTURAL STEAM ENGINES the portable steam engines were fairly satisfactory for threshing grain during the third quarter of the nineteenth century, they possessed one serious mechanical weakness: they were not selfpropelled. 1 Unable to move under .their own power, their use was necessarily limited to belt operations, leaving all draft work to be performed by oxen or horses. T h a t successful self-propelled machines failed to reach the farms until the 1870's was not due to deliberate neglect on the part of inventors; in fact, efforts to build engines capable of traveling over common roads or pulling implements across fields were almost as old as the steam-engine industry itself. As early as 1769, Nicholas Cugnot drove a steam carriage through the streets of Paris.2 By 1833 there were about twenty road locomotives in England which were transporting passengers over the highways at fifteen miles an hour. 3 However, unreasonable legal restrictions imposed by Parliament tended to discourage the use of steam carriages, and inventors devoted more attention to railroad building. 4

ALTHOUGH

As railroad locomotives and steamboats demonstrated their practicality, farmers in Great Britain in growing numbers became interested in the possibility of securing self-propelled farm engines for plowing and cultivating the soil. More power appeared essential, especially during the fall plowing season which followed harvest and preceded the autumn rains. One farmer tilling four hundred acres of heavy clay soil complained in 1840 that he needed seventy horses for plowing during August and September, but fifteen could do all the farm work the rest of the year.5 During the 1850's, the Royal Agricultural Society offered a prize of £ 5 0 0 to the person who built a successful steam plow.8 Meanwhile numerous inventors were at work on this problem. Mr. Heathcothe, of Tiverton, tried in 1832 to plow with an ingenious system of ropes and pulleys powered by a stationary engine, but the machinery was too complex to merit adoption. 7 James Boydell demonstrated a self-propelled engine near Louth in 1857, where, accordΘ0

SELF PROPELLED AGRICULTURAL STEAM ENGINES

61

ing to the Illustrated London News, it plowed an acre in seventy minutes. This performance delighted a huge crowd which included observers from Russia, Germany, and Sweden.8 Unfortunately the machine required the attention of an army of mechanics and frequent breakdowns proved costly. During this period of experimentation, John Fowler and Frederick Howard concluded that steam engines were too heavy to traverse fields. T o overcome the loss of power through self-propulsion, these men devised a system in which the engine remained stationary, but its power was applied to cables attached to independent gang plows. As the cable wound itself on the windlass beneath the engine boiler, the tillage implements moved back and forth across the field. The cable was controlled by anchoring another pulley at the far side of the field, or two engines could be used, one stationed on either side of the area to be plowed. T h e London Times in 1862 mentioned that the Fowler and Howard steam plows were the only successful ones in operation.· Eight years later over eight thousand of them were in use, many of which were exported to Egypt for preparing the soil for cotton production. 10 In the United States, self-propelled engines were also needed for plowing, a slow, tedious job requiring about 60 per cent of the total power expended in raising a crop of wheat. 11 Prior to the Civil War and for a considerable time thereafter, the breaking of the tough prairie grasslands had usually been done with huge "bull" plows pulled by three to seven yoke of oxen. Since these slow, lumbering beasts moved along at a leisurely mile-an-hour pace, the "poor man's team" and the conventional "gee and haw" left much to be desired. The substitution of horses for oxen provided more speed and better control, but this change failed to eliminate the power problem because the strength and endurance of horse flesh were limited. Efforts to secure an iron horse to defy the heat and arduous labor of the fields received the enthusiastic support of many farmers and agricultural journals. Five Louisiana plantation owners in 1841 subscribed five thousand dollars as an award to be given to anyone who would invent a steam plow that could turn ten acres per day. One of the subscribers insisted that it cost twelve thousand dollars in Negroes, teams, and implements to plow ten acres of land in a day. He believed that a cash premium would set to work some man gifted with ingenuity who would introduce a steam plow.12 T h e New York State Agricultural Society in 1859 offered a $250 award for the building of an engine that would relieve horses in plowing, reaping, and tilling the soil.13 Moore's Rural New Yorker in 1851 stated that it was strong in the faith that plowing by some power independent of animal muscle would be introduced. 14 T h e editor of the Plow, the

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Loom, and the Anvil announced in 1857 that the "whole world is waking to the importance of the successful steam plow." 15 In response to these pleas, scores of blacksmiths, mechanics, and inventors attempted to build a satisfactory self-propelled engine. Obed Hussey, Baltimore's famous builder of reapers, exhibited a steam plow at the Indiana State Fair in 1856.1® Shortly after, Joseph W. Fawkes of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, constructed an awkwardlooking thirty-horsepower engine with an upright boiler. The machine was over twenty feet in length and was mounted over a large drum six feet wide which acted as the' main drive wheel. It weighed almost ten tons, and cost over two thousand dollars.17 Fawkes appeared at several plowing demonstrations, as well as at the Illinois state fairs of 1858 and 1859. Although several steam plowing engines were built in the late fifties, it was the Fawkes engine that attracted national attention and dramatized the potentialities of this type of power for agricultural purposes. Because of the wide publicity received, Fawkes is often given credit for designing and building the first steam plowing machine in the United States. At the state fair at Centralia, Illinois, on September 17, 1858, when he demonstrated his engine by plowing a strip of level land, baked hard by the summer drought, the reaction of the public was one of spontaneous acclaim. An editor of the Chicago Press who witnessed the event wrote: The excitement of the crowd was beyond control and their shouts and wild huzzas echoed far over the prairie and there beneath the smiling autumn sun lay the first furrow turned by steam on the broad prairies of the mighty West. The goal was won. Steam had conquered the face oí nature and the steam plow had become a fact. 18

A correspondent of the Ohio Farmer in 1859 suggested that "Fawkes is the great card now, and when he gives a couple of püífs on his whistle and the great steam horse speeds over the ground dragging the gang of plows, almost every man, woman and child leave horses and sulkies to their own fate and follow this blower-up of antiquated notions." 19 " T h e steam plow is a success," exclaimed the Wisconsin Farmer, "and Fawkes is immortal." 20 T o the north where another great wheat-growing area was emerging, Henry H. Sibley, Governor of Minnesota, was so impressed by Fawkes's performance that in an address before the Dakota County Agricultural Association at Ninniger in 1858 he predicted that the steam plow would supersede all other types of power.21 It is reasonable to assume that the public interest in the use of steam plows which had been aroused by the Fawkes demonstrations had also influenced Abraham Lincoln to think along these lines.

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Two weeks after Fawkes appeared at Centralia, Lincoln addressed the Wisconsin Agricultural Society and the annual fair in Milwaukee on September 30, 1859. This was his only speech with an extensive discussion of agriculture, and in it he had much to say about the use of steam power on the farm. 22 Although Lincoln admitted that he had never seen a steam plow, he said that he had thought a good deal about it in an abstract way. Possessing about as much mechanical knowledge as the average dirt farmer of his day, he went on to suggest that the distance an engine must travel in the field could be reduced by a plowing attachment consisting of several plowshares. The attachment would be bolted to a revolving chain and hitched to the engine. The chain would run transversely to the direction in which the engine was moving. By rotating like a huge band saw, the chain of plows would turn the ground in a strip a rod wide each time the engine moved slowly across the field. Mechanically-minded men would be needed to solve the technical problems involved. After expressing this impractical idea, the speaker revealed remarkable foresight by suggesting that the self-propelled farm engines of the future would be rather expensive to operate because a crew of men would be needed to haul the water and fuel supplies to the engine in the field.23 However, the wave of optimism which followed the Fawkes demonstration was short-lived. The extensive publicity proved to be grossly overrated, and the prediction for the immediate success of the steam plow was forty years ahead of its time. When Fawkes attempted to give another plowing demonstration at Decatur, Illinois, in November 1858, the failure there was as signal as the success at Centralia had been two months earlier. T h e engine bogged down in soft ground, and the people went home disappointed. 24 Members of the Executive Committee of the Illinois State Agricultural Society, who were appointed to act as judges to award the Illinois Central Railroad prize of three thousand dollars, disagreed in their opinions about the success of Fawkes's engine. A compromise of a fifteen-hundred-dollar award was finally agreed upon. 25 In 1858, Warren P. Miller of Marysville, California, built a steam wagon of the crawler type which laid its own track. Its design was a forerunner of the caterpillar tractor of the modern era. Although the engine was awarded a four-hundred-dollar prize at the state fair by a judging committee who pronounced it "suitable for agriculture," its manufacture was not continued.2® In spite of the efforts to make a practical plowing engine, all attempts prior to the Civil War were unsuccessful. Each engine was built by an individual with perhaps the help of a few friends. Lacking capital and financial reserves, the inventor could not carry out

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experiments to improve his engineering models. As a result, practically every man who touched the steam-plowing engines went bankrupt. 27 T h e individual inventor could secure no government subsidies to aid him financially, nor could he seek information from research centers, experimentation agencies, or schools pioneering in the field of agricultural engineering. Left entirely on his own, and without steel tools and instruments of precision, the mechanic of the 1850's was forced to rely on trial and error and to suffer the almost inevitable results. Another weakness was the inordinate desire to accomplish wonders. T h e engines were built in such ponderous weights and elephantine proportions that it seemed designers intended to plow all the land in sight in one day's operation. Instead of taking a steam engine which had already been manufactured by an established company and modestly converting it into a self-propelled machine, these inventors insisted on building an entirely new engine. T h e results were mechanical monstrosities, scarcely capable of puffing their way to the nearest junk pile. James Waters of Detroit, for instance, bravely took to the field with a behemoth structure thirty-seven feet long, supported on driving wheels ten feet in diameter, and pulling a train of thirteen plows intended to furrow a strip nineteen feet wide. 28 Although this machine actually broke seventy acres of Illinois prairie in 1860, it was not entitled to the generous headlines which exclaimed: "Steam Plowing Triumphant!" 29 Like its predecessors, this giant among Lilliputians succumbed to the evils of impractical design, and irretrievably rusted its way into early retirement. Then, too, the steamplowing engines were too expensive for the average American farmer. One of these men, after watching the Fawkes steam plow in action, wrote to the Illinois Farmer explaining: I went home, Mr. Editor, and did a good deal of thinking while my horse plodded his weary way through the mud. The improvements of the age are wonderful. . . . I believe the steam plow will succeed. It can be made to break up the prairies. It can do a vast deal of work when the machine is perfected. . . . Believing that the steam plow is to succeed, what is to be the result? The plow is to cost 2,500 dollars. Common farmers will hardly want such plows. It appears that only the rich can use them successfully. . . . 30

T h e self-propelled steam traction engine captured the imagination of the American people, but several decades were to pass before it could be regarded as practical power equipment for the farm. Joseph C. Kennedy, superintendent of the 1860 United States census, commented that the steam plowing engines were so heavy that they buried themselves inextricably in the ground, and that they

SELF-PROPELLED AGRICULTURAL STEAM ENGINES

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"appear to have been abandoned for the present." 31 Horace Capron, Commissioner of Agriculture under President Grant, after noting that only two applications for patents for steam plows had been filed in 1870, announced that the problem was not fully solved. "It requires time," he added, "and the exercise of inventive genius and a large outlay of capital to fully settle the question of utility and practicability of the application of steam power to the cultivation of crops." 32 These failures, disillusioning as they appeared at the time, did not kill mechanical experimentation; they only encouraged inventors to scrap impractical machines and to attempt new methods in design. During the sixties and early seventies, renewed efforts were made to build self-propelled road locomotives for hauling freight over western sections of the country which were without railroad facilities. Even though several railroads had reached the Mississippi River by 1861, with one line running as far as St. Joseph, Missouri, much of the sparsely settled trans-Mississippi region was still dependent upon slow horse and cattle trains to move supplies. If road engines pulling wagons could precede the railroads out on the trails of the western plains, they would solve the transportation problem, encourage settlement, and increase agricultural production on the frontier. Even if a transcontinental railroad were laid, scores of road locomotives would be needed to operate a large number of feeder lines. T o conceive of a fleet of these engines puffing across the plains and whistling their way through the Indian country was not as visionary as might be expected. In Great Britain, the Ransomes and Aveling companies were building road engines in the late fifties, and the Fawkes and Waters engines in America, although unsuccessful in plowing, had shown that the self-propelling principle was feasible.83 Major Joseph R. Brown, a pioneer of Minnesota Territory, made one of the first attempts to haul freight over western roads by steam power. In 1859 he was transporting goods from St. Paul to Fort Ridgely and the Indian agencies along the Mississippi River. Desiring a faster means of transportation, he had John A. Reed build a road locomotive in New York. In 1860 the engine arrived at Henderson, Minnesota, where it was used for a time to haul freight from the steamboat landing to the stores of the town.3* This machine, shaped very much like an old-fashioned railroad locomotive, traveled two miles an hour, and its twelve-foot-drive wheels pulled twenty tons of freight.35 Because of poor roads, however, the project was abandoned in Minnesota. Convinced that this method of freighting goods was sound, Brown bought another steam wagon to operate on the level plains along

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the Platte River where he planned to establish a permanent schedule, with two outfits running between the Missouri River and Denver. 36 This machine, driven by four ten-horsepower engines, arrived by boat in Nebraska City, Nebraska, in July 1862. After it was steamed up on a boiler full of muddy Missouri River water, it was run off the deck of the West Wind to the levee and then over several nearby hills, much to the delight of the spectators. 37 Enthusiasm ran high in anticipation of the introduction of steam transportation to the western plains. T h e local press reminded its readers that the twenty-five thousand people living in Colorado Territory were obliged to send all their products east and receive in return food, clothing, and the other necessities of life. A large trade would always be carried on between the East and West, giving employment to great caravans upon the boundless prairies of the Missouri River. Nebraska citizens expected the steam wagon to be a great improvement over the slow and expensive system of animal teaming on the prairie roads. 38 T h e editor of the Nebraska City News predicted in 1862 that the two thousand loads of heavy freight pulled between Nebraska City and Denver each year by ox and mule teams would soon give way to the new steam wagons.39 T h e citizens of Otoe County appropriated twelve thousand dollars for the construction of bridges and improvement of a road running through their county to the Platte River Plains. 40 A resolution hailed this new and successful application of steam in the propulsion of wagons across "our beautiful and fertile prairies." 41 In July 1862, the steam road locomotive drawing three wagons containing freight and excited passengers started bravely westward, puffing along at a rate of five miles per hour. Twelve miles from Nebraska City one of the cranks on the driving shaft broke, bringing the entire venture to a sudden end. 42 Today, a lone monument stands on the spot where this steam monster died in its tracks—another casualty marking the historic path of the Oregon Trail. Major Brown's failures did not discourage others from making similar attempts to use steam road engines for transport. Jesse Frye and two friends in 1864 presented a memorial to Congress asking the federal government for a grant of land as a right-of-way along the Santa Fe Trail of the Southwest. In addition, a government subsidy was requested to help finance the steam transit line which would substitute steam road engines and iron freight wagons for the tedious, dilatory, and uncertain animal trains which had long been used on this great highway leading from Independence, Missouri, to New Mexico. In return for financial support from Congress, Frye and his associates promised to help develop the six hundred miles of public domain stretching from the Missouri River

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to the base of the Rocky Mountains. They would facilitate transportation to the mines, carry mail and supplies to the army garrisons, and encourage settlers to migrate to these regions. T o make their argument as convincing as possible, the memorial stated that over a hundred tons of freight passed a given point each day on the Santa Fe Trail and that there were over 20,000 wagons and 150,000 head of oxen and mules employed in transportation over the trail each year. If steam engines were used, thousands of cattle dying annually on the route for want of forage would be saved.43 The Frye steam road engines were expected to cut the time of travel over the Santa Fe Trail from two or three months to five or six days. One of these engines was built in New York and demonstrated in Brooklyn in 1864, after which several prominent men wrote letters describing the advantages of its engineering design. Major General William F. Smith of the United States Army Engineers stated that Frye's invention would revolutionize transportation west of the Missouri River and open up rich mineral lands. He added, "I trust you will have no trouble in getting aid from Congress and capitalists." 44 In spite of this moral backing, the Frye project received little financial support, with the result that the engine apparently never had the opportunity to test its strength against the wiles of the Apaches or the torrid heat of the desert sands of the Southwest. During the early seventies, several efforts were made to transport freight over the roads of various states by using the Thompson steam road locomotive. This engine was designed in Edinburgh and built with some improvements under license in America by the Great Locomotive Works of Paterson, New Jersey.45 T h e Thompson steamer carried a vertical boiler mounted above drive wheels which were covered with hard rubber tires. One of the Thompson engines was used in California in 1871, where it traveled ten miles an hour drawing over twenty tons of freight. 48 Another one costing five thousand dollars was put into use on a two-thousand-acre farm near Wells, Minnesota. 47 A newspaper man who witnessed the experiment in 1871 reported that the machine was fired u p and driven around, but the new boiler foamed so much that frequent stops were required. T h e reporter thought the engine would revolutionize the transportation business and promised to keep the readers informed as to how the "old thing works." 48 After a month's trial, however, dust sifted into the working parts of the engine, causing so many breakdowns that the machine was abandoned. 40 Meanwhile, Oliver Burdette and Robert Webb built three steam wagons near New Athens, Ohio. During the first trial run in 1868, the engine climbed a hill near the city, much to the amazement of

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the people who lined the road. One man in his excitement threw both his hat and wig into the air. 50 Unfortunately public acclaim did not prove an index to the success of the steam wagon. 51 T h e early self-propelled road engines occasionally stirred up interest on a state-wide basis. In Wisconsin, the legislature in 1875 passed a bill appropriating ten thousand dollars as an award for the inventor who could design a traction engine capable of traveling two hundred miles under its own power. Sanguine inventors immediately got busy in several Wisconsin cities, and the legislature appointed a commission to formulate rules for the staging of a contest to determine the winner of the prize. Two engines named after their respective home towns, "Green Bay" and "Oshkosh," entered a race with the starting line in Green Bay and finish at Madison. Describing the race, one witness remarked: " T a l k about your excitement, Barnum's Circus was no greater attraction! Horses could not be kept anywhere near the highway when we came along." 52 T h e "Oshkosh" won the race by completing the distance without a breakdown, but the prize money was withheld because the commission did not believe the engine would provide a cheap and practical substitute for horses on the highway and farm. 53 On the Pacific Coast, John H. Roberts, a man with interests in mines and lumber mills, gave the railroads some competition in the Sacramento Valley in the late seventies by encouraging Riley R . Doan of Sacramento to build several fifteen-ton steam engines to haul grain and lumber out of the valley. One of Doan's daughters relates that the Southern Pacific Railroad, fearing this type of competition, paid Roberts a sizable sum of money to get out of the grainhauling business.54 Although a few steam road engines were used with limited success, this method of hauling freight proved rather impractical. Mechanical engineers discovered that it was much easier to maintain steam pressure in an engine in a stationary position than in one that was springing over rough roads and attempting to climb hills. In addition, the more complicated features of the self-propelled engines caused frequent breakage and costly delays. Robert H. Thurston, a member of the United States Commission to the International Exhibition held at Vienna in 1873, stated: " T h e introduction of the road locomotive, in substituting for horses whenever work is done, is taking place slowly . . . so slowly that it seems to attract but little attention notwithstanding its immense importance. . . ." 5 5 Some progress had been made; yet it was evident that the steam road engines were not the real answer to the farmer's request for a satisfactory steam traction engine. Even as late as 1876 a bill was introduced in the California legislature providing for a fifteen-thousand-

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dollar bounty to any citizen of the state who built a machine propelled by steam which could be substituted for horses on the farm or highways.58 Voices expressing the desirability of self-propelled agricultural engines were raised in all sections of the nation. From the East in 1872 came a New York farmer's hopeful expectation that in the near future the agricultural steam engines would travel over the common roads, haul produce to market, plow, drill, cultivate, and to a considerable extent supersede horse labor.57 Similarly, a southern plantation owner in 1870 believed the day was not far distant when the smoke of the steam plow would be in sight of the millions of men who cultivated and inhabited the vast continent.58 From the western Minnesota prairies in 1872 echoed the same refrain: "By whoever may stand at the head of the government or whoever is king of the Cannibal Islands, nature has decreed in her great book of destiny that the steam horse shall be hitched to wagons and plows. T h e time for it has come in Minnesota. . . ." 58 Apparently the farmers needed a good self-propelled engine, but it was difficult to find a practical solution to this engineering problem. Following the usual pattern of mechanical progress, the steps toward successful achievement were slow and evolutionary in character. Men designed self-propelled agricultural steam engines only to discover they were mechanical failures. Occasionally an inventor scored some measure of success, but faced financial ruin before his engine could be manufactured and sold in quantity. Since no successful steam plowing engines were manufactured in the United States immediately following the Civil War, several of the British cable plowing steam machines were imported from England for use on an experimental basis. Initial field trials were received with enthusiasm. The Journal of Agriculture in 1870 reported that all men of observation believed the country was ripe for the steam plow.40 A southern planter, Henry E. Lawrence, used one of these plowing outfits on his one-thousand-acre sugar estate near New Orleans. He believed that the crops of the South could be increased by one-third and the number of mules decreased by the same percentage through the use of cable plows. He insisted that farmers could no longer turn a deaf ear to this method of applying steam power to the cultivation of the soil and predicted their general use for breaking up the prairie lands of the West.*1 The importation of British steam plows, however, failed to meet American needs because of their great weight and high cost. When Colonel William Patterson, a Philadelphia merchant, imported a set of Fowler plowing machines in 1869 for use on his thirty-thousandacre farm in New Jersey, he paid thirteen thousand dollars for the

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two fourteen-horsepower engines, plows, and tackle.®2 Few farmers could afford such luxury. T h e n , too, cable plowing was not adapted to the large grain fields of the West where the length of the furrow was usually measured in half-miles rather than in rods. H e r e the foreign plows with their short strings of cable were grossly inadequate. T h e objections were evidently well established in the minds of the farmers of the United States because in 1870, when three thousand of the steam cable plowing outfits were in use in Great Britain, only four were operating in this country. 83 T h e rejection of the English cable plow suggested that successful steam plowing in the United States would have to await the development of a practical self-propelled engine capable of moving across the field with a gang of plows. W i t h this purpose in mind, Philander H . Standish spent $2,500 constructing at Martinez, California, a traction engine which was used in 1868 to plow a h u n d r e d acres in the Diablo Valley. 84 T h i s engine pulled a cutting machine with revolving blades intended to pulverize the soil instead of turning it over as with a moldboard plow. T h e machine was generally regarded as a sort of mechanical nightmare propelled by an impossible motion and this type of construction was abandoned. 6 5 T h e work of others was about as impractical. T h o m a s S. Minnis of Meadville, Pennsylvania, and Owen R e d m o n d of Rochester, New York, also built selfpropelled plowing engines of some merit, b u t their shortcomings were too serious to promote their production in larger numbers. T h e n u m b e r of inventors who built steam engines for plowing during the seventies was legion. In the nonindustrial state of Minnesota, at least seven of these machines were designed, given field trials, and then discarded. ce After witnessing this parade of mechanical failures, the editors of farm journals lost faith in the f r e q u e n t announcements of those who claimed to have solved the problem of steam plowing. W h e n a Heydricks steam plowing engine was given a trial near Philadelphia in 1870, the editor of the Ohio Farmer remarked that it was all very well for eastern journalists to talk about t u r n i n g Yankee inventions loose on the western plains, b u t "the prairies have been the death of all steam plows as yet . . . if Heydrick's invention is not a good deal better than Fawkes' it had best be kept to amuse sidewalk farmers in the Eastern cities." 67 Since the attempts to build steam road locomotive and plowing outfits failed to produce a self-propelled engine for farm use, a new approach to this problem was necessary. A few engineers in the seventies realized that self-propelled steam engines would never reach the average American farm unless several objectionable features could be eliminated. T h e farmers living in the great grainproducing areas needed the improved agricultural engines, b u t they

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were the very people who were least able to pay high prices for the new machinery. Emerging from the panic of 1873, discouraged by low agricultural prices, burdened with debts, and fighting railroad monopolies, these people were unable to pay five thousand dollars for self-propelled machines. On the contrary, they needed engines that were relatively cheap in price, selling around the thousanddollar figure. In addition, the farm engineers had little interest in complicated machines constructed with intricate gears, a variety of chains, pulleys, and gadgets. Unless it were simple to operate, the new self-propelled steam engine would be limited to a few experimental machines operating within the convenient radius of a good repair shop. Furthermore, the prospective customers wanted selfpropelled engines which were backed by a manufacturing company of good business reputation and one that could provide excellent repair services. Farmers had little faith in the fly-by-night blacksmith who built one or two self-propelled engines in his spare time in his own shop. Obviously, the self-propelled engines needed to be manufactured by reliable companies possessing engineering experience and skill, financial resources, and adequate distribution facilities. When these companies produced machines in large numbers, and standardized parts to provide repair services, then and only then would the self-propelled agricultural steam engines become a reality. In the light of these prerequisites, a few farsighted men abandoned plans to design new self-propelled steam engines and began converting the ordinary portable steam threshing engines into traction engines by adding a simple self-propelling attachment. This new approach broke all precedents, swept out impractical designs, and made possible the successful introduction of self-propelled steam engines to American agriculture. T h e ordinary portable steam engines had been in use on the farms of the United States for a period of twenty-five years (1850-75) before their design was changed sufficiently to convert them into successful self-propelled engines. This delay was due in part to the fact that the manufacturing companies were unable to supply the demand for portables during most of these years. In the early seventies the engine departments of the respective threshing-machine companies were so small that even when operating at full capacity their total production was limited. For instance, Russell and Company of Massillon, Ohio, built only six portable engines in 1874.®8 T w o years later the J. I. Case Company of Racine, Wisconsin, manufactured seventy-five engines. 69 T h e Gaar Scott Company of Richmond, Indiana, which claimed in 1879 to be the "largest manufacturers of threshing engines in the world," turned out only 250 engines during

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the entire year. 70 Since the manufacturers were unable to meet present demands for these common farm engines, there was no reason to switch their production from a reputable product with a ready sale to a newly designed self-propelled model which would be strictly experimental in nature. By the late seventies, however, many different companies had entered the portable engine field. In addition, scores of boiler and machine shops began building these engines because they proved to be a profitable side line to add to their regular business. Faced by this competition, a few of the companies began to study the needs of the farmers more carefully to determine how they might improve the design of their engines. W h e n the old reliable threshing-machine companies added a few self-propelling attachments to their portable engines, the immediate success of the experiment ushered in a new era of power farming in the United States—the era of the steam traction engine. T h e loudest demands for self-propelled agricultural steam engines came from the custom threshermen who were looking for a machine to save time and thus increase their annual profits. Prior to the Civil War, when the farmers furnished most of the labor during the threshing season, the time factor was not so important, but following the war, when the custom thresherman began to furnish more of the labor to go with his machinery, the importance of time grew proportionately, with added financial responsibilities for the owner of the outfit. On the large threshing outfits where a crew of twenty to thirty men was at work, a few minutes lost in unnecessary delays were multiplied into hours of wasted time which showed up in the form of diminished earnings. If there was one thing a good thresherman detested, it was the payment of wages to a crew who stood around idle or sat in the shade while he moved the threshing outfit. A waste of the crew's time was unavoidable when moving a portable steam engine and threshing machine because of the inefficient system commonly employed. Under ordinary conditions, when the time for moving arrived, four horses were hitched to the engine to pull it off the field. Another team followed, hauling the water tank and fuel box, while a fourth team took up the rear of the column to pull the threshing machine. T h e s e horses were unhitched from bundle wagons, and men and teams which should have proceeded without interruption to the next field to load up more bundles were taken from their work and engaged in an awkward moving operation. These extra maneuvers meant a loss of valuable time, resulting in fewer bushels of threshed grain per day and a corresponding cut in the threshermen's profits.

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With a self-propelled engine, capable of pulling the whole threshing outfit, the moving process was simplified and carried out without appreciable delay on the part of the crew. An additional saving in moving time was made, since the self-propelled engine pulled the water tender behind the engine and water could be pumped into the boiler while the engine was traveling. As a result, the steam pressure could be constantly maintained, making the engine ready for use as soon as it reached the next threshing location. A Kansas thresh-

Earliest self-propelled Case engines transmitted power from crankshaft to rear wheels by means of chain of spur gears. Engines still steered by horses in 1876.

erman, discussing this advantage in 1878, said that the farmers were pleased with his work because when he arrived in the field his engine was all steamed up and ready to go. Those with old-fashioned portables often wasted two hours firing the engine while the hands stood around and watched the process.71 By increasing the speed of travel on the road to four miles an hour, self-propelled steam engines saved additional time for the threshermen. 72 This brought relief to the owners of portable engines who had long complained of the interminable problems involved in trying to move their heavy engines across soft plowed fields, through muddy roads, or over steep hills. Many of the early sketches pictured

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FARM

the engineer and his assistants walking beside their teams with whips in hand energetically flogging the struggling horses which were attempting to drag the threshing outfit from one location to another. A Pennsylvania custom thresherman complained in 1871 that it took six horses to pull his engine, and that the farmers objected to the weight so much that he was afraid he would lose their jobs the next season. 73 T h e editor of the American Agriculturist, in the late seventies, maintained that the chief objection to the use of steam power

First self-steering Case traction engine, 1878. Note that steering wheel has made driver's seat by stack and tongue unnecessary.

on the farms was the difficulty of moving the heavy engines, especially in hilly country and over bad roads. 74 In striking contrast to these gloomy accounts came reports of operators of self-propelled engines indicating many of the advantages of their new machines. As might be expected, testimonial letters appearing in the C. and G. Cooper catalogue of 1883 had nothing but praise for the traction engines. However, allowing for a certain degree of exaggeration, these letters do reflect the improved performance of engines equipped with the self-propelled attachments. A farmer in Georgia claimed that his Cooper engine could travel readily over the roughest and muddiest roads in the state, 75 and a New York owner asserted that he threshed for a man "where they

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had used six horses to draw out a common portable engine, but my engine rolled out easily by itself. . . ." 76 As there were no steering devices on the early self-propelled farm engines, a team of horses was used to steer the engine while on the road. The other four or six horses which usually made up the threshing outfit could be eliminated, thus bringing an additional saving to the owners of the machinery. The saving resulting from the elimination of the cost and care of these horses more than compensated for the expense involved in adding the self-propelling traction gearing, which by itself usually amounted to J150." Self-propelled gearing enabled the thresherman to use larger engines without experiencing difficulties in moving because of the extra weight. An engineer could move a fifteen- or eighteen-horse engine as readily as one of eight horsepower. In addition the multiple uses of the self-propelled engines encouraged their sale. Many threshermen and farmers who had hesitated to buy portable engines because of the shortness of the threshing season now bought self-propelled machines for driving portable sawmills and for hauling logs and loads of freight over the roads. The many advantages of the new self-propelled engines made the portable threshing engines obsolete. The new engines, by virtue of their economy of operation and convenience in handling, were preferred by farmers during the threshing season, forcing owners of horse-power and portable-engine outfits to thresh at lower rates and to accept shorter runs. Within a few years, the popularity of the new engines was well established. By 1883, two-thirds of the orders for threshing engines sold in the country, according to the C. and G. Cooper and Company of Mount Vernon, Ohio, were for engines of the self-propelled type.78 When the officials of a few of the large threshing-machine companies became interested in designing self-propelled agricultural steam engines in the seventies, their engineers were able to draw upon the experience of many individuals who had experimented privately with mechanical devices employing the principle of selfpropulsion. Most of these individuals had been ordinary threshermen in the field who worked out their own solutions of the practical problems which faced them in their daily work. Joseph McCune, for instance, who begin doing custom threshing with a portable steam engine in Ohio as early as 1855, devised a self-propelling attachment for transmitting power from the main crankshaft of his engine to the rear wheels by means of a set of gears. 79 Another farmer living near Painesville, Ohio, converted a Hulburt and Page portable engine into a self-propelled machine by connecting the main crank-

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shaft in front to a countershaft and set of gearing in the rear, by means of a belt.80 This engine received special commendation by a judging committee at the Ohio State Fair in 1871. Although these homemade traction engines had been rolling around the countryside in various places, it was not until 1873 that the Merrit and Kellogg Company of Battle Creek, Michigan, went into the manufacturing of self-propelled agricultural engines on a business-like basis. Advertisements in the Western Rural of Chicago indicated they were superior to any in the market for driving threshing machines and sawing wood.81 In spite of the fact that the engine was of a design that was good enough to be substantially duplicated by the best manufacturers of threshing engines ten or twelve years later, Merrit and Kellogg exhausted their capital and discontinued the production of these machines after three years of manufacture. 82 C. and G. Cooper and Company of Mount Vernon, Ohio, gained the distinction of being the first company in the United States to manufacture self-propelled agricultural steam engines in large numbers and to distribute them to farmers in various parts of the country. Since the company did considerable pioneering work in the steam traction engine field in the seventies, their annual catalogues in subsequent years did not hesitate to inform the readers that "We were the first to make a successful traction engine." 83 T h e Cooper patent provided for the use of two sets of beveled gears fastened on either end of an inclined shaft which would transmit the power from the main crankshaft of the engine to the box of gears attached to the rear wheels. The company sold a hundred of these engines in 1876, and by 1880 over a thousand of them were in use.81 This burst of industrial activity demonstrated beyond all doubt that the selfpropelled engine was no longer an experiment, but had taken its place in that class of improved machines necessary to American agriculture. Aware that farmers were ready for the self-propelled engines and that many of the technical problems in their manufacture had been solved, most of the well-known threshing-machine companies by 1881 were turning out hundreds of the self-propelled farm engines. Profiting by experimentation, engineers frequently changed the designs of their engines, or circumvented a competitor's patents by stealing them outright. During one season a company's advertising literature would soundly condemn a certain feature in a competing engine, only to appear the following year with the same feature incorporated in its own product. Even the glib salesmen for the different companies had to be alert to keep up with these changes. The most serious engineering problem involved in the manufac-

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ture of self-propelled engines was the construction of a satisfactory traction attachment. Since opinions varied as to die best way to transmit power from the engine to the rear drive wheels, several types of self-propelling attachments were designed. The Cooper and the Aultman Taylor engines transmitted the power through a set of bevel pinions and an inclined shaft. T h e early Frick and Minnesota Giant engines, on the other hand, made use of a chain to carry power from the engine to a sprocket on the countershaft near the drive wheels. T h e chain drive operated with a minimum of friction and

Early Frick road locomotive with train of spur gears to drive rear wheels.

worked reasonably well. When the engine coasted downhill, however, the chain had a tendency to jump off the sprocket, leaving the engineer without any braking power. As a result the engine could veer off the road or catapult down the hillside, leaving the engineer to his own resources. Occasionally the chain would break, with one end recoiling to hit the operator of the engine. By the late 1880's, after many years of trial and error, most of the threshing-machine companies had abandoned the bevel-pinion and inclined-shaft principle as well as the chain-drive system of self-propulsion. In their place, a string of spur gears of different sizes worked against each other to carry the power from the engine to the drive wheels. If the first great engineering problem in the manufacture of selfpropelled steam engines had been the invention of satisfactory traction attachments permitting an engine to move itself, a second closely related problem was the control of the progress of the engine once

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it was put in motion. Some type of clutch was needed to give the engineer complete control over the traction power of his engine as well as to engage the flywheel for belt work. Although several different kinds of clutches had been used with some success, the most practical one was developed by Russell and Company of Massillon, Ohio, in 1885.8S This was a friction clutch which embodied the principle of expanding shoes inside the rim of the flywheel to transmit the power of the engine to the driving gears or to the flywheel. T h i s type of clutch was later used successfully on practically all traction engines. The" third major engineering problem in the manufacture of selfpropelled agricultural steam engines concerned the designing of a self-steering mechanism. Since the portable engines were pulled by horses, the early self-propelled machines incorporated the same principle of steering. In addition to guiding the engine, the horses could be called upon as a reserve force if their strength were needed to pull the engine over difficult spots in the road. T h e n , too, an engine preceded by a team of horses accustomed to these machines created less fear among other horses met on the highway. On many occasions when a team of spirited horses saw for the first time this monster breathing fire and belching out clouds of black smoke they were terrified. Without any preconceived notions about this machine, they seemed to conclude that the mysterious ogre possessed sinister motives that might not augur well for the general welfare of horseflesh. Generally the horses Vould halt in their tracks, then back u p into the buggy, to rear, to lunge, to kick the dashboard off the carriage, break out of the harness, and desert the scene of action, leaving a disconcerted driver with nothing to console his spirits save a vehement outburst of descriptive curses.88 If, however, the same horses approached an engine preceded by another team, a sense of mutual sympathy and understanding was usually established, allaying unreasonable fears. T h e editor of the Cultivator and Country Gentleman stated in 1881 that the modern farm engines no longer needed horses to pull them, but a team was usually attached to prevent frightening other horses on the road. 87 T h e fear of causing "runaways" on the highways promoted some states to enact laws requiring that a team of horses precede all steam engines traveling on the roads. New York had such a law in 1883.88 T h e Ohio Farmer in 1887 warned all threshermen to take the greatest precautions against frightening horses on the road with their engines because they would be held liable for any unnecessary negligence. 89 Yet, the placing of a span of horses before the steam traction engines as ambassadors of good will on the highway failed to eliminate all the unpleasant moments for the farm engineer. One thresher-

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man who was short of horses used a team of oxen to steer the engine along the road. After several miles of traveling on a hot day, the oxen decided to quench their thirst in a nearby stream. They let out a bellow and, disregarding the frantic efforts of the driver, pulled the engine down over a steep embankment into the refreshing waters of the river.90 Occasionally horses moved more slowly than the engine, which threatened to run over the team. An Ohio farmer recalled how he cured a balky horse that refused to cooperate in steering the engine. A neighbor brought his team over and hitched it to the engine while, I got on the seat with the lines in one hand and the throttle in the other and we started out. One horse was balky and he would fly into the collar and try to run, then he would rear back and sit down and slide till the seat of his pants touched the smokebox of the engine which was too hot for comfort, so he finally got the idea and was very meek about the whole business. 91 Ί ΙΡ« —

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Since the steam traction engines had plenty of power to pull themselves, many threshermen welcomed an opportunity to rid themselves of the bother and expense associated with this extra team of horses. By the early 1880's many of the traction engines were being equipped with self-steering apparatus making the engines independent of horses. This dawn of an era of mechanical independence was undoubtedly a proud moment for the owners of steam traction

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engines. When the farm engineer could drop his last pair of reins and place his hands upon the greasy knob of a steering wheel, his emancipation was complete. With a self-propelled, self-steered traction engine that could start, stop, reverse itself, climb hills, cross fields, crawl out of mud holes, and carry its master around the countryside, the thresherman was to all appearances king of his mechanical domain. In a day long before the arrival of the gas tractor or the automobile, while the wealthy aristocrat was still confined in his luxury to the best team of Morgans in town hitched to a phaeton, the ordinary custom thresherman was traveling the well-known roads of his own community in a private self-propelled vehicle. T h e first steam traction engines, like most innovations, were greeted with considerable skepticism. Many people insisted that they would not have enough power to pull themselves over rough roads, while others claimed that in traveling downhill the water would run to the front end of the boiler, exposing the crown sheet above the firebox, and cause violent explosions. A Kansas farmer, who introduced the first traction engine in his community in 1878, wrote that when he first started out "most everybody said it would not do; the first hill I came to I would have to be helped up, and the first one I went down, I would blow up." 92 It was not long, however, before the eyes of the skeptics were opened to the realization that the new engines were more efficient in performing the work than the old portable machines. Although the use of portable engines had become a common sight in all regions of the United States where belt power was in great demand, these new self-propelled steam engines carried a special appeal which aroused the curiosity and interest of the general public during the seventies. When a New York thresherman made the first move with his traction engine in 1879, he found to his surprise that people had driven great distances to see his machine. Some of them laid bets that he would never climb a nearby hill with his outfit but "up we went amidst cheers from the crowd." 93 T h e first traction steam engine introduced into L e Sueur County, Minnesota, by Joseph Rynda in 1882 was met outside the village of Heidelberg by a crowd of people eager to see an engine that traveled on the road without either oxen or horses. 94 Usually crowds of interested spectators were not satisfied to view the new engines from a distance: they demanded a free ride. A steam traction engine in 1878 pulled a passenger load of 212 people through the streets of Vevay, Indiana. 8 5 A subscriber to the Power magazine wrote in 1884 that he was running a Case ten-horsepower engine and that "since it is the only full traction thresher in these parts, we excite a great deal of curiosity. When we are moving, the tank and

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81

separator are covered with men and boys anxious to ride after a steam engine that draws itself." 98 Not all of the people who saw the first steam traction engines, however, had their curiosity satisfied by one glance at the machine. An early traction engine made a profound and lasting impression on one farm boy in Michigan. Henry Ford, in his book My Life and Work, recalls that his hard work on the farm as a boy led him to devise ways to improve transportation. According to Ford, one of the two biggest events in his early life was the meeting with a steam engine on the road eight miles from Detroit when he was twelve years old: I remember that engine as though I had seen it only yesterday, for it was the first vehicle other than horse drawn that I had ever seen. It was intended primarily for driving threshing machines and sawmills and was simply a portable engine and a boiler mounted on wheels, with a water tank and coal cart trailing behind. . . . It had been made by Nichols Shepard and Company of Battle Creek. I found that out at once. The engine had stopped to let us pass with our horses and I was off the wagon and talking to the engineer before my father, who was driving, knew what I was up to. It was that engine which took me into automotive transportation. I tried to make models of it and some years later I did make one that ran very well, but from the time I saw that road engine as a boy of twelve right forward to today, my great interest has been in making a machine to travel roads. . . .®7

By the mid-eighties the agricultural steam traction engines had emerged from a process of mechanical evolution until they were now capable of supplying the major belt power needs of the American grain-growing farmer. T h e Cultivator and Country Gentleman pointed out in 1881 that anyone whose experience reached back twenty-five years could fully realize how much steam power had taken the place of brute force in doing work on the farm. "It is one of the best signs of a more intelligent and thoughtful agricultural class." 98

Chapter V T H E STEAM-ENGINE BOOM, 1885-1912 farmers possessing the latest in modern machinery during the mid-eighties were doubtless unaware of the ever-changing agricultural developments that were soon to make their farm implements grossly inadequate. As the nation grew to maturity in the early part of the twentieth century, substantial progress along economic and technological lines acted as a powerful impetus, forcing farmers to adopt new methods and machinery to keep pace with the times. Agriculture was influenced by the continued expansion and settlement of the West which opened u p large acreages capable of producing cereal grain crops in unprecedented quantities. This trend, encouraged by the extension of railroad lines, the subjugation of the Indians, improved communication, and the influx of immigrants, continued long after the United States census officials announced in 1890 that the last frontier had been reached. In many of the areas beyond the Mississippi River, the settling-up process continued well into the first quarter of the twentieth century. During these days of settlement, while the immigrants were continuing to occupy uninhabited pockets on the western plains, the instability manifest on all frontiers was even more apparent. Some of the early homesteaders were speculators who proved u p without any intention of doing manual labor. They usually borrowed money on their land and were short of capital. Becoming discouraged by droughts, grasshoppers, and severe winters, they returned to their former homes in the East. 1 At times the number of people in the eastward migration outnumbered those moving westward. 2 In spite of these periodic recessions and the boom and bust cycles which interrupted the progress of settlements in certain regions, the total population of the western states and territories steadily increased. Many serious-minded fanners, tough, tenacious, and resolute, clung to their lands and homes in the face of staggering odds and acute personal privation. They made homes in the West and pioneered a work for those who followed. By 1890 the increase in population had warranted the admission of the omnibus states of Montana, Idaho, Wyoming, Washington, and the two Dakotas. Naturally, the new settlements resulted in more farms and a corAMERICAN

82

T H E STEAM-ENGINE BOOM, 1885-1912

83

responding increase in the number of acres sowed to grain crops. According to studies made by the Department of Agriculture, the number of harvested acres in the United States nearly doubled during the thirty-year period from 1880 to 1910, while the number of farms increased during the same period by over two million. 3 Inevitable increases in the production of wheat followed, for this was the principal frontier crop. During the ten-year period from 1885 to 1895, the total wheat crop in the United States was 4,456,000,000 bushels. T h e next decade produced 5,785,000}000 bushels, an increase of 1,330,000,000 bushels.4 As the railway mileage increased throughout the West, new towns sprang u p along the right-of-way, spaced about ten or fifteen miles apart. This made it possible for most farmers to make a daily round trip to town with a team and wagon load of grain. Grain elevators painted in traditional red became towering prairie monuments. These skyscrapers of the plains, surrounded by the general store, the post office, the livery stable, and the blacksmith shop, formed the heart of the town whose business prosperity and economy were based in large measure on the value of the grain crops.9 In Kansas in 1901, the wheat crop of the state was so immense that the railroads were unable to provide sufficient cars to transport the grain. In western Kansas the elevators were filled to the roofs, and still the wheat poured onto the market. Some grain dealers secured circus tents and, using only the side walls, dumped tens of thousands of bushels into them. In some instances as much as sixteen thousand bushels of wheat were dumped in piles on the ground without pretense of cover or surrounding guard. 6 While the total crop production zoomed to new heights and the number of harvested acres constantly increased, the United States census reports showed that the number of persons engaged in agriculture did not expand in proportion to the increase in the production of cereal crops. In 1870, 6,000,000 farm workers raised a cereal crop of 1,388,526,403 bushels, while in 1900, 10,381,765 workers harvested 4,434,698,746 bushels/ Credit for this increased agricultural productivity was due those who used better machinery to cultivate the soil and harvest the grain. It was due also to the men who rotated their crops, utilized fertilizers, installed irrigation systems, and selected improved varieties of seed. The adoption of more scientific methods, suggested by agronomists at agricultural colleges, was also of vital importance. But one of the most significant factors in this agricultural era was the increased efficiency of farm laborers. Each man was capable of doing more work per day. Hadley W. Quaintance, after a careful study of agricultural statistics, states that, "Taking the United States

84

STEAM POWER ON T H E AMERICAN FARM

as a whole, the efficiency of the average farm worker in the year 1900 appears to have been 86 per cent greater than in the year 1870." 8 Quaintance attributes this increase to the greater utilization of mechanical power.® William M. Hurst and Lillian M. Church of the United States Bureau of Agricultural Engineering, in evaluating the causes for the increase in production per agricultural worker, assert that "it was due, in a large measure, to the increased use of power and machinery on farms." 10 T o describe the raising of the four billion bushels of cereal crops in 1900 without reference to the power which pulled the farm implements or drove the belt pulleys on thousands of machines would constitute a serious oversight. As the steam engine provided the only successful type of mobile mechanical power for the farms of the United States during the seventies, eighties, and nineties, it would be unwise to minimize its importance. In 1880 there were 1,200,000 team horsepower available for agricultural purposes; in 1890 the figure stood at two million. 11 In 1910 a peak of 3,600,000 was reached.12 The total amount of horsepower on the farms of the country from 1850 to 1930 is shown in the following chart:

1850

i860

1Ô70

ΙΒβΟ

1630

1300

19\0

I3£0

A m o u n t of p o w e r available for f a r m p u r p o s e s in United States. Courtesy

U . S . D e p a r t m e n t of A g r i c u t t u r e Miscellaneous Bulletin 157, April

19SS.

1330

THE STEAM-ENGINE BOOM, 1885-1912

85

From these data it is evident that the rapid agricultural expansion from 1870 to 1910 required all the power that could be provided by draft animals and steam engines available. However, the chart, in showing the total amount of power available for agricultural purposes, fails to do justice to the importance of steam because the value of mechanical power lies in its exceptional usefulness. Fifty horses on a farm, for example, may seem statistically impressive, but the figure is misleading because it denotes potential rather than actual power. Since a large herd of horses could not be hitched to a belt pulley to provide a convenient, reliable, and economical source of power, it is apparent that utility rather than quantity is the measure of paramount importance. As farmers blackened the prairies with their plows and extended the wheat belt into the former lands of the bison, the Indian, and the wandering cowboy, the tempo of farming operations became even more accelerated. The Dakota Farmer pointed out in 1895 that speed in threshing meant everything to the farmer as well as to the thresherman. "Time is money," the magazine said, "and in these days of low prices and sharp competition, fast work is about as important as saving all the grain. . . ." 1 3 Most men took their work seriously; some perhaps too seriously. A thresherman at work near Cedar Falls, Iowa, broke his arm in 1893 when he attempted to put a belt on the self-feeder. He refused to leave his rig, however, saying that this was no time to be laid up with injuries. 14 A farmer at Eagle City, Iowa, was reported to have refused to leave his wheat fields to attend his wife's funeral, remarking that harvest came only once a year but a wife could be secured at any time.15 T o save valuable time and to be less dependent on manual labor, the average American fanner in the 1870's began substituting the self-binder for the reaper, the walking plow for a gang plow, and the horse-power threshing machines for portable engines. In the eighties and nineties, these same motives prompted men to smother the flames in the old portables and kindle a fire in the steam traction engines which had appeared on the agrarian scene. The arrival of steam traction engines was most timely. In the Pacific Coast states the combined harvester machines were well adapted to the application of steam power. Combined harvesters, or combines as they are called today, were the culmination of a series of inventions designed to decrease the amount of labor and cost involved in cutting, threshing, cleaning, and delivering the grain ready for market. Every operation was performed mechanically. The combined harvester moved across the field, delivering the grain untouched by the hands of workmen. Although the combine did not come into general use in most sec-

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S T E A M P O W E R ON T H E A M E R I C A N

FARM

tions of the country until about 1925, the history of these machines goes back more than a century. Samuel Lane of Hallowell, Maine, obtained the first patent for a combined harvester in 1828.1" Even though the machine was never used, the patent indicates that men of vision had long cherished the dream that the arduous work of harvesting and threshing could be done by machine in a single operation. In the spring of 1836 the United States Patent Office recorded the specifications of a combine built by E. Briggs and C. G. Carpenter. On June 28 of the same year, Hiram Moore and John Hascall of Kalamazoo, Michigan, patented their first machine. 17 This combined harvester operated fairly successfully. Since it gained national attention, it is usually regarded as the first combine to be used in the United States. T h e machine harvested three acres in 1836 and twenty the following year. Several improved machines were built by Moore and Hascall during the early forties. 18 Andrew Y. Moore, who operated one of these combines, in a letter to the Pacific Rural Press in August 1889, explained: In the spring of 1843 I bought the Bates farm near Schoolcraft, Michigan and moved thereon the last of March. I operated his Hiram Moore's machine as usual and that season had the only complete machine built for myself. It was drawn by 16 horses, hitched two abreast, walking by the side of the grain cutting 10 feet wide, thrashing, cleaning and bagging the same, doing 25 acres in a day. . . , 1 9

When James Fenimore Cooper traveled near Kalamazoo in 1848 he saw one of the Moore-Hascall combined harvesters at work. He described his impressions in The Oak Openings, relating how this "gigantic invention" pulled by sixteen horses cut the ripened grain, separated the kernels from the hulls, cleaned it with a fanning mill, and left the sacks ready for market. 20 T h e five combined harvesters built by Hiram Moore were used in Michigan from 1836 to 1853. Their operation was discontinued in the fifties because of the introduction of the reapers which could be handled conveniently by two men. 21 Uneven ripening of the grain, plus damp weather, which toughened the heads of the wheat, made the work of combining extremely difficult. R . L. Ardrey suggests in American Agricultural Implements that the Michigan combines would have proved more successful if someone had been able to invent something to regulate the weather. 22 Since the fields on the Pacific Coast were not subject to rainfall during harvest, Andrew Y. Moore shipped one of his combines from Michigan to San Jose Valley, California, where it threshed six hundred acres of grain in 1854. T h e editor of the California Farmer, in August of that year, exclaimed with considerable enthusiasm: " W e saw it moving on its

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ponderous wheels. . . . At the close of the day's work, the harvester looks back and sees twenty acres of headless straw, while the decapitated grain lays over the broad field in well-filled bags, resembling hundreds of large sheep. T h i s is one of the wonderful inventions of the age. . . ." 23 After this beginning the number of machines slowly increased until over a dozen makes of combines were at work on the West Coast in the mid-eighties. 24 Since only four men were needed to operate the horse-drawn machines, they effected great savings in the cost of labor. At this time the cost of combining an acre of wheat in California was $1.75, while the same work by steam engine and separator cost $3.00." During the eighties and nineties the large combines were often pulled by from fourteen to forty horses.2® One of the most popular postcards in the state of Washington showed 165 head of horses and mules pulling five of these machines across a wheat field.27 T h e number of horses required varied with the width of the cutting bar, the size of the combine, and the roughness of the land being harvested. T h e driver on a seat towering ten feet above the ground had to be a Jehu in skill to manage the teams below. When the torrid sun beat down relentlessly, many of the horses died from the heat—a strong argument for the use of steam traction engines. In response to urgent demand, several manufacturing companies during the eighties introduced large traction engines to the harvest fields on the Pacific Coast. A correspondent for the American Agriculturist, after observing a steam combine harvester in operation in 1890, reported that "steam power has been successfully applied during the last two years with a great reduction of costs." 28 In the early nineties the Holt Manufacturing Company of Stockton, California, and the Best Company of San Leandro were building large field engines. Some of them pulled combines cutting a forty-two-foot swath, and harvested the crop at a cost of less than 25φ an acre, as against $1.75 for the same job done by horse-drawn machines. 29 A crew of eight men with a 110-horsepower traction engine could harvest from 75 to 125 acres a day. 30 T h e big engines were independent of the combines, but to provide uniform motion for the threshing machinery, an auxiliary steam engine was mounted on the frame of the harvester. Steam was conveyed to this engine through a hose connected to the boiler of the traction engine. This arrangement was similar to the power take-offs on the modern gas tractors. T h e Holt Company in 1898 had over nine hundred of these engines pulling combines in the Pacific Coast states. 31 Because the price of coal was high in the western states, inventors designed combines so that part of the threshed straw coming from

88

STEAM POWER O N T H E AMERICAN FARM

the machine was fed to the engines and burned as fuel. 32 By 1910, however, many of these outfits were burning oil instead of straw or coal. These iron-ribbed giants transmitted their power by chain drive to the rear wheels, some of which measured twelve feet in diameter." With extension rims, some of the wheels had a six foot face. This permitted the engine to travel over the uneven surface of the grain fields, cross ditches and low places and, as one enthusiast reported, "ascend the sides of hills with as much apparent ease as a locomotive along its steel rails." 34 One of the engineers, operating a Holt combine outfit in California in 1910, wrote that the machine cut one hundred acres a day during the threshing season. T h e separator man received $7.00 a day and the engineer, $5.00. T h e oiler, fireman, header tender, and sack sewers each received $3.50 per day. 35 Not only were more steam traction engines needed to pull the big combines in the Far West, b u t additional steam power was also required to drive the modernized threshing machines coming into use in the other grain-growing sections of the United States. Spurred on by increasing demands for threshing machines of greater capacity and efficiency, several new attachments were added to the separators as standard equipment. T h e most important inventions were the self-feeder, wind stacker, and self-weigher. These attachments saved labor and made the work of threshing much easier, but they made necessary more belt power to drive the improved machines. Following the Civil War numerous attempts were made to devise a mechanical attachment for threshing machines which would eliminate hand feeding and relieve members of the crew from one of the dirtiest jobs at the rig. Although patents for self-feeders were issued as early as 1865, Byron Jackson of Woodland, California, manufactured the first automatic self-feeders in 1870 and shipped them to many parts of the West Coast. 38 These feeders consisted of an endless conveyor which carried the unthreshed grain from the ground u p into the threshing cylinder. When loaded barges came in from the field, the headings were pitched on to the feeder conveyor. Since the grain was not bound into bundles, band-cutting knives were unnecessary. These feeders were in such common use in the Sacramento Valley by the late seventies that Jackson predicted the day was not far off when threshermen would no more think of hand feeding than they would think of threshing with a flail." East of the Rocky Mountains, where the grain was usually bound and shocked in the field, it was necessary to add an automatic bandcutter to the feeder attachment before manual labor could be eliminated from this phase of the threshing. F. H. Marshall of Darlington, Indiana, built a self-feeder in 1882 featuring a number of

T H E STEAM-ENGINE BOOM, 1885-1912

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revolving knives which operated from cranks to cut the twine bands of the bundles and feed the unthreshed grain systematically into the cylinder. Although Marshall's patents lacked perfection, his principles of design were later incorporated by practically all of the manufacturers of self-feeders.38 As the mechanical feeders materially increased the speed of threshing, they soon became standard equipment on the new machines. These attachments, however, required more power on the belt. Frank G. Kranick, who conducted a series of tests to determine the amount of power needed to drive thresher attachments, reported in 1917 that a self-feeder on a thirty-two-inch separator required 1.17 to 2.38 horsepower to drive it even when the machine was running empty. 38 The self-feeders, by increasing the amount of straw entering the threshing machine, necessitated more labor in forking the threshed straw as it came from the machine. Without a straw carrier, from four to eight men were needed for the man-killing job of clearing the straw from the separator and stacking it in piles. This arduous task was relieved to some extent by the use of the endless conveyor stacker, mounted on trucks and placed at the rear of the threshing machine where it could be swung from side to side as the straw was conveyed a considerable distance from the thresher. But several men were still required to manage the swinging stacker.40 T o eliminate these labor costs, James Buchanan carried on many experiments in the eighties before he perfected and patented his first successful wind stacker in 1892. This patent incorporated the principle of a revolving fan to force a blast of air through a large pipe from which the straw was blown from the threshing machine far into the air where it would fall onto a pile, thus eliminating additional laborers. Aware of the advantages afforded by this patent, a group of Indiana lawyers led by Archie A. McKain bought u p the patent rights and in 1891 organized the Indiana Manufacturing Company. Other patents were also bought, giving the company a monopoly on the wind-stacker principle. Any threshing-machine company wishing to attach a wind stacker to its separators was bound by contract to sell the attachment at a fixed price of $250. In return for this privilege the Indiana Manufacturing Company collected thirty dollars' royalty for each machine sold with the wind stacker.41 T o establish proof that the royalty had been paid, a transfer featuring the bust of the happy farmer in a straw hat was afixed to each separator using the attachment. No doubt thousands of people who saw the "Happy Farmer" medallion were unaware that each one of these symbols represented thirty dollars in the pocket of the Indiana Manufacturing Company, which did not manufacture stackers but merely held

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STEAM P O W E R O N T H E AMERICAN FARM

patent rights to the use of them. Needless to say, these patents became involved in some of the longest court battles of the entire threshing-machine industry. Pneumatic stackers were at first frowned upon by many farmers. Some insisted that the wind from the fan would suck all the grain out over the sieves of the separator and blow it into the straw pile. 42 A few kernels of grain always passed out of the machine with the straw, but this negligible loss had gone unnoticed when the old straw carriers were used. When the wind-stacker fans, however, picked u p these kernels and blew them against the tin blower spout they resounded like hail on a glass window. Many of the farmers protested that their whole crop was being blown away. Occasionally, too, farm laborers objected to the new invention because it put men out of work. 43 However, any attachment capable of saving enough in labor costs to pay for itself in a few weeks was not to be denied the threshing trade. It became an indispensable feature of most threshing outfits in the late nineties, especially of the machines that operated in the great wheat fields on the western plains stretching from Texas into the Canadian provinces. In addition to making substantial savings in the cost of labor, the wind stackers changed the entire threshing scene. These blowers shot a blast filled with chaff and straw thirty to forty feet into the air and sent a cloud of dust windward which was carried far afield. From a distance this dust stream matched the smoke rising from the stack of the steam engine, and gave the appearance at times of two engines operating, one on each end of the threshing outfit. In addition, the blower traveling at high speed let out a steady roar which could be heard for miles on a still day. This blast rising to a full crescendo drowned out the subdued "tuck-tuck" of the steam engine and the muffled growl of the threshing cylinder, transforming what had been a relatively quiet performance into a noisy one in which members of the crew shouted to make themselves heard above the monotonous din. Significantly enough the wind stackers required more power to operate than any other threshing-machine attachment. When running empty, the blower took as much power as was needed to drive the rest of the separator. On a fifty-four-inch machine, the fan in the blower took 12.31 horsepower to r u n while idle. 44 This invention alone necessitated the use of more power on the driving belt than had been supplied by the twelve- and sixteen-horsepower steam engines common in the mid-eighties. A third invention was the self-weigher and elevator, which automatically weighed the grain as it was threshed and ran it out into a wagon box. This device eliminated the hand bagger from the

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threshing crew. About one-half horsepower was needed to drive this attachment. The self-feeder, wind stacker, and self-weigher reduced the number of men necessary to keep a separator running by almost 50 per cent, but they increased the power requirements by approximately the same percentage.45 During the 1890's, these labor-saving inventions grew increasingly popular among threshermen in all the major grain-growing sections of the United States. The treasurer of the Huber Manufacturing Company, Samuel E. Barlow, in his annual reports to the Board of Directors revealed that approximately one-third of the threshing machines sold in 1896 were equipped with wind stackers and selffeeders.49 The Indiana Manufacturing Company received royalties for nine wind stackers in 1891; ten years later nine thousand failed to supply the demand. 47 By 1900 most of the threshing machines in the Red River Valley were equipped with self-feeders, wind stackers, and self-weighers.48 As threshing machine attachments were coming into general use, the capacity of the separators was also increased by enlarging the size of the machines. T o increase the threshing capacity, wider cylinders, sieves, and straw racks were built into the separators. In 1900 threshing machines were featuring cylinders thirty-six to fortyfour inches in length with a corresponding increase in the size of the rest of the separator. In 1898, according to the American Thresherman, the threshers in the Northwest "as a rule use forty-inch cylinders and a large number of forty-four by sixty-four inch machines are also sold." 49 These cylinders were also enlarged in diameter, and once the huge double-bar cylinders were set in motion, they were able to cut through tough, damp bundles without losing momentum. Obviously the increased size of the threshing machines resulted in more bushels of threshed grain each day. Records kept on the A. R. Dalrymple farm near Hague, Dakota Territory, reveal that fortyfour different threshing outfits, during the six-year period from 1883 to 1888, averaged 1,620 bushels of wheat per day.80 In 1900 the threshing machines operating in the same area were capable of threshing out from two hundred to four hundred bushels an hour, or double the capacity of machines in use fifteen years earlier. 51 This trend continued until it was not uncommon for the big steam rigs in the Northwest to thresh four thousand bushels of grain a day during the decade preceding World War I.52 T o drive these threshing machines, which doubled their capacity during the late nineties, steam traction engines with twice their former power became a necessity.53 The annual report presented to the Board of Directors of the Huber Manufacturing Company in 1895 stated that, "Our engine sales this year have run more to the

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STEAM POWER ON T H E AMERICAN FARM

large sizes than last year on account of the larger separators and the extra attachments on them. . . ." 5 4 In 1899 an implement dealer in Minneapolis observed that the call for engines of over twenty horsepower was so great that several of the branch houses were unable to fill their orders. Agencies that had large engines refused to sell them unless the customer agreed to purchase a complete threshing outfit." Ever-increasing demands for more steam power were not confined to threshing, but were extended to other types of farm work, such as plowing, building roads, sawing lumber, and hauling freight over the highways. T h e need for powerful traction engines to break u p the virgin sod of the prairie lands of the Northwest became imperative. Native Buffalo grass had developed an elaborate root system so compact and tough as to discourage attempts to turn over large areas of it with single breaking plows pulled by horses. Lack of power for breaking in parts of Nebraska, the Dakotas, Montana, and the Western Canadian provinces provided a strong check to settlement and retarded the production of grain crops in many communities. 58 Even after the steel breaking plows had ripped through the age-old sod, the job of plowing the same land in preparation for the seeding of future crops presented a serious problem. Plowing had always been the greatest single item of power consumption on the farm. In plowing, the farm horse was under more strain than in any other type of work. Only those who have followed a team of horses slowly down the long furrow of a large field, with a plow biting off a few inches of heavy soil en route, can fully comprehend the time and energy involved in plowing a quarter section. In an effort to describe the slowness of the process, Lynn W. Ellis and Edward A. Rumelv calculated that to plow a square mile with a single twelveinch plow, one man and his team would have to walk 5,280 miles; to plow a tract five square miles would require walking a distance greater than the circumference of the earth. 57 Ever since the manufacture of steam engines for threshing purposes in the I850's, attempts had been made to develop a satisfactory plowing engine. Unfortunately these efforts met with little success. T h e pre-Civil-War engines of Fawkes and Waters, as well as those of Standish, Thompson, and a score of other inventors in the sixties and seventies, had been rejected as impractical. T h e importation of foreign cable-plowing outfits proved too expensive. But the designing engineers of manufacturing companies never abandoned the hope that this problem would eventually be solved. By 1885, the Geiser, Frick, and Farquhar companies were all experimenting with traction engines built to pull a gang of plows by direct draft. 5 8 Sales of these engines, however, were small. Since they could pull a plow

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with only five or six shares, work done with them failed to give the owner a large enough margin of superiority in speed and economy over the system of plowing with horses. Meanwhile, the owners of ordinary threshing engines considered using their machines for other types of work. If these engines could pull separators over the roads, why not hitch them to gang plows and replace horses on this job? During the 1880's numerous experiments of this nature were tried. Occasionally a threshing engine of sixteen horsepower could be seen moving across a stubble field pulling three gang plows turning six furrows simultaneously. Fuel for the engine was usually supplied from a load of straw drawn by horses and kept abreast of the firebox.89 Joseph Mills, writing from St. Lawrence, Dakota Territory, in 1883, tells of his experiences plowing with a Frick traction engine: This being my first experience in the use of traction engines for plowing, I had of course some things to learn by practical tests. . . . We labored under many disadvantages, which will be greatly lessened next season, among which was scarcity of water, there being but few wells. . . . With steam we found that fifteen acres could readily be turned in one day, using five 16-inch Casaday sulky plows. . . . e0

These efforts, in most instances, resulted in failure because the plows were designed for animal power and were unsuitable in both weight and construction for use with steam engines. Then, too, when the gang plows were hitched in tandem with a crude system of chains, ropes, and cables, the outfit was unwieldy, especially in turning around at the ends of the field. In addition, the threshing engines had not been manufactured for plowing purposes. Designed primarily for stationary belt work, the engines had narrow traction gears which could not stand the strain caused by the heavy pull on the drawbar. Even though the average threshing engine carried eight hundred pounds of metal for every horsepower developed, the manufacturers had equipped the machines with drive wheels only five or six feet high and tires but twelve or fourteen inches wide.41 Hundreds of farm owners were eager to use steam power for plowing, but when they saw one of these threshing engines crawling along at a mile and a half an hour with only five or six plows, floundering to a standstill in every soft spot of ground, or getting stalled on hills of moderate steepness, they concluded that plowing with steam engines was impractical. T o avoid these weaknesses, inventors began to make radical changes on their blueprints in an effort to build a satisfactory plowing engine. Since such machines would need to be large in size, rugged in construction, with plenty of power on the drawbar, they would be expensive to manufacture. Only those with exceptionally

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FARM

large crop acreages would have the capital to invest in these engines. T h i s fact, no doubt, explains why most of the early successful plowing engines appeared in California. J a c o b Price of San Leandro, California, built a steam traction engine to be used as a road roller to crush rock on the streets of the city. T h e San Jose Daily Mercury on October 13, 1887, editorially lampooned the engine stating that the machine which cost four thousand dollars was probably in the infirmary mashing potatoes for the invalid patients.· 2 T h e editor admitted, however, that this might have been only a rumor, as some men had been seen coaxing the roller along San Pedro Street. W h e n someone placed a brick in front of one of the big wheels, he said: T h e engine puffed and snorted, and the unwieldy machine bucked and teetered and jerked and rasped and strained and worried. T h e engine groaned piteously, the wheels slipped, the machine trembled and rattled, and, finally, by a great effort, the hardened clay was conquered and the roller jerked its weary way along. . . .* 3

Although this exaggerated description leaves the merits of the road roller much in doubt, Price continued his engineering at Racine, Wisconsin, where the J . I. Case Threshing Machine Company built several of his plowing engines. T h e advertisements claim that the largest of these, weighing nine and one-half tons, could pull as much as forty or fifty horses. 64 T h e Bozeman Chronicle described the performance of one of these engines in the fields of Montana, reporting, in 1892, that the machine moved back and forth across the broad valley turning over the sod as the smoke ascended into the clear mountain air and a band of coyotes followed at a respectful distance.®5 During the nineties, Best and Holt traction engines were used for plowing as well as for combining the crops on the large wheat ranches on the Pacific Coast. T h e Best engines were of thirty, forty, and fifty horsepower and plowed from thirty-five to forty-five acres a day. T h e y were advertised in the Pacific Rural Press in 1890 as the "Monarch of the Field," equal in strength to one hundred horses. 66 T h e Dakota Farmer in 1890 reported that these engines had reduced the cost of plowing from two dollars to forty cents an acre. 07 T h e Holt Manufacturing Company in 1898 insisted that their traction engines would plow, harrow, and seed from twenty-five to forty acres per day. T h e engines were fitted to burn coal, wood, or straw. For freighting they pulled fifty to eighty tons over ordinary roads. 68 Technologically these iron monsters were adequate for plowing, combining, logging, and hauling supplies for mining camps, but their initial cost, which ranged from four to five thousand dollars, put them out of the buying reach of the average farmer. As a result, the machines were practical only in the western states of Idaho, Oregon, Wash-

THE STEAM-ENGINE BOOM, 1885-1912

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ington, Nevada, and California, where they could be worked to capacity for several months of the year. Meanwhile, farther east more powerful threshing engines were being built. Officials of the well-established threshing-machine companies, recognizing the need for a satisfactory plowing engine to meet the needs of the large grain farmers, began to redesign their threshing engines so they might be used for plowing as well. T o tap this new market most of the companies manufactured a special plowing engine. T h e building of these machines in 1903 and 1904 marks the beginning of the era of traction plowing in the midwestern sections of the United States and the western provinces of Canada. 89 In 1904 the Case Company published a steam plowing catalogue which included twenty-eight letters of testimonial from owners of plowing engines living in the tier of wheat-producing states from Texas to Canada. These letters indicated that the use of traction engines for plowing was no longer a novelty.70 By strengthening the gears, axles, and shafting on the engines and adding larger water tanks and coal bunkers, considerable progress had been made in converting a threshing engine into one which could be used for plowing.71 T o prevent the heavy machines from miring down in soft ground, broad drive wheels and extension rims were provided. The Geiser Company, one of the pioneers in building steam plowing engines, came out in 1904 with an engine which had drive wheels three feet wide.72 In addition semi-steel and all-steel traction gears were used in place of cast iron. Special heavily constructed plows with steam-lift attachments were also manufactured for use in traction plowing. Conscious of the benefits to be derived from plowing with steam engines, many farmers turned to them in their efforts to secure more mechanical power. One farmer living in North Dakota in 1905, after watching the unloading of several carloads of thirty-five-horsepower steam engines with tires nearly three feet wide and steam plows consisting of sixteen sixteen-inch shares, declared that farmers had been skeptical of the value of steam power as an agent for plowing but now they were enthusiastic about it and many more outfits would be shipped into the country. 73 The superintendent of the engine department of the Huber Manufacturing Company of Marion, Ohio, in writing to a dealer in Oklahoma in 1907 complained that "The only trouble we have right now is to build enough of these plow engines to supply the trade in your territory and up through Kansas, Iowa, Nebraska and the Dakotas. We have to turn down some of the nicest orders one would ever want to see, but when we can't build them fast enough we can't. . . ." 74 From 1885 to 1912 steam power continued to be applied to Ameri-

96

STEAM POWER ON THE AMERICAN FARM

can agriculture in ever-increasing amounts to create a steam engine boom of unprecedented proportions. In the rice-producing states of the South the demand for more power for belt work was likewise manifest. During the late 1860's several northern manufacturers were shipping wheat threshers into the rice-growing districts, but these machines frequently cracked the rice kernels and failed to separate the grain from the stalks.75 Consequently special rice threshers were built by several companies. T h e Kingsland and Ferguson Manufacturing Company of St. Louis in 1886 claimed that it had been a pioneer in this field and that it had built an "Invincible" rice thresher as early as 1866.™ By 1910, however, companies such as Case, Farquhar, Frick, Robinson, Gaar Scott, and Belleville were equipping their threshing machines with cylinders, concaves, and sieves which were designed for threshing rice, peas, and beans. 77 Apparently rice threshing required the use of good machinery and plenty of power. A thresherman in Arkansas after using a twenty-fivehorsepower Huber engine during the rice-threshing season of 1909 explained: " T h e rice crop was good here last year, but this is new country so the threshermen have to hustle for a living. Rice is somewhat like wheat but threshes harder. We find that 1,000 bushels per day is a good average. We were out 26 days and threshed 23,000 bushels last year. T h e price is and per bushel. . . 78 A veteran of eleven years in the fields of Louisiana found rice threshing harder* on both men and machinery than threshing in the North. He said he would like to see "some of the engine experts handle an engine in the mud of our rice fields." 78 Meanwhile, the number of acres and the size of the grain crops outgrew the number of threshing rigs in the field, creating severe hardships for many farmers. Especially hard hit were those not carrying on diversified farming, whose economic welfare depended almost entirely upon the successful marketing of their grain crops. For instance, when large portions of the Northwest grain crop of 1891 were caught by a big snowstorm in early November, threshing was practically closed for the season. Threshing crews deserted the custom thresherman to seek warmer climes, leaving the farmers of the Red River Valley with 20 to 30 per cent of their crops standing in the field.80 T h e warm spring rains swelled the grain in the shock, causing it to sprout and making it worthless on the market. 81 Officials of the Huber Manufacturing Company estimated that over ten million bushels of wheat were seriously damaged that winter because of failure to get the threshing done on time. 82 T h e scarcity of threshing rigs varied somewhat, according to the size of the harvested crop, but in good years the shortage was very

THE STEAM-ENGINE BOOM, 1885-1912

97

apparent. Farm Implements and Hardware reported the sale of a new steam outfit in Kansas in 1892 and added that, "It looks now as if there will be use for all the threshers that can be p u t into the field in this p a r t of the country." 83 From Carlisle, South Dakota, in 1902, came the complaint that there was a severe shortage of threshing machines and that "Every day is like Sunday, not a machine near or running. O u r vicinity has a fine crop and there is certainly a money making chance for some enterprising thresher." 84 T h e d e m a n d for new steam engines and threshing machines was also voiced by farmers who were dissatisfied with the kind of work being done by the old rigs. I n some areas, farmers were dependent u p o n an old threshing outfit that long since should have been consigned to oblivion. T h e s e ramshackle machines made a lot of noise and threw out clouds of dust mixed with weeds, chaff, short straw, and enough good grain to pay for most of the cost of the threshing. Occasionally the threshed grain left the machine too dirty to sell a n d too foul to feed without cleaning. O n e farmer after growling a b o u t the faults of the worn-out threshing machine insisted that they were a " f r a u d u p o n the public a n d a menace to the interests of the farming community." 85 Strong d e m a n d for new steam threshing machinery was reflected in increased business for the threshing-machine companies. T h e gradual rise in the price of grain following the panic of 1893 m a d e for better times o n the farms a n d encouraged the sale of threshing machinery. W h e n increased industrialization started the trend toward urbanization, the population of the United States increased faster after 1890 t h a n did the area p u t u n d e r the plow. From 1895 to 1911 the f a r m e r profited f r o m an almost continuous advance in the average price of agricultural products. 8 6 As a result, a business boom in farm machinery got u n d e r way. T h e a n n u a l reports of the treasurer of the H u b e r M a n u f a c t u r i n g Company presented to the Board of Directors made frequent reference to the growth of business. I n 1894 the report stated that a very good trade was m a i n t a i n e d in the western states. 87 A year later the annual report said: " W e h a d about all the trade we could take care of. W e could have sold more goods. Crops have been excellent a n d we would have done a very large business h a d we been prepared to handle it." 88 I n 1898, the treasurer lamented that they were u n a b l e to fill all orders a n d that " W e lost a great amount of business on account of o u r inability to handle it, for all trade everywhere exceeded everyone's expectations, and we like other concerns in o u r line were not nearly able to supply the demand. T h i s company was never so near to 'Easy Street' f r o m a financial standpoint." 8 ·

98

STEAM POWER ON T H E AMERICAN FARM

T h e same optimistic tone was expressed by the branch house managers and implement dealers who followed the trade prospects. One dealer at Chatfield, Minnesota, sold twenty-two steam rigs during the summer of 1897, indicating good sales in that section of the country. 80 A branch manager of the Advance Thresher Company of Battle Creek, Michigan, remarked in 1901 that the demand for steam outfits was so great that his company expected to be all sold out by the first of August. He added that by midsummer there would scarcely be a first-class threshing rig for sale in the country. 91 Sales in foreign countries also encouraged manufacturing companies to develop their export trade. T h e Gaar Scott Company of Richmond, Indiana, was one of the first to seek a foreign market for their threshing machinery. 92 By 1884 they had sold steam engines and separators in Sweden and Russia. 93 When the Huber Manufacturing Company won four awards for their engines at the World's Fair in Chicago in 1893, the favorable publicity resulted in sales in Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Russia, and the West Indies. 94 T h e J . I. Case Company in 1899 sold twenty-five complete steam rigs to South America, where they were used primarily in the large wheat-growing sections of the Argentine. 91 T h e American threshing outfits proved very popular in South America and gained a substantial preference over the English machines because of their greater speed and economy of operation. 90 T h e European machinery, however, was frequently more durable and long-lived. T h e development of the foreign trade in Canada, and particularly the provinces of the Canadian Northwest, was a natural extension of the machinery business already established in the American Northwest. According to the report of the Department of Agriculture in Saskatchewan in 1916, over half a million people had immigrated to the province from the United States during the previous ten years. 97 From 1901 to 1911 Manitoba's population increased 78 per cent; Saskatchewan's, 439 per cent; Alberta's, 412 per cent. 9 8 This influx of settlers, and the land booms which accompanied the immigration, increased Canadian wheat production from 22,456,000 to 208,697,000 bushels during the same decade and created a strong market for threshing machinery manufactured in the United States. 89 With Canadian land selling at the rate of twenty thousand acres a day in the Minneapolis and St. Paul land offices in 1902, and the western Canadian provinces of Alberta, Saskatchewan, and the district of Assimboia producing sixty-two million bushels of wheat, the American manufacturers of agricultural machinery rejoiced at the prospects of increased sales. 100 Frederick E. Kenaston, president of the Minneapolis Threshing Machine Company, predicted in 1902

T H E STEAM-ENGINE BOOM, 1885-1912

99

that western Canada would soon have fifty million people and insisted that American factories would have to double and treble their output of threshing machinery to meet the demand. 101 The increased sale of threshing machinery enlarged the total volume of business done by the various manufacturing companies. Frank Bull, president of the Case Company, declared in 1898 that "our sales of threshing machinery have reached the unprecedented amount of three million dollars." 102 This was double the amount of business done ten years earlier.103 The Avery Company of Peoria, Illinois, turned out a separator every two hours and a steam engine every five hours and did a $1,250,000 business in 1900.10« In 1902 the Minneapolis Threshing Machine Company sold $2,500,000 worth of machinery and anticipated a $3,000,000 business in steam engines and separators during the following year.105 The records of the Gaar Scott Company of Richmond, Indiana, show the growth of the steamengine business, especially following the depression of 1893. Gross sales were: 109 1858 1868 1878 1888 1893

$

70,794 234,170 547,367 1,081,755 911,964

1895 1897 1899 1901 1903

$1,175,777 1,946,806 2,115,983 2,740,950 2,923,010

Increased business activities of the manufacturing companies during the late nineties led to the rather well-founded rumor that twentyeight thresher companies had merged to form a giant trust with a total capitalization of thirty-five million dollars and capital stock of one billion dollars.107 Archie A. McKain, of the Indiana Manufacturing Company, was thought to be one of the promoters of this scheme to convert the entire industry into a large monopoly. Although such a plan was discussed, several large companies failed to cooperate and the merger did not materialize.10® As the steam-engine business continued to grow, a large number of businessmen invested their money in these factories. In 1905 there were thirty-seven companies which manufactured approximately 7,500 steam traction engines.109 This output reached a top production figure of about ten thousand in 1913, after which a decline set in, prompted by the introduction of the small gasoline tractor, until in 1920 only seventeen hundred engines were built. By 1925 this type of manufacture had been virtually abandoned. 110 The following figures showing manufacture of agricultural steam engines by seven representative companies gives a fairly accurate indication of the rise and decline of the steam-engine boom.111

100

STEAM POWER ON T H E AMERICAN FARM Production Figures of Agricultural Steam Engines Case

1876 1877 1878 1879 1880 1881 1882 1883 1884 1885 1886 1887 1888 1889 1890 1891 1892 1893 1894 1895 1896 1897 1898 1899 1900 1901 1902 1903 1904 1905 1906 1907 1908 1909 1910 1911 1912 1913 1914 1915 1916 1917 1918 1919

75 109 237 244 310 411 506 592 302 195 182 236 280 297 456 462 572 482 199 127 346 262 211 920 1,032 962 1,574 1,906 1,348 1,286 2,021 1,421 1,645 1,662 1,308 2,321 2,251 1,916 1,379 952 774 598 4 346

Huber

23 62 126 95 83 144 87 153 130 195 252 325 402 396 475 361 185 339 264 217 342 412 445 550 478 454 320 346 377 373 225 427 427 364 199 284 221 290 197 76 37 96

AultmanTaylor

255 340 350 250 110 120 220 140 210 260 180 190 230 200 260 250 320 250 90 170 250 165 150 170 280 195 50 40 60 50

Geiser

290 190 330 306 310 260 310 335 335 450 540 550 610 550 710 850 790 920 1,020 980 600 675 750 850 40 700 540 360 120 40 160

Minneapolis

Port Huron

Harrison

50 110 175 380 105 160 255 140 200 365 430 480 556 450 365 410 475 150 180 175 400 110 90 300 230 295 300 180 0 140

31 40 42 69 62 94 87 97 68 47 52 108 141 252 267 342 266 300 315 310 283 328 300 113 212 162 131 147 175 199 278 200 130 55 167

65 30 58 58 64 43 45 54 37 49 33 25 25 24 26 32 37 31 2 21 15 2

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T H E STEAM-ENGINE BOOM, 1885-1912

1920 1921 1922 1923 1924 1925 1926 1927 1928 1929 1930 1931 1932 Total:

AultmanTaylor

Geiser

Minneapolis

Port Huron

Harrison

Case

Huber

434 100 154 198 130 1 1 0

155 53 48 33 17 4 2 2 0

40 25 0

20 150 130 10 20 0

150 45 55 50 25 0

160

0 1 4 11 4 10 4 15 4 5 2 3 0

35,737

11,568

5,870

15,801

7,981

6,030

839

Number of agricultural steam engines manufactured by the Case, Huber, Aultman-Taylor, Geiser, Port Huron, Minneapolis, and Harrison companies, 1890-1925. Courtesy

Hans J. Anderson,

Minneapolis,

Minn.

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STEAM POWER ON T H E AMERICAN FARM

Production figures of the seven companies show that the steamengine boom began its upward swing in 1897, reached its peak from 1905 to 1914, then declined rapidly until the industry virtually came to an end in 1925. The Case Company reached top production in 1906, 1911, and 1912, with over two thousand engines manufactured each year. The Huber and Minneapolis companies had their best years in 1901 and 1902, the Aultman-Taylor in 1906, the Geiser in 1907, the Port Huron in 1900, and the Harrison in 1898. The total production of the seven companies reached its maximum in 1906 when 4,478 engines were built. Although the Gaar Scott Company of Richmond, Indiana, led all others in the United States in production in 1898,112 two years later the Case Company moved rapidly ahead to a position of unchallenged leadership.113 Other companies making a strong showing were the Advance, Russell, Reeves, Geiser, Huber, Buffalo-Pitts, Minneapolis, Rumely, Avery, Frick, and Nichols and Shepard.11* Since the customers often bought a complete threshing rig, the manufacturers usually built threshing machines to accompany the engines. The production figures on separators followed the same trend as those of the engines, except that the life of a separator was shorter than that of the engine. This necessitated the manufacture of more separators to meet the demand. T h e Case steel threshing machine, which was put on the market in 1904, proved very popular. T h e total sales of Case separators reached one hundred thousand by the summer of 1923. If these threshing machines were placed on freight cars, the train would be five hundred miles long.115 The Nichols and Shepard "Red River Special," the Avery "Yellow Fellow" and the Robinson "Bonanza" also sold in large numbers. During the last quarter of the nineteenth century, American manufacturing entered the era of big business characterized by the concentration of financial resources, increased specialization in labor, more extensive research, the use of improved methods, and the utilization of better machine tools and materials. These factors encouraged numerous technological changes in all lines of manufacture including the threshing-machine industry. As a result of improved design, steam traction engines were more powerful and operated with greater efficiency. Although scores of technical changes were made, the alteration of the engine to eliminate the long stroke of the piston and the slow speeds of the machines of the 1880's was one of the most important improvements. By balancing the engines and improving the steam valves, their speed could be increased. In 1890, the engines made from 80 to 150 rpm. 11 · The modern engines of 1911 ran about 250

T H E STEAM-ENGINE BOOM, 1885-1912

103

rpm. 11T Naturally the higher speed increased the power of the engines. Improved steam valves to provide more efficient distribution and utilization of the live steam was another important mechanical achievement. In the early 1880's the Farm Implement News estimated that one-third of every ton of coal was wasted in the generation of steam because six-sevenths of the steam was lost by radiation and inefficient valve systems.118 T h e improved D-slide valve, the Gould balanced valve, and the Baker poppet valve, which came into general use after the turn of the century, effected remarkable economies in

Center-crank, tandem-compound cylinder, Case steam traction engine, 1897.

the use of the steam. By surrounding the boiler with a wooden steam jacket, less heat was lost by radiation, an improvement which also increased the efficiency of the engine. Steel boiler construction proved to be very desirable since it made possible the use of higher steam pressures, which in turn increased the power of the engine. T h e low-pressure boilers of the 1870's carried only seventy to ninety pounds of pressure. By 1910, however, the improved steel boilers were about four times as strong as the older types and operated under twice the amount of steam pressure. 11 * Other improvements included more steel gears, double gearing for plowing engines, improved lugs arranged in a pigeon-toe fashion, steel extension rims, and rear mounted engines with the axle behind the boiler to prevent the engine from rearing up in front on a hard pull. T h e use of two cylinders instead of one gave twice the power, an innovation which led to the manufacture of cross-

104

STEAM POWER ON T H E AMERICAN FARM

compound and tandem-compound engines. T h e double cylinders made it impossible for the engines to stop on dead center. Starting of a heavy load on the drawbar, therefore, became much easier because the engine could now start at any point. During the late 1920's, A. D. Baker of Swanton, Ohio, in an effort to compete with the gasoline tractor, manufactured a steam engine which had an automatic self-feed coal stoker and a steam condenser, improvements which made shoveling coal and hauling water unnecessary. 120 T h e Baker engine was an excellent machine, but it came too late to save the agricultural steam engine. Some observers complained that the designing engineers at the factories lacked originality, and that all steam traction engines when viewed from a distance of two hundred yards looked alike. Although there may be some justification for this criticism, there were many occasions when the engineers broke from tradition and experimented with novel designs. One of the models manufactured by the Minneapolis Threshing Machine Company in 1904 had two smokestacks instead of one. It was thought that this innovation would reduce the force of the exhaust and thus diminish the number of dangerous sparks flying from the stack. Since the same results could be secured by adjusting the opening of the exhaust nozzle, the use of the double stack was unnecessary.1®1 T h e Wood, T a b e r , and Morse Company of Eaton, New York, built a four-wheel-drive engine in the 1880's which carried the power to the front wheels by means of a long string of spur gears. Excessive friction in these gears and difficulties in steering made the engine rather impractical. T o d a y one of these machines is on display at the Edison Institute in Dearborn, Michigan. In an effort to secure more power for a plowing engine, the Huber Company manufactured a twenty-six-horsepower machine with two cylinders attached to the boiler and set at right angles to the engine shaft. T h i s ingenious bit of engineering delivered plenty of power to the drive wheels, but the excessive strain on the single crank pin caused the abandonment of the design. In spite of a few mechanical failures, the technological improvements from year to year made possible the manufacture of larger and more powerful engines for threshing and plowing. In this respect the constant increase in the size of agricultural steam traction engines paralleled the development of railroad locomotives. T h i s trend toward giganticism is revealed by the engine record books of the Nichols and Shepard Company of Battle Creek, Michigan. Of 334 engines going through the testing rooms in 1909, all but forty-eight were in the twenty- to thirty-five-horsepower class. 122 Data on the Huber Manufacturing Company of Marion, Ohio, 1 2 3 and the Minneapolis Threshing Machine Company of Hopkins, Minnesota, 124

THE STEAM-ENGINE BOOM, 1885-1912

105

shows the increased size of the steam traction engines during the period from 1878 to 1909. Largest Engine Manufactured by Huber Company Year Horsepower 1878 8 1879 12 1882 16 1893 20 1900 25 1903 30

Minneapolis Company Year Horsepower 1891 16 1893 18 1896 27 1898 30 1904 35 1909 45

By 1912, the Gaar Scott, Port Huron, Russell, Advance, Geiser, Rumely, Avery, and Reeves companies all sold engines rated at forty horsepower. T h e Northwest Thresher Company of Stillwater, Minnesota, built a huge plowing engine in 1909, advertised as a fifty-onehorsepower machine, and the Frick Company was manufacturing fifty-horsepower engines in 1917.125 The Gaar Scott "Big Forty" plowing engine, when carrying twentyone barrels of water in the tanks, weighed over thirty-five thousand pounds. It had two tandem-compound steam cylinders, double steel gearing and was described by the company as looking "like a locomotive that had rebelled at the cramped rail bed and taken off across the country." 128 T h e big Reeves forty-horse cross-compound plowing engine had two cylinders measuring nine by fifteen inches and fourteen by fifteen inches. T h e wheels were seven feet high and almost five feet wide. T h e rear axle measured seven inches in diameter and was turned by gears which were over seven inches in width.12* Two men were required to operate the machine, the engineer riding above in the cab to steer the engine, and the fireman below to tend the fires. T o the Case Company goes the rather dubious honor of manufacturing the largest commercially built steam traction engine used in the United States. This road engine was designed for use in localities which lacked railroad facilities. Its purpose was to haul ore from mines, lumber from sawmills, and to plow on a large scale. When filled with water and fuel ready for work, the engine weighed 46,000 pounds, and was said to be capable of developing 216 horsepower on the belt pulley and pulling twenty-five fourteen-inch stubble plows in the field, or fifty tons of freight on the highway.128 Since these behemoths were too heavy and expensive for ordinary use, very few of them were built.12» Most of the large steam traction engines were sold in the great wheat-growing regions of western and northwestern United Sutes, in

106

STEAM POWER ON T H E AMERICAN FARM

Canada, and in the Argentine. Eighty-one letters written to the Gould Balance Valve Company of Kellogg, Iowa, in 1919 by owners of engines in the twenty-five- to thirty-five-horsepower class reveal the following geographical distribution: 130 North Dakota South Dakota Western Canadian Provinces Kansas Minnesota

30 engines 16 15 7 4

The Port Huron Thresher Company manufactured 768 traction engines of twenty-five to thirty-two horsepower. Seventy-one per cent of these were sold in western Canada and the states of North and South Dakota, Montana, Minnesota, Nebraska, Kansas, and Oklahoma. The distribution of sales was: 131 0 North Dakota South Dakota Nebraska Kansas Saskatchewan Minnesota Alberta Montana Manitoba Iowa Oklahoma Texas Mississippi Michigan Indiana

50

100

150

200

—

In addition to the production of steam traction engines and threshing machinery, manufacturing companies continued to add new types of machinery to their line of farm implements. By 1912 most of the large threshing-machine companies were selling plows, water tanks, corn planters, feed mills, cultivators, discs, and other tillage implements. The Case Company entered the automobile manufacturing business in 1912, and sold cars through its regular threshingmachines dealers and salesmen. T h e Avery Company of Peoria, Illinois, built farm motor trucks for several years.

THE STEAM-ENGINE BOOM, 1885-1912

107

Typical barnyard threshing scene, 1890. Case engine and grain separator. Large farming operations demanded increase in mechanical power.

Chapter VI T H E HEYDAY OF STEAM POWER ON T H E FARM the early part of the twentieth century, the use of steam power in American agriculture reached the height of its development. T h e steam traction engine was king of the field in an era unusual in many respects. Farming operations were on such a gigantic scale that a sense of the dramatic pervaded the work of threshing and plowing as the largest and most powerful agricultural engines ever built rolled from one farm to another. These land dreadnaughts, some of them towering twelve feet into the air, were powerful brutes capable of driving large threshing machines through an avalanche of grain, pitched as fast as six men could fork the bundles. On the drawbar, too, their power was most convincing. At times chain couplings failed to hold the twenty-ton juggernaughts of steel and cast iron. 1 On the road the drive wheels crushed loose rocks like eggs or pressed them deep into the ground. After the engine had passed over a field, the wheel tracks could often be seen the following year because of the hard packed soil. T h e cost of large engines and separators was equally impressive. During the 1860's and early seventies, when the small portable engines were selling for around a thousand dollars, two or three farmers often bought an engine to do their threshing and other belt work. As the self-propelled engines in the late seventies were larger, more expensive, and adaptable to more types of work, the owners of these machines were encouraged to do more custom work to pay for their investments. After 1900, the price of a large threshing outfit reached four thousand dollars, the most expensive farm machinery on the grain-growing farms of the country. T h e cost was then so far beyond the economic resources of the average farmer that the threshing business was turned over almost entirely to a group of professional custom threshermen.2 Since the ordinary grain farmer was dependent on the custom thresherman and his crew of men to thresh out his crops, he had respect for the big steam outfits. Somewhat apprehensively the farm family got busy, repairing the grain bins, hauling hay to feed the threshermen's teams, and soliciting neighbors to assist with the DURING

108

THE HEYDAY OF STEAM POWER ON THE FARM

109

1

work. When the threshers arrived with their teams of horses, bundle racks, grain wagons, and the crew of twenty or thirty men, they constituted a real invasion. For the farmer these busy days were charged with excitement. 4 It is no wonder that even today a retired farmer may dream that he hears the steam whistle of the engine calling him to work.5 These threshing operations, although they represented only one of the methods by which steam power was applied to farm work, grew into a business of enormous proportions. Steam threshing rigs entered the fields wherever the cereal grain crops were grown extensively. T h e average township in the northern part of South Dakota in 1905 had nine steam threshing outfits at work during the fall season.« The Daily News of Aberdeen, South Dakota, in that year reported that ten steam rigs were working in the vicinity, while the smoke of the same number could be seen within five miles of the nearby towns, Bright and Putney. 7 The Huber Manufacturing Company, wishing to convey something of the magnitude of the threshing enterprise in the country, stated, rather glowingly, in 1903: Few of you threshermen appreciate the importance of your calling. You have invested 225 million in threshing machinery. The capital involved is second only to the Standard Oil Company. Your gross earnings for last season were 185 million. This is more than the combined capital of all the companies merged into the great steel trust. You have given two months employment to 680,000 men. This is ten times the number of men in the United States army. You have paid forty million for hire. This is more than the combined capital stock of all the threshing machine companies in the country. . . . s

The actual number of steam threshing outfits at work in the United States each year varied according to the total number of acres of threshable grain and the degree of success or failure of these crops. Studies made by members of the United States Department of Agriculture reported seventy-two thousand steam engines in use on farms in 1910,® while the American Thresherman put the figure at seventyfive thousand for the same year.10 The army of custom threshermen who owned and operated these steam rigs was composed of a motley crowd of men, who by virtue of their work were recognized as something more than farmers and something less than engineers. Half farmer and half mechanic, they entered the threshing business for various reasons and with mixed motives. Those born into a family of "threshers" spent part of their childhood playing around their fathers' steam engine, and at an early age they could fire the boiler or haul coal and water. After acquiring the steam-engine habit, they turned with natural inclination to the ownership of their own outfits when they grew old enough to handle the rig." A Kansas thresherman in 1907 sent to the American Thresh-

110

STEAM POWER ON T H E AMERICAN FARM

erman a picture of his eleven-year-old boy, stating that the youngster fired, oiled, and kept water in the boiler of a Case engine throughout a run of twenty-five days.12 An owner of a threshing machine in Oklahoma recalled that "My father, God bless his gray hairs, began threshing when I was a small boy, and consequently I have grown up with one. . . ." 13 Another class of custom threshermen emerged from the hopeful ranks of the "get rich quick" class. These men, by hastily multiplying several thousands of bushels of grain by a given number of cents a bushel, concluded that they could make a fortune by working two or three months a year. Although they knew little about business risks, interest rates, depreciation, repair bills, insurance rates, and the omnipresent fuel and labor costs, they purchased threshing outfits only to discover that they had made errors in their mathematical calculations. There was much that glistened about a new threshing rig, but it was not all gold. Still others were lured into the threshing game by their desire for personal aggrandizement and for the prestige which they assumed would come to the boss of an outfit in his own community. The hard work, responsibility, and worry involved, however, soon brought disillusionment to their dreams.14 A more select group of men with sound judgment, business ability, and mechanical aptitude, who were confident of their own ability to handle men and machinery, also entered the threshing ring. Most of these men were farmers who could save money by doing their own threshing. Respected by their neighbors, they were able to do the threshing in the community year after year with little interference from competing outfits. They were grateful for any profits that might accrue in good years to offset the losses incurred in poor years. The successful custom thresherman spent considerable time preparing for the first day of threshing. If the engine and separator had been in use for a number of years, the operator would spend several days repairing and reconditioning the machinery. The steam engine was checked over, the firebox grates examined, leaky flues calked or replaced, and bearings or working parts on the engine taken up to prevent pounding and slapping.15 Since the engines usually outlasted two separators, considerable repair work was generally necessary to put the threshing machine in good running order. Before the J . I. Case Company introduced all-steel threshing machines in 1904, the wooden separators were subject to frequent breakdowns. The numerous leather belts were spliced with strips of "whang" leather. As the belts needed constant attention, the operator purchased the leather by the half hide to have a sufficient supply for the threshing season. While the machinery was being cleaned, oiled, and loosened up, a list of repairs was ordered for emergencies.

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T h e hiring of a crew of dependable men for the season's run was one of the most difficult pre-threshing problems. Every custom thresherman knew that his machinery was designed to thresh grain at a certain rate of speed. T h e efficiency of operation depended on how dose to maximum capacity the machinery could be operated. If the crew was not complete, the threshing machine operated at partial capacity; and since many of the daily expenses were fixed charges, the margin of profit could easily be lost. Then, too, if the thresherman was short of help, the men on the job were forced to overwork to keep the machine supplied with bundles. Because they had no chance to rest during the day, they became discouraged and frequently walked off the job, leaving the owner with no alternative but to recruit another crew. Since the large threshing rigs operating throughout the wheat belt areas required from twenty to thirty-five men, the farmers themselves could not furnish enough labor by exchanging help.1® In the townships where ten machines were in operation, the laboring force of 200 to 350 men was often several times larger than the entire population of the area. In North Dakota, parts of Minnesota, and Canada, where the crop acreages were large and the local population small, transient workers provided practically the entire labor force. William Allen White, after observing the threshing operations in North Dakota in the late nineties, estimated that most of the important work was done by transients.17 In the southwestern states of Texas, Oklahoma, and Kansas, there were enough local farm boys to make up only the nucleus of an average crew, but most of the men were hired from migratory gangs. Where there were many small farms, as in the eastern grain-growing states, the threshing was usually done by the farmers themselves who exchanged labor within their own neighborhoods. The use of transient labor originated in the seventies, when large numbers of hands were needed to bind, shock, and thresh the grain in the field.18 Migrant labor became a necessity because of the seasonal character of the work on grain-growing farms which required little help during the winter months. On the large wheat fields of the Northwest, two or three men could care for the horses on a fivethousand-acre wheat farm in the wintertime; yet during the ensuing threshing days forty to sixty men were needed to handle the crops on the same acreage." Although the need for transient labor fluctuated according to the crop yields in a given locality, at no time were the crop failures general enough to make this type of labor unnecessary for the entire grain-growing regions of the western states. Newspapers reported with great regularity the lack of men to handle the crops. In 1901,

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station agents along the line of the Northern Pacific Railroad sent in dispatches listing thirty-three cities and towns demanding laborers, with Fargo and Grand Forks alone asking for a total of seventeen hundred men. 20 In 1903, the Soo Line sent out an appeal for twentyfive hundred harvest hands to be sent into Minnesota and "North Dakota. 21 T h e Minneapolis Journal reported in 1909 that twenty thousand men were needed to handle the crops stretching from Iowa itito Manitoba. 22 Occasionally the demands for migratory labor became so great that attempts were made to force men to leave the trains and accept jobs in the fields. In 1901, this method was used in Kansas and Iowa. T h e impressment of laborers at the point of a gun or the sharp end of a pitchfork, however, was soundly criticized by newspaper men. One editorial made this suggestion: The tomato can tourist may yet be subjected to the indignity of forced removal from his berth on the bounding trucks or the downy bumpers of the cars to the hard and well-paid toil of the fields. Indeed that stage has already been reached in the evolution of the desperation of the farmer. Were not thirty hobos driven from the right-of-way in Iowa the other day for their services? But what is to hinder the determined farmer from holding up the millionaire's special train and putting him and all his guests to work in the fields. . . · 23

A note of desperation was voiced in 1905 by a thresherman near Aberdeen, South Dakota, who excitedly explained to his neighbor over the telephone that one of the members of his crew had escaped. H e made an earnest plea that the neighbor turn out and help "head him off and run him down." 24 Even when there was no real scarcity of man power, it was difficult to get the men to the right place at the proper time. Since the railroads provided the only means of rapid transportation, the companies tried various methods to create a more flexible labor supply. Company officials realized that unharvested and unthreshed crops meant less freight, a strong incentive to cooperation. A special rate was sometimes given to a person going in a group which numbered at least ten; at times excursions were provided for working men at half fare. 25 As abuses appeared from time to time, the railroad companies changed most of their policies providing for reduced fares. Many men did not object to reduced rates, b u t this did not necessarily imply a willingness to work. Some arrived early in the season annd hired out to a farmer in advance with the understanding that they would be on hand for the harvesting and threshing season. W h e n the time for real work arrived the men deserted, explaining that they were

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just investigating the economic and social conditions of the country.2® Nor did the free ride to the West mean that the men would pay full fare for the return trip. After sweating long hours in the wheat fields, the men had no intention of parting with cash for railroad fare. Invariably they rode the "blind baggage" on passenger trains or chose the more leisurely top of a boxcar where they could enjoy the scenery as they jolted across the continent. In one evening alone in 1905, the freight trains coming into Aberdeen, South Dakota, were dotted with from four to five hundred transient laborers.27 The floating workman was an important factor in the extension and growth of agriculture in the western states. Without him there would have been little movement of grain from these areas toward the milling cities farther east. As a general rule, these men were nomads, wanderers with no settled place of abode. Like birds of passage they moved on from place to place, their homes hundreds of miles away. They were a simple, honest-minded group, racially well divided, and representing all walks of life. From the eastern cities came clerks, stenographers, barbers, YMCA boys, and college students out for the summer to earn money for the next academic year. Some of these men coming from as far away as New York reached the wheat fields of Kansas armed with large-caliber pistols and knives, to protect themselves from the attacks of savage Indians. 28 A large number of hands from the mine fields of Pennsylvania and Illinois came in search of higher wages.28 Lumberjacks from the camps of Minnesota and Wisconsin joined the autumnal procession of transients headed for the wheat fields of the western prairies.30 The migratory laborer must not be confused with the real hobo or the tramp, although in dress, manner of living, and mode of travel they had much in common. The transient laborer would work and earn some money, while the genuine hobo would not. J. C. Walter, manager of the Grand Central Hotel in Minneapolis, spent many years catering to these men and had dealings with thousands of them. He states that the floating laborer and the hobo look much alike; "neither is vicious and the true hobo, despite the general belief to the contrary, is honest and will not steal, neither will the harvest hand. The latter will borrow money and actually repay it. He is generally good-natured, generous and improvident to the last degree." 31 Men reached the wheat fields of the West from two directions. Many workers went south as far as Oklahoma to begin harvesting and threshing in early June. As the grain ripened to the north, they migrated in that direction until they closed out the season in the Red River country or the Canadian provinces. A second course of migration followed the railroads west from Chicago. On this route the Twin Cities was a labor terminal, tunneling the workers into the

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Dakotas. During the fall of 1909, over a thousand men left Minneapolis within a twenty-four-hour period, all of them headed for the wheat fields of the Northwest. 32 As these floating laborers stopped off in Minneapolis, they set up camp on the banks of Cedar Lake where they built their fires, cooked their stew in tin cans, washed their clothes, and slept in boxcars in the Minneapolis and St. Louis Railroad yards. Local police, on at least one occasion, not knowing whether the men were potential criminals or "tourist workmen," decided to take no chances and arrested forty-two of the "wheat inspectors" on the grounds that they were congregating in large numbers. 3 ' When the transient laborers reached the western plains, the custom threshermen were as confused as the city policemen had been. Whenever the hobos and working men met informally to eat their mulligan stew in the jungles or traveled in their well-ventilated boxcars, there was nothing in their appearance or conduct to distinguish one group from the other. They all traveled lightly and seemed to belong to the same fraternity. T o complicate matters further, a few of the men failed to run true to type; occasionally a semi-hobo would turn a hand and deliver an honest day's work for pay. Similarly the transient laborer could develop a strong aversion to manual labor even in its incipient form. When a custom thresherman loaded up a hayrack full of men at a railroad station and started off toward his threshing rig, he was never quite certain what kind of company he was keeping. Only the stern realities of the business end of a pitchfork could determine the real merits of a thresher hand. Since the threshing season in most sections of the country offered little steady employment, the transient workmen moved frequently. Railroad brakemen often caused them considerable trouble. When railroad division superintendents ordered their men to keep all "dead heads" off the trains and swore in deputies to help enforce the order, life became pretty grim for the workmen riding the freight trains. 34 Some of the brakemen "shook down" the workmen for whatever they could get. One of the transients declared: "I have seen trains with nearly 200 hands riding, and each one gave up a dollar. During the fall season I believe many brakeman's graft was from 250 to 500 dollars a month in addition to his salary. . . .38 T o get revenge the workmen sometimes tossed the brakemen from the train." 34 T h e "floater" in the transient labor gangs met many hardships and dangers. By rough experience he learned that most of the men he met were his enemies. He usually worked like a slave during the rush season's work, saved his wages, amassed his "stake," and then became a prey of the criminals who dogged his footsteps. Victim when he was flush and pariah when broke, the floater's life offered few associations except with sly shysters who profited by his improvidence. His most

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persistent enemies were the holdup men who robbed him at gun point as he rode the boxcars or loitered by the wayside, the gambler who dressed like a tramp and inveigled him into a poker game where the odds from stacked cards and marked decks were high against him, and the bootlegger who assuaged his thirst with doped liquor and then "rolled" him as he lay in a stupor. A transient worker in the 1890's said: To all good citizens we were "pesky go-abouts." We were indeed as sad a lot of unskilled, unorganized, overworked, and underpaid undesirables as could be imagined. Between the "hijacks," railroad "shacks" and "bulls" who bullied us, the bootleggers, phony card-and-crap-game artists who tempted us, and "John Law" who was supposed to protect us, we were everlastingly out of luck. For us "justice" was a joke. . .

The migration of labor toward the western grain fields was not confined to the floaters traveling by rail. Each fall farm boys from the states of Wisconsin, Illinois, and Minnesota would go west with a team and bundle rack annd hire out to threshermen to pick up some extra money. T h e amount earned from the use of the horses and wagon was added to the lads' wages. In early autumn these teams and racks would begin moving westward, sometimes in a long single file and again as lone travelers. A few young colts usually accompanied the rattling bundle rack with its roll of horse blankets tossed in one corner and a water bucket swinging from the cross beams. Personal belongings wrapped in a burlap sack rode in the built-in feed boxes at the rear of the wagon. These men camped like gypsies outside the towns en route, cared for their horses, and slept under the stars and the harvest moon. According to a news item from Frazer, Minnesota, in 1905 the teamsters from the Dakotas were passing through by the scores every day. They reported only fair crops and moderate pay for their work. The rainy season had greatly hindered their success in making money and many wished they had remained in southern Minnesota.38 Firemen, engineers, and separator men also got jobs each season handling the threshing rigs. These men were in great demand and commanded wages that were often three or four times those received by the unskilled members on the threshing crew. T h e Minneapolis Journal reported in 1914 that there was a shortage of good engineers and separator men and that these men were getting from $4.50 to $15 a day for their services.3· Many of the engineers were experienced railroad men who easily transferred their knowledge of handling locomotives on the rails to the iron horse on the farm. 40 Some of the engineers who owned threshing rigs shipped them on freight cars into the sections of the country which had grown excel-

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lent crops. Shipment of rigs across state lines became a common practice. Over fifty steam threshing outfits were brought into one North Dakota county by the Soo Railroad in 1901, and even these additional machines were unable to supply the demand in that area. 41 Since the introduction of these out-of-state machines tended to increase the competition for the local custom threshermen, frequent protests were made in an effort to discourage this system of threshing. T h e editor of the Farm Implements called attention to the fact that threshing rigs were being slipped into the Northwest from Indiana, Illinois, and Kentucky. He suggested in 1898 that the local threshermen's organizations consider this problem in their business meetings.42 Although the operation of all steam threshing outfits was based on sufficient quantities of threshable grain, good machinery, capable engineers, and an adequate supply of labor, the success of a given rig depended on the extent to which these factors could be blended into a unit which could do its work quickly and efficiently. A common system of organization and rules of daily operation were generally employed by all the large steam threshing rigs in the country, although minor variations appeared from time to time, depending on local customs or unusual threshing conditions. Every good thresherman planned to operate his threshing machinery as many hours each day as possible and for as many days as he could in order to increase his earnings. Work for all hands was from sunrise to sunset or for as long as there was sufficient light to work." Sometimes threshing began at 4:45 in the morning, with the crew stopping a few minutes for breakfast at six o'clock." Certain Canadian threshermen were known to thresh until midnight by moonlight.·"1 In the morning, the fireman usually crawled out of his bunk between three and four o'clock. With a kerosene lantern in one hand and a lunch bucket in the other, he made his way to the fields to find the threshing outfit. If the steam engine was a straw burner, he kindled a fire; if a coal fire had been "banked" the night before, he shook out the ashes and stirred the fire to get up steam pressure in the boiler. After coaxing the fire along until ten pounds of steam registered on the gauge, he turned on the steam valve in the smokestack, creating a forced draft which quickly intensified the heat of the fire and shortened the time needed to get up normal steam pressure. Between four-thirty and five o'clock the fireman pulled the whistle string. He let out one or two long blasts, indicating that threshing was to be the business of the day.46 There was considerable pride attached to the early morning whistle. Each engineer in the neighborhood tried to be the first to break the morning stillness with a shriek that would

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reverberate and echo across the plains. One thresherman recalls that an engineer who could not fire up and blow his whistle long and intermittently an hour before sunrise was regarded as lazy and unreliable." The fireman had to know more than how to get up early to blow the whistle. His job called for considerable skill and a practical knowledge of the care and firing of steam boilers. A good fireman could get up steam in the morning within an hour's time, and by skillful tending of the fire, he could maintain steady steam pressure all day long using a minimum of fuel and water.48 On the other hand, an unskilled fireman could waste half the fuel and most of the forenoon getting up steam. This inefficient firing caused delays because the steam pressure was inadequate.4* When firing with straw, a good fireman kept the chute full at all times to prevent cold air from reaching the fire. By careful firing he kept a white hot flame roaring over the brick arch in the firebox.00 According to a Canadian fireman this was not easy: From dawn to dark I had to keep the firebox loaded with straw. There was not a chance to look up for a minute; it was just a steady pitching all day long. After it was over my body felt like a shell. It took me five minutes to get my back straight enough so I could stand up, while my hands were almost welded on to the fork handle."

Whether firing with straw or coal, the fireman could be most uncomfortable at his job. When the temperature was near the hundreddegree mark, the engineer found himself standing within a few feet of a firebox heated to about two thousand degrees.52 The boiler filled with water at 325 degrees radiated an additional heat, drenching the fireman in his own sweat, and perhaps reminding him of Hades itself. During the late fall, however, when cold weather set in, this heat became a consolation. The fireman guarded against fire hazards, kept an eye on the water gauge and assisted with the moving or resetting of the threshing rig. Although most young men considered the fireman's work a good job, at least one fireman in Kansas failed to see much glamour in some of his experiences. He wrote to the Threshermen's Review in 1898: Allow me to say that the most dreadful days of my life have been spent in connection with threshing machinery. I have slept beneath the canopy of heaven with a Randolph header for a couch and have arose at three o'clock in the morning, tore out the side of a sod house for kindling, walked three miles and started a fire in the dearest engine this side of the Mississippi. T h e boys would bring me my breakfast of soda biscuit and sow belly. I have walked majestic and solemn at midnight and drank water that would make an engine foam in fifteen minutes. I have burned tons upon tons of Leavenworth coal and tore loose enough cinders to pave the state of Kansas and have shouted.

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"Come on boys, help us tighten the belt," until I have about lost faith in mankind and fell in love with the hired girl because she had on a clean apron. . . Another member of the threshing crew, who like the fireman often regarded sleep as something to be resorted to only in an emergency, was the water hauler, commonly known as the "water monkey" or "tank man." Some of the bundle pitchers regarded this work as a lazy man's job, which could be done by anyone who liked to sit in the shade of the engine or who had a pull with the boss. In most cases, however, this was far from true. T h e water supply from which the steam was generated was as essential as fuel to the operation. Its absence caused deep concern around a rig because an empty boiler was likely to explode at any moment. When the engineer blew the distress signal—one long whistle followed by three short ones—a chill went through the entire crew. Although the tank man's job did not involve continuous manual labor, it carried a large measure of responsibility and required plenty of fast action at times, especially in the vast prairie country of the West where the absence of natural water supply forced the tank man to rely upon the artesian wells in the community. Since these wells were often pumped by windmills, inoperative on calm days, the supply of water available was unpredictable. When cattle drained the stock tank, it was often necessary to visit several farms before a load of water could be secured. In the fall of 1909, dozens of steam outfits in Alberta, Canada, were tied up, unable to turn a wheel because of the scarcity of water. 54 If recent rains had filled ponds and sloughs with water, the tank man tried to get close enough to reach the water reservoir with the fifteen-foot hose attached to the wagon pump, and then pull away without getting stuck in the mud. During an average day's threshing in South Dakota with a twenty-five-horse engine, four tank loads of water were used. 55 Water haulers in North Dakota and Saskatchewan were sometimes forced to haul water ten miles.5® T h e engineer and separator man usually reached the threshing rig around five o'clock in the morning. T h e n they proceeded to oil and grease the machine and tighten the belts.57 If the straw was damp and tough from a heavy dew, the separator man put in another row of concaves and tightened them closer to the cylinder teeth, in order to knock out the kernels from the grain heads more effectively. These men often went through a little preliminary ritual which took on the aspect of an opening ceremony. Since the early morning air was usually perfectly still, a conference was necessary to predict the direction from which the wind would blow during the day. For ease in threshing, it was important that the feeder of the separator face into the wind. A strong side wind failed to clear the dust away from the sepa-

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rator, provided an undue hardship on the men pitching directly into the wind, and caused the drive belt to run off to one side of the pulleys or flop crazily in the cross currents. T h e men in conference often picked up a handful of dust or chaff and threw it into the air to determine the air currents. In threshing from the shock—the most common practice wherever small grain was grown extensively—the grain in the field was first pitched onto racks and drawn by teams to the separator. All steam threshing rigs, which included separators with at least a thirty-sixinch cylinder, were fed by pulling two loads of bundles up to the threshing machine simultaneously, one load stationed on each side of the feeder. T h e drivers of the two teams and two "spike" pitchers assisted with the j o b of unloading. W i t h this method four men pitched bundles into the threshing machine all day long. Since the two "spikes" got little rest during the day, their work was usually considered the hardest on the crew. T h e size of the threshing crew depended upon the number of teams and men needed to keep the machine supplied with bundles. Under ordinary conditions, a thirty-six-inch separator required ten- or twelve-bundle teams. 58 If this was not enough to keep the threshing outfit going, more men with bundle racks were added to the crew, or extra pitchers were sent into the field to help the bundle-haulers with their loads. 89 In this system of bundle hauling, organization was at its best. Each man and team of horses soon learned his place. Loading and unloading were carried out in cycles of perfect rotation. Just as die pitchers at the separator reached the bottom of their racks, two more teams came in from the field with their loads and took their places at the machine in a never-ending chain. At noon and at night the same order was maintained, with the first man to come in to eat being the first to return to the field. When moving from one j o b to the next, the first bundle-haulers to finish on one field loaded up at the next farm. One teamster hitched to the cook car, another moved the water tank and coal tender, the machine followed, and in a short time and without confusion all were at work again. 4 0 Although bundle-haulers were considered unskilled labor, the classification was not an accurate one. City boys who went threshing for the first time never forgot their initial awkwardness, naïveté, and ineptitude.®1 When assigned to a bundle rack and team of horses, they entered a world of uncertainties. Knowing nothing of animal husbandry, some of the men treated their horses to two bushels of oats at a feeding, while others jumped with fear when their horses crowded in the stalls, fought flies, or snorted in unexpected fashion. Some of them put the harness on backward, and most of them at,first

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fastened the tugs to the singletrees before taking down the reins or fastening up the tongue of the wagon.«2 Once in the field, they wasted time in moving from one shock of grain to the next; they turned too short, breaking the wagon or overturning their bundle rack. Their loads became a tangled mess, and they attempted to unload at the separator by gripping the pitchfork like a club to fight their way through the straw. In spite of an unmerciful ribbing from the seasoned members of the crew, given time and patience, the green thresher hand usually improved rapidly. After two or three weeks on the job, he took on polish and began to handle horses without breaking the harness or the wagon. He discovered that he could save time in loading up in the field by driving the team from the side of the rack and using a tine of the fork to pull on the lines, and he learned to build respectable loads by forking bundles with an easy, deft movement without lost motion or wasted effort. Even the experienced thresher found that his work on a steam outfit was not easy. Since every effort was made to thresh as much as possible while the weather was favorable, the hours put in each day were long and monotonous. T o be on the move at early dawn with a short time out for dinner, and then come rattling home on the last rack after dark represented a full day's work. Some threshermen remarked in lighter vein that they worked on the nine-hour principle, nine hours in the forenoon and nine hours in the afternoon. Some of the men in Illinois in 1902 tried to adopt a ten-hour day for all threshing hands, but this feeble attempt failed because it was impossible to regulate work as seasonal and as intense as threshing." In addition the threshing crews faced unfavorable working conditions when days were too hot, too windy, or too cold.84 With late July and August temperatures registering in the high nineties, the bundlehauler's shirt often remained blackened with sweat throughout the day. High winds sometimes swept the grain fields, parching the lips of the workmen, filling their eyes with dust, and making every pore smart.65 Each bundle caught in a stiff breeze had to be wrestled into place, extra effort which sapped reserve strength. After a rain, the air often became muggy and stiffing, and at times swarms of mosquitoes, gnats, and flying ants harassed the men in the field. Toward evening many a bundle-hauler as he finished unloading his rack at the threshing machine, weary almost to exhaustion, would pause hopefully for a sign from the engineer to quit for the day, only to be disappointed. With an empty stomach and a painful fatigue, he would slowly go back into the field as if to prove that his body could stand the strain of one more load of bundles. When the sun lost its fire as it faded into the west and a curtain of blue crept up the eastern sky, the cool of the

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evening brought welcome relief to men who had taken a sound physical beating. In the late fall, the threshing sometimes dragged on until the weather became extremely cold. Franz Wood, one of the founders of the Wood Brothers Threshing Machine Company of Des Moines, Iowa, recalls threshing in South Dakota late one season. He writes: Snow came before we were through and we had to pull the separator through snow widi oxen. We didn't have time to stop for anything. My boots were all worn out. My toes protruded through the ends of them into the snow playing peek-a-boo with each other. In the morning when we rolled out and tried to wash the first touch of the ice water would cause electric sparks to fly from the chills and shivers that shook our bodies.·«

Letters from threshermen in the Northwest reported threshing in January and February until stopped by heavy snowfalls.·7 Temperatures around the threshing machines often dropped below zero. One correspondent sent a picture to the Farm Implements magazine showing a steam rig threshing flax at Douglas, North Dakota, on December 15,1911, with the thermometer registering twenty degrees below zero.·· After a hard day's work, the threshing crews were given uncomfortable sleeping quarters with little protection from the damp or cold. These conditions were quite prevalent on the widely scattered farms on the western plains during the early days of agriculture when the farmers themselves were surrounded with simple and almost primitive accommodations.·* Since individual farm families had scarcely enough room for themselves, the extra thresher hands were expected to ñnd beds anywhere as long as it was not in the house. As a result, the expression "good enough for threshers" came into common usage in many communities, signifying that less care and good judgment were needed in preparing for the threshers than for other people. 10 During periods of good weather, a member of the threshing crew usually wrapped up in a blanket and crawled into a nearby straw pile from which he emerged at dawn shaking the chaff and straw from his underwear. 71 In spite of these minor irritations, however, a good clean pile of straw could be quite comfortable. T h e men who preferred a roof over their heads took their bed rolls into the barn, granary, or shed. A South Dakota thresherman recalled that in the 1890's he carried his own blankets and slept in the barns, hay stacks, straw piles, chicken coops, or anywhere he could get some sort of shelter.72 Another veteran of many threshing seasons in Nebraska remembered the many nights he slept in the hayloft wrapped in horse blankets. In September a refreshing sleep could be secured in that way.

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But when the days, warm and sunny, were followed by frosty nights, or windy, rainy ones, actual suffering was incurred. Men saturated by perspiration during the day were sensitive to the temperature at night. T h a t was one reason why so many rural mothers objected strenuously to having their boys "follow the machine." It was a rough, trying life for the boy who did not have a robust physique. . . , 73

T h e practice of sleeping out-of-doors or in the barns on the western prairies was general during the era of steam threshing. T h e introduction of more threshing rigs, however, shortened the length of the season so that the work was completed before the weather turned cold in October. 74 In many of the eastern and midwestern states, smaller groups of men were given beds in the farmers' houses and treated almost as well as the members of the family. 75 In many instances, meals served to workmen on the big steam rigs threshing in the Southwest, West, and Northwest during the nineties were no better than the housing facilities. This was especially true when the crew boarded with individual farmers instead of eating in the cook car which accompanied some of the threshing outfits. Although special efforts were made to feed the threshers well, there were at least some occasions when the food was very unsatisfactory. Some farmers served food that was poor both in quality and quantity. In 1908, a disgusted thresherman in Tennessee growled: "We have had to put u p with victuals that were not fit for a good honest dog to eat. . . ." 7G Cases of ptomaine poisoning occurred. Rancid pork, stale eggs, sour bread, scorched potatoes, greasy doughnuts, and butter that was not fit for the soap kettle were sometimes served.77 Writing out of a lifetime of experience in threshing, one man related that the boss of the threshing rig always looked for a riot among the boys when it was announced that the next job would be that of a certain farmer. In describing the food served at this place, he remarked that "maggoty meat, no matter if the maggots disappeared in the process of cooking, is worse than offered to idols and causeth unpardonable offense." 78 An old-time thresherman of western Minnesota recalls eating bread so hard that he could stand on one of the loaves. After drinking several days from a farmer's shallow well, he relates, "One day unfortunately we found one dead rooster and one dead buck sheep at the bottom of the well." TB Franz Wood mentions in his memoirs that on one job men were eating dinner when he noticed the woman of the house, filling the stove with cow chips by the hand method of firing. When finished she proceeded to pat the butter gently into place on a serving dish without washing her hands. Needless to say, the appetites of the crew were visibly affected. 80 With these unfavorable conditions prevailing on many of the threshing outfits, the question naturally arises: Why did these la-

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borers stay on the job? Why would anyone feel like working under conditions as intolerable as these? The obvious answer is that many of the men did desert their bosses and move on to some less rigorous environment. Many of the men who had hired out were unable to meet the physical demands made upon them during a threshing run. This was especially true of those who were not accustomed to hard manual labor. A piano tuner from the East, for instance, may have known a lot about tuning forks but nothing about pitchforks. The Minneapolis Journal reported in 1909 that the YMCA boys from the eastern cities were daily applying for food and lodging after their disastrous experiences in the fields of the West. They are a disappointed, dejected, heart and foot sore lot. About all the worldly goods they have is their YMCA cards. Employment agents are to blame for sending these boys to the wheat fields. They are stenographers, clerks, college lads and youths from other vocations in which their hands are strangers to calluses and they can not stand the work. The boys all tell stories of working one day, sleeping in straw stacks or pup tents and waking up the next morning too tired to take a step. The only thing for them to do is to beat their way back home. . . . 8 1

While working in the intense heat, some of the men suffered from sunstroke. A bundle-hauler at work near Leola, South Dakota, was hurried to a doctor with hemorrhage of the lungs, believed to have been caused by dust from the separator and excessive heat.82 A Kansas newspaper in July 1914 listed the deaths of three men from heat exhaustion.®* The men who stuck by the owner of a threshing rig until the last acre of grain was threshed did so because personal satisfactions compensated for the more unpleasant aspects of the work. The motives which impelled a laborer to return year after year to the arduous work of the threshing season were often varied and somewhat intangible. Some of the men were attracted by the wages. The two- or three-dollar daily wage customary prior to 1914 was almost clear profit, because board was furnished and room was as reasonable as the evening air. This scale of wages was higher than that of most other types of unskilled labor, tempting many men to go threshing to earn spending money or to build up a little stake for themselves. Then, too, threshing operations during the heyday of steam power were an unforgettable experience for those who participated. Since the threshing crews were composed of a large number of men with different backgrounds, a stimulating social atmosphere developed whenever the men got together. In conversation, the scope of ideas was almost unlimited. The symposiums around the dinner table or gab fests in the barnyard unquestionably included some of the longest yarns, biggest boasts and bald-faced lies that were ever heard on

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the plains of the Middle West." During a rainy spell or a breakdown of the threshing machinery, the men resorted to various diversions: wrestling, feats of strength, or the swapping of personal belongings. The novice or "greenhorn" was victimized as a pastime and became the butt of wisecracks and practical jokes.»5 This social time seldom remained dull because new experiences interjected an element of surprise. When a day began no one knew whether a thunderstorm would strike, forcing the crew to scurry for cover, or whether a runaway team of horses would cut across the stubble fields breaking a set of harness, smashing property, or injuring a workman. 84 Among the men themselves, a clash of personalities might flare up at any moment precipitating a violent argument featuring the use of bare fists, pitchforks, or knives. The Indiana Farmer reported a quarrel on a threshing outfit near Muncie in which one of the men was stabbed. 87 A South Dakota newspaper in 1913 mentioned that the new city jail in Aberdeen had received its first occupant when a thresher got into an argument and rapped his opponent over the head with a club, leaving him unconscious in the street.88 When heavy rains interrupted the threshing, the large crews from the several rigs in the community often drew part of their wages and hurried into the nearest town. The entry of several hundred men into a small town, doubling or trebling its population within a few hours' time, usually resulted in some exciting moments for everyone in the vicinity.8* The threshers often stuck together, forming gangs spoiling for a fight, a recreation regarded as good clean fun. The Aberdeen Daily News in 1905 reported a lively time in the small town of Mellette when twenty threshing crews entered it bent on having a good time and spending their money. The two saloons in the city did a thriving business until the threshers began to get quarrelsome. Fights then ensued in rapid succession over almost nothing, and to restore quiet, the city marshall took things in hand. He deputized two draymen to help him clean up the bunch and armed with policeman billies, they started their work about seven o'clock last evening. After a hard fight, in which the billies did not seem to be very effective, the marshall changed his mode of attack by substituting guns for clubs. The crowd then surrendered about ten o'clock. Some were placed in the city jail and the rest run out of town. The officers weren't hurt very much, but a few of the threshers were badly cut and bruised by the billies. The fight created quite a stir in the little city.90

In more recent times, especially after 1900, the meals served the thresher were usually so good that fond memories of them often helped lure him back to the grain fields for another season's run. The long hours of heavy work required hearty meals. When the cold fall weather arrived, demanding the utilization of both heat and energy,

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the appetites of the threshermen reached gargantuan proportions. Quantity above all else was the requirement even at the expense of quality. Despised were the dainty servings, the cute little cookies, and the touch of color set forth by the inexperienced cook who misunderstood the basic food requirements of the men in the held.91 Serving was of necessity country style, and the men conveniently dispensed with etiquette. Perhaps one reason why the farmers' wives worked so hard to prepare good meals for the threshers was that their guests made such a vigorous attack on the food that this alone was ample praise for the cooks. During this gastronomical miracle, food disappeared from the threshing table like "dew in the midsummer sun." »* Anyone who has "gone threshing" can readily recall the somewhat typical noontime meal—a dozen men chewing corn off the cob and others gulping down their coffee. The combination of sounds rising from the table blended into a rhapsody of almost orchestral quality. After the last forkful, the men rose, wiped their mouths on the backs of their hands, rested a brief moment, rolled irregular cigarettes from a sack of "Bull Durham," and returned to the fields. When the threshers were boarded by the farmers, the wives spent much time preparing the meals. One of these women, who fed her share of threshing crews in the Northwest, recalls: Making gallons of pickles of all kinds, cucumber, beet, bean and apple. Jars of canned fruits and vegetables were inspected, many were bought, long before the siege started. . . . Bushels of potatoes were dug and put in a cool, dark place. A day or two before the outfit arrived, the house was filled with the aroma of cake baking. Frosting pans were turned over to the little folks who were patiently waiting. Huge batches of bread were baked and stored in the cool basement. Pounds of butter had been packed away to keep fresh. . .

Another Dakota housewife, in discussing preparations for threshers, stated, in 1900, that she began baking bread two days before the men arrived, sometimes piling up a reserve of forty loaves.94 One farm woman suggested that farmers' wives were trying to put too much variety on their tables. She believed that it was not a good policy to feed the threshers better food than their own families got during the rest of the year. She suggested that the meals during threshing time be reduced to a few simple dishes, but each one in quantity. For a simple breakfast she presented, in all seriousness, her own menu of coffee, cream, sugar, oatmeal porridge, bread, butter, fried potatoes, ham and eggs, and fresh steak.98 To relieve the housewives of the burden of cooking for threshers and to facilitate the serving of the meals, most of the large steam rigs of the country included a special cook car. On some of the big wheat farms of California, Washington, and North Dakota, where the fields

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were a long distance away from the farm buildings, the cook car was pulled out into the field where the threshing was done.9« In some cases the men ate in relays so that the machinery could be operated without stopping for dinner. T h e custom thresherman hired a cook or two to take charge of the meals. T h e cook car was a rectangular room about twelve by twenty-six feet in size mounted on wheels—usually a pair of old separator trucks. Inside, a cook stove stood in one corner with a crooked smokepipe which found its way through a piece of square tin in the roof. A cupboard with shelves filled with dishes and a variety of kitchen Utensils occupied another corner, while two long counters extended the length of the car on both sides. A door at the rear opened onto a small porch from which portable steps led to the ground. On this back porch, the men found pails of water for washing, and a small mirror, usually hung loosely on the outside wall. When traversing rough roads the cook shack held its course like a good ship in a storm, but a melody of noise rose from the room as kitchen pans, bottles, and vegetables rolled pell-mell about on the floor. T o the casual observer, the cook wagon may have appeared somewhat plain, but the thresher hands coming in from the long day in the fields viewed the well-spread tables with genuine satisfaction. After the members of a big threshing crew in the Northwest had worked together as a team for about a hundred days during the season's run, they generally stayed with their boss until the last job was finished. However, when the weather suddenly turned cold, and snow and ice caused a delay in operations, many of the men became discouraged, quit work, and moved to more comfortable quarters. Some reported that they decided to leave when the snow got eight inches deep and the ice on the ponds was thick enough to bear a team of horses.97 Many of the hands went back to their homes in the eastern or southern states, others to their old haunts in the northern woods of Minnesota and Wisconsin. 98 During this transition period, while shifting from one type of work to another, many of the men went on a spree and spent or squandered most of their hard-earned savings. Occasionally, a provident hand reached home with his earnings, but he was so rare as to be something of a curiosity even to his fellows." Thomas D. Campbell, president of the Campbell Farming Corporation and present wheat king of Montana, in recalling his operation of steam threshing rigs in North Dakota observed: Most of the men employed were lumberjacks from the Minnesota woods and hobos who were tough and hard working, proud of their strength and all heavy drinkers. T h e cook was invariably a lumberjack who got drunk at every opportunity and always wanted to fight somebody.

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After harvest was over, the men would all go to East Grand Forks, spend all their money in saloons and sporting houses the first night, then go to the woods for the winter, work hard for six months and do the same thing over again in the spring in the Bemidji or Cass Lake Saloons. . . . This characteristic always amazed me. These men would fight a buzz saw if the time keeper made a ten-cent mistake in their time, but yet they would forfeit their entire wages in one night at the end of the season.100

The men most familiar with the various aspects of steam power and its use for agricultural purposes were the engineers who owned the threshing machinery or supervised its operation. Acting with authority, they determined policy and issued their orders for the day. Since members of the threshing crew were often working at a great distance from the rig, the engineers sent information to them by means of the steam whistle, blown according to the prescribed code of signals in common use in the community. One long continuous sound was given to attract attention to the working place and to indicate that work would proceed. Other whistle signals were: Two long blasts One short blast Two short blasts Three short blasts One long, and series of shorts Two long, two shorts Continuous short whistles

Work completed for the day Stop threshing machine Start threshing machine More grain boxes needed Water needed Moving to next farm Unusual distress or fire 101

A good engineer with a well-organized system resorted to a minimum use of the whistle, whereas the inexperienced operator blew the whistle without provocation as if its air-piercing shrieks added importance to his position. One Michigan thresherman recalls that as boys he and his friends could always gauge the degree of sobriety of their engineer by the manner in which he blew the whistle.10In addition to keeping the threshing machinery running smoothly, engineers felt responsible for the prevention of injuries and accidents around the rig. Since there were always some irresponsible people at the machine, who would take unnecessary chances in exposing themselves to danger, engineers had to face the problem of personal safety. The intensity with which the work was done encouraged many men to make foolhardy moves. In addition, the large threshing machines with their exposed belts and array of whirling movable parts, set in motion and driven by a powerful steam engine, developed such momentum that the machinery could not be stopped at a moment's notice. As a result, anyone caught in this cyclone of machinery was likely to suffer serious consequences. Children and young people, fascinated by the threshing machinery, wanted to swarm over it, and had to be

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driven off by the engineer, who often greeted them with well-chosen and mellifluous profanity. Although the number of threshing accidents is unknown, there were enough tragedies each year to indicate that the occupation was rather dangerous. The Minnesota Bureau of Labor, Industry, and Commerce reported in 1911 that "the substitution of power machines for hand labor has made agriculture a hazardous industry. . . ." x03 The files of the Minneapolis Journal for the five-year period, 1899 to 1904, mentions thirty deaths caused by injuries sustained around the threshing outfits in this section.101 Many of these accidents occurred when the victims were caught in the main drive belt, which stretched out like a pair of ribbons from the threshing cylinder to the steam engine flywheel eighty feet away. The use of a long belt put the engine farther from the separator, minimizing the danger of fire. In addition, a hundred-and-sixty-foot belt was heavy enough to prevent slippage on the pulley of the threshing machine. Traveling at high speed in a smooth line with scarcely a ripple, the belt looked innocent enough—so innocent, in fact, that workmen grew careless. Instead of walking around the separator or engine to get from one side of the machine to the other, they sometimes stepped between the upper and lower parts of the drive belt. If the person lost his balance, he was carried into the pulley of the threshing machine or the flywheel of the engine where his body was usually crushed, or pounded almost to a pulp.105 Since it was impossible to encase the belts, pulleys, and protruding shafts of the separator, many men were injured as they tended the machine. The self-feeder with its knives lashing out to slash bundles of grain was a particularly dangerous zone. If a man slipped in stepping from a loaded bundle rack to the top of the separator, he was caught in these revolving blades, which shredded his legs before the machinery could be stopped.106 Not all the accidents around the separator, however, were fatal or even serious. On some occasions a workman got too close to a revolving shaft, and his clothes were entangled in the machinery. Within a few seconds he found himself without a stitch of clothing left on him much to his own surprise and that of the interested spectators. While operating a steam traction engine, the engineer himself could not be too careful in his efforts to avoid personal injury. Besides the danger of burns from the hot firebox and the high-pressure steam in the boiler, there were many hazards involved in oiling or greasing the moving parts of the engine.107 If the engineer's gloves or coat sleeves were caught in the gearing next to the flywheel, a hand or arm could be quickly crushed or jerked from its socket.108 Some engi-

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neers were hurt when they took hold of the flywheel to turn the engine off dead center but forgot to turn off the throttle. The engine would kick over with a sudden burst of speed, causing the flywheel to strike the engineer before he could release his hold. 10 · Many of the most tragic accidents occurred when the engineer was moving his outfit from one threshing job to the next. T o save valuable time, these moves were sometimes made at night when the operator's vision was obscured. If a steering gear or chain broke on a downgrade, the traction engine often plunged into a ditch or rolled down an embankment, wrecking the threshing machinery and injuring members of the crew.110 Occasionally the separator pole would break while going down a hill, and the threshing machine would then run forward, out of control, with the feeder crushing the engineer against the boiler of the engine. Even though a steam engine moved very slowly, seldom traveling over two miles an hour, a surprisingly large number of persons were run over and crushed to death under the broad wheels of these heavy machines. In 1901 at least three people were killed in this manner in the state of Minnesota alone.111 One of the most serious and persistent problems that plagued engineers operating steam traction engines on the highways was the failure of bridges and road culverts to support the weight of the outfits. Too frequently, while the threshing rig was rolling across one of these spans, the bridge would give way without warning, plunging steam engine and separator into the river below, often carrying the engineer and fireman along. Sometimes members of the crew were able to jump clear of the wreckage and swim to safety, but even if they succeeded in saving their lives, they could not easily forget the harrowing experience nor overlook the financial loss to their damaged machinery. The problem of inadequate bridges developed because agricultural machinery over a period of years increased in size more rapidly than improvements were made in highway construction. Most bridges in use in 1900 had been built to support horse-drawn vehicles, which usually carried loads of not more than two or three tons. As a result, threshing outfits composed of a twelve-ton steam engine pulling a separator of two or three tons, and followed by a water tank and coal tender, imposed more weight than many of the bridges could safely sustain.112 Then, too, bridges were often neglected because the construction and maintenance of local roads and bridges was under the administration of county commissioners and township road supervisors who held elective office. In most cases these local officials were slow to initiate improvements which called for a higher tax levy on

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their constituents. They often ignored the pleas of the minority group of custom threshermen who demanded removal and replacement of these death traps. Because of the dilatory actions of road commissioners and the disinterested attitude of the general public, a grim toll of bridge accidents occurred in all sections of the United States where steam traction engines were used to any extent for agricultural purposes. Even the comparatively level lands of Kansas, Nebraska, and the Dakotas possessed enough of these bridge hazards to make this problem a live issue among threshermen there. Accounts of bridge failures in the various grain-growing states appeared frequently in the pages of the threshermen's periodicals. Descriptions of the tragedies were very similar; the only variations being the location of the accident, the distance of the fall, the number of injuries or casualties, the amount of property damage, and the degree to which the engineer was innocent of responsibility for the disaster. Some of these accidents were particularly ghastly, for the victims were not only mangled but also scalded so badly that they died a few hours after the disaster. According to a report from Iowa in the fall of 1906, "When the accident occurred, Henderson was caught in the steering attachment and pinioned against the boiler and was literally scalded to death. He wore a heavy pair of gloves and with these he protected his face and eyes, but his body was simply cooked. . . ." 113 Many of the small wooden culverts that bridged ditches six or seven feet deep were also extremely dangerous. Quite frequently the front wheels of the engine would start across the culvert successfully, but when the rear drive wheels carrying the most weight hit the wooden platform the planks would give way, dropping the rear end of the engine into the ditch in a jackknife position. This sudden drop of the rear wheels doubled the coal tender or feeder of the separator against the engineer, pinning him against the boiler of the engine where he was burned to death by fire and steam. When this happened, the operators of the engine had no time to make their escape. Some of the steam-engine manufacturers, as a safety precaution, eventually built the "boot boards" of the rear platform upon solid iron beams which were strong enough to hold up the engine when the drive wheels dropped off the edge of a culvert or bridge abutment. 114 Incensed by the frequency of these bridge and culvert disasters, custom threshermen began to secure some support in their fight against county officials whom they accused of playing politics, of dereliction of duty, and of criminal neglect. Henry Field, owner of a seed house in Shenandoah, Iowa, printed several articles in his Seed Sense in 1913 which criticized the county commissioners in scathing

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terms for their failure to safeguard the lives and property of those who operated steam traction engines.115 When the county commissioners of Clermont, Ohio, in 1906 put up a warning sign that they would not be responsible for any damage incurred by the running of traction engines across a certain bridge, Bascom B. Clarke, editor of the American Thresherman, defended the thresherman, saying that such scarecrow notices did not lessen the responsibility of the commissioners.118 One thresherman in Iowa voiced his opinions of the county officials: What gets my whiskers is how any man, be he overseer, commissioner, or Old Nick himself can go out on a main traveled road and recovcr an old bridge with nice new three inch planks and leave the old stringers in, so rotten that you can push a seven inch spike into the head with your fingers. This is done here. . . . I sometimes think it would be the right thing for each county to own an engine of average weight and compel the supervisors, county and state commissioners to ride over each and every bridge once a year. Of course they are not to be tied fast; give them a chance to jump the same as other traction men have. 117

These grievances became an important consideration among various threshermen's organizations. These groups urged the state legislators to pass laws providing for the building of better roads and bridges in their respective states. In 1915 three thousand threshermen meeting in Wichita, Kansas, adopted a resolution favoring the enactment of a bill by the Kansas legislature to provide for the building of all bridges and culverts in the state according to uniform plans and specifications prepared by the State Highway Department. 118 Meanwhile, some improvement in bridge and culvert construction was being made. In many instances, when a steam traction engine smashed a weak wooden bridge, a new bridge was constructed of steel or concrete. In the case of a bridge accident near Dell Rapids, South Dakota, in 1906, the day after the tragedy a contract was let for a new cement bridge capable of supporting a load of ninety tons.118 In some of the pictures appearing in threshermen's magazines showing steam engines lying half submerged in water beneath a wrecked bridge, a new steel bridge could be seen going up over the scene of the accident: 120 T h e rise of the automobile industry also encouraged improvement of highways and roads throughout the country, but by the time the bridges had been universally improved the iron horse on the farm had begun to retire from active duty. In addition to difficulties in traveling on the highways, engineers of steam traction engines sometimes ran into trouble when they attempted to cross ground softened by recent rains or saturated with water from adjacent ponds or sloughs. Loose, sandy soil would also stop an engine. This difficulty was nearly impossible to overcome be-

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cause of the great weight of the engines, most of which carried nine hundred to a thousand pounds of metal for every horsepower developed on the drawbar. 121 In spite of the broad drive wheels and the frequent use of extension rims, when these ponderous engines reached a soft spot in the field they sank hopelessly into the mud. Although the traction engines had plenty of power to turn their drive wheels, they could not get adequate footing to extricate themselves. Once an engine was buried to the wheel hubs or until the firebox rested on the ground, it required considerable ingenuity and labor of a sizable crew of men to get the machine back on solid ground. Sometimes it took three days to do the job successfully.122 On some occasions the engine was lifted by a number of jackscrews, much like a house-moving project, until the wheels could be placed upon planks or timbers which would sustain its weight. It took a Missouri thresherman, who got stuck on some sand hills, two days to plank the engine and separator for thirty rods so he could continue. 123 Sometimes enough loose rocks could be thrown under the drive wheels to enable the engine to work its way onto firm footing. On other occasions long chains or wire cables were used. One end of the chain was tied around the drive wheel, the other end to solid anchor posts in front of the engine. When the wheels began to turn they wound themselves onto the chain, moving the engine out of the mud hole. One of the less desirable features of steam traction engines was their almost constant need of attention on the part of the engineer or fireman. Lacking the dependability of the modern gasoline motor, they could not be left in operation for hours at a time without supervision. Since the engine worked by means of heat and pressure, two factors that were variable and subject to frequent change, a capable engineer never wandered too far away from his place of duty behind the throttle. He realized full well that the high-pressure steam under his control could do an immense amount of work, but he knew, too, that, under certain conditions, the boiler could explode without a moment's notice. The explosion of farm steam engines constitutes one of the most serious chapters in the history of the application of steam power to American agriculture. High-pressure boilers under the best management were relatively safe, but the potential danger inherent in these engines was never completely eliminated. 124 Almost without exception threshermen had a genuine respect for steam. Even veteran threshers stepped away from an engine when its safety valve blew off under maximum pressure, reflecting a sense of apprehension not found in the operation of modern gasoline tractors.126 Occasionally an engine boiler exploded with terrible force. Since a small metal tank ten by thirty inches under sixty-five pounds of

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steam pressure has energy equal to a pound of gunpowder, the explosive force of an engine boiler holding thirteen barrels of water under 150 pounds of steam pressure was tremendous.124 When a steam engine exploded in Michigan in 1899 the boiler took off like a rocket. It sailed into the barn where it smashed the threshing machine, and then it glanced off through the opposite end of the barn breaking a fourteen-inch sill on the way.127 Another steam traction engine in Indiana exploded with such violence that the boiler was demolished and its dome hurled twenty rods from the scene of the accident. One of the rear drive wheels of the engine was blown through the wall of a house nearby. 1 " A news item from Bathgate, Dakota Territory, in 1885 reported that a steam threshing engine blew up, destroying the engine and damaging a Methodist Church and a saloon in the blast.129 Since a large number of men were usually at work around the steam traction engines, boiler explosions often took a heavy toll in human lives. On many of these tragic occasions, five and six men were killed in a single blast.140 The spraying steam and the flying fragments of iron and steel shrapnel sometimes scalded and dismembered bodies.1®1 Fortunately, not all boiler explosions resulted in the loss of life. Sometimes only one end of the boiler was blown out, which limited the danger zone. Threshermen have been catapulted twenty feet through the air and still lived to thresh another day. 1 " Other lives were saved by the use of the early automobiles, which rushed doctors to the scene of the accident in record time. 1 " One of the unfortunate consequences of boiler explosions was the fires which broke out among the dry straw surrounding the threshing rigs. Hot coals from the firebox were often scattered over a wide area, igniting a series of fires that sometimes enveloped the straw stack, the bundle loads of grain, and the entire threshing machine. A news item from Concordia, Kansas, in 1914 reported that a traction engine was completely wrecked and the separator and two loads of wheat were burned when a threshing engine boiler exploded.1®* During a similar accident, near Junction City, Kansas, in 1909, the separator and four stacks were completely destroyed by fire.1®8 The number of steam traction engines which exploded on the farms of the country is a matter of conjecture and speculation. Many minor accidents of this nature were not reported in the newspapers or threshermen's magazines. In addition, only a few sutes adopted boiler inspection laws. Even those which did, failed to break down their records far enough to indicate agricultural engine explosions. Many custom threshermen, possessing a natural pride in their machines, held the view that these disasters were rather rare. No doubt

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many communities in the grain-growing sections never experienced one of these unfortunate events. On the other hand, these explosions did occur during the entire steam-power era and were never entirely eliminated as a source of anxiety and concern. During an eight-day period in July 1914 a Kansas newspaper reported two explosions of boilers on threshing engines. 13 · According to the Minnesota Industrial Commission, the last death caused by the explosion of a steam traction engine was that of a custom thresherman, killed while threshing in Lac Qui Parle County in 1930, 1 "—a year which far postdates the days of steam power. It seems that the worst outbreak of boiler explosions occurred during the last few years of the nineteenth century. By that time, the steam-engine boom was getting under way in earnest, and many new manufacturing companies entered the steam-engine field. T o meet the demands of threshermert for more power, the new engines were given higher horsepower ratings by increasing the steam pressure of the boilers. But pressure was increased in boilers without a corresponding strengthening of boiler plate or improvement in its construction. Before manufacturing companies could eliminate the weaknesses in some of these boilers and improve their design, many explosions occurred, especially in the Northwest where greater demands were placed upon the various steam engines then in use. In 1897, Farm Implements magazine observed that, "the threshing machine explosions are apparently causing an unusual amount of damage to property and loss of life this fall." 138 T h e Grand Forks Herald of North Dakota in the same year printed a cartoon showing a frightened thresherman standing between an exploding steam engine and a prairie fire with the comment that boiler explosions had been remarkably frequent during the fall season. 139 Boiler explosions in North Dakota alone in 1898 killed twenty-seven people, injured many more, and caused property loss amounting to $118,Ó00. 140 Faced with an increasing number of tragedies of this type, and the general apathy of the public about corrective or preventive measures, one irate thresherman exclaimed: A man killed by a boiler explosion is regarded with about as much sympathy as a dead dog. A dead horse killed by an explosion is regarded as of far more value than a man—horses cost money, while a killed man is hustled off to the cemetery with as much feeling as the old couplet, "Hustle his bones over the stones, for he is only a pauper. . . ." 1 4 1

Fundamentally, all steam-boiler explosions were caused by the obvious fact that the internal pressure exceeded the strength of the metal shell in which it was contained. T h e cause of a specific explosion, however, was often difficult to determine—so difficult in some

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instances as to make it impossible to single out any one factor. In these cases, survivors frankly admitted that the causes were unknown, and the newspapers reported that the cause of the accident could not be determined. These accidents could have been caused by any one factor or a combination of factors, such as faulty boiler construction, rusting away of the boiler shell, excessive steam pressure, uneven and unequal expansion of the boiler plates, or cold water hitting overheated metal surfaces.142 Undoubtedly many of the early agricultural steam engines violated a well-recognized principle of boiler construction that all surfaces exposed to the fire should be protected on the opposite side with water. As a result, some boilers exploded from overheating of the boiler plates which had deteriorated rapidly. Most of these early steam boilers were single-riveted. This formed a weak spot at the joints, and they opened up under steam pressure. Some boilers were weakened by uneven heating, which caused the plates to buckle, a weakness which could lead to a break in the boiler shell. One of the most common causes for a break was the formation of a layer of scale on the inside of the boiler, formed by the evaporation of water containing carbonates, sulfates, and chlorides. Since this scale was a nonconductor of heat, 60 per cent more heat was required to evaporate water in a boiler lined with an incrustation one-quarter of an inch thick.142 This meant that a hotter fire was needed, which, in turn, tended to burn the metal and cause the plates to bulge or crack. Occasionally steam traction engines exploded because of improper handling by incompetent and careless operators. Many of these pseudo engineers seemed to think that because the engine was made of iron and steel it was indestructible. They discarded all precaution, allowing the water to get low and exposing the crown sheet to the direct blaze of the fire. When these plates were heated almost to incandescence, the erratic engineer would turn on the pump injecting a stream of cold water into this fiery cauldron. In many cases this foolish act caused an explosion, which ended the life of both engineer and engine. Some foolhardy men actually attempted to fire boilers without steam gauges.144 Occasionally engineers tampered with the steam gauges or turned down the safety valves to secure more power, while others pulled into the fields with old rusty death traps which no reputable engineer would have touched.145 Even if an engine was of good design and in perfect running order, it could not survive for any length of time if placed in the hands of a man ignorant of the basic principles of the successful application of steam power to the various needs of agriculture. Some of the owners of threshing outfits were accused of false economy in hiring the first tramp that came along who called himself an engineer. 14 ·

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Since the number of steam-engine explosions around 1900 caused considerable alarm among the threshermen and farmers, most of the companies engaged in manufacturing steam traction engines began to adopt the improved railroad locomotive-type boiler. By using better materials, improving the workmanship and reinforcing the most common weak spots, the companies made boilers almost four times as strong as the older ones had been. 147 In addition, certain laws were passed which required that the boilers of all steam traction engines sold should meet certain specifications as to thickness of the boiler shell, kind of riveting, and type of joints. Canadian and Ohio boiler laws, for instance, required that all boilers should be doubleriveted with butt and double-strap joints. 148 T h e American Society of Mechanical Engineers set up a code of standards which was adopted by most of the major grain-growing states. T o meet these various requirements by 1916, threshingmachine companies were manufacturing engines which would pass any of the tests in Canada and the United States. T h e Advance Rumely Company advertised that it foresaw the universal adoption of the new boiler laws and had designed its engines to conform to the specifications prepared by the American Society of Mechanical Engineers.149 Paradoxically, the problem of steam-engine explosions, like the contemporary bridge problem, had just reached the stage of reasonable solution when the engines began to lose their popularity and pass silently from the agricultural scene. T h e custom threshermen operating steam rigs on the western plains faced one unusual geographic problem. While steam-engine operators in the eastern states were scarcely affected, western engineers were constantly irked by complications resulting from the use of alkali or "hard water" that came from the artesian wells in this section of the country. Alkali water was indeed bad medicine for the digestive system of a steam traction engine. It was difficult to assimilate, and often caused the engine to cough, foam, and prime over. Although the artesian water was often crystal clear when it came from the deep wells, it carried enough calcium, sodium, and magnesium compounds to scale up the inside of the boiler and coat the flues so heavily that the engine was practically worthless within two years. T h e rapid accumulation of this scale made necessary frequent replacement of the flues in the boiler. 150 Philip S. Rose, former agricultural engineer at North Dakota State College at Fargo, estimated in 1907 that the average life of a steam traction engine in that area was about seven years, with the actual working time limited to two years. A thresherman in South Dakota, in an unhappy mood, wrote in 1901 that "We are hard on flues. We have to reflue every season at an expense of sixty dollars. . . ." 151

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Since the answer to the alkali problem lay in the water supply, western steam-engine operators, whenever possible, tried to secure rain water from ponds or streams nearby, even if this water was muddy and carried foreign matter in suspension. By blowing the steam off the top of the water in the boiler, much of the sediment and scum could be carried away. When the dirt setded in the bottom of the boiler, however, the hand plates could be removed and the dirt scraped or washed out of the water legs surrounding the firebox. Various boiler compounds could be added to the water to combat incrustration. T h e George Frick Company sold one of these preparations as early as 1865.152 T h e Journal of the Franklin Institute in the 1870's recommended a lacquer with which to paint the boiler walls to prevent the formation of scale. 1 " Engineers sometimes resorted to the use of soda ash, kerosene, or potatoes to counteract the strong alkali in the water. 154 Although the water could at times be improved in quality or "softened" by the use of various compounds, the results were not always satisfactory. These compounds counteracted the alkali in the water, but in so doing they created a soaplike condition which caused the water to "foam" violently. 155 This agitation resulted in wet steam, a substantial loss of power, a clouded water gauge, and general inefficient engine performance. Under these conditions the water became so "light" that it followed the inside of the boiler shell upward into the dome and then over the steam pipe into the cylinder. It washed the oil off the piston and valves and caused unnecessary wear on these engine parts. 15 · This "priming" of the cylinder with water, if not carefully done, could easily knock out the piston head, causing serious delays and mounting repair bills. If the engineer was not bothered by alkali, foaming, and priming, there was always a good chance that some of the flues would begin to leak, allowing water to escape from the boiler into the smokestack or firebox. This potential threat usually gave the engineer considerable cause for worry. These leaks wasted water, increased the cost of fuel, and sometimes halted threshing operations in the middle of a season's run. Like a physician, the operator carried a set of special tools to be used in these emergencies. With hammer and calking instruments, he attempted to mold the iron over the offending break, or he resorted to a reamer which he used to roll down the ends of the tubes to tighten them. Sometimes an engineer would drive a piece of wood into the end of the flue. The wood absorbed water and swelled enough to tighten up the loose flue. If the situation became serious, some courageous engineers would pull the fire from the engine, climb into the roasting firebox and roll down the hot flues.1" Fire hazards around a steam threshing outfit could not be dismissed

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lightly by those who worked around these machines. Although it did not differ essentially from that encountered with portable steam engines in earlier years, the danger was sometimes accentuated because of intensification of the threshing operations, increased size of the crews, larger fields of combustible materials, and increased difficulty in anticipating situations which arose during the day's work. T h e owner of the rig, usually the engineer, knowing that he was responsible for all losses caused by fires, was particularly interested in all preventive measures that might be taken to avoid this type of property destruction. 1 5 8 In spite of precautionary measures, however, some fires were started from sparks flying from the smokestacks of steam traction engines. When straw was used for fuel and the engine was barking loudly under a heavy load, it was almost impossible to prevent some sparks from shooting into the air, even if the smoke was filtered through a screen on the stack. Flax straw was especially difficult to handle because its fibrous texture delayed complete combustion, causing a stream of sparks. During bright daylight, the sparks were invisible, but after sundown these straw burners presented a display of fireworks. Some farmers demanded that an engine be stopped late in the evening because of these flying embers, not realizing that the same process had been going on all day in less visible fashion. When coal was used in the firebox, and a good screen capped the smokestack, the danger from sparks was reduced. 159 But fires from this source occurred often enough to cause some anxiety on the part of most custom threshermen. A report from Oklahoma during the threshing season of 1910 stated that sparks from a steam engine had set a fire which destroyed a threshing machine, adding that "this is the second machine to be destroyed by fire in this vicinity during the past two weeks." 1 6 0 During one week in July 1914 seven fields in Kansas were fired by sparks emanating from steam traction engines. 161 One farmer in Montana in 1915 refused to let a steam rig pull on to his farm, saying that he thought the steamers had already burned up enough grain and separators.1®2 T h e most destructive fires started by steam traction engines were those which got out of control in the large grain fields on the western plains. These sometimes developed into raging prairie fires which at times swept relentlessly across thousands of acres of land, burning farm homes, agricultural implements, livestock and practically everything of value that lay in their way. 1 · 3 During certain years the fall months grew exceedingly hot and dry, turning the grass and vegetation brown and crisp like the brittle yellow straw that stood in the stubble fields. If a spark from a steam threshing engine touched off this tinderbox before a stiff wind, the people of the community faced

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grim tragedy. Whenever these fires sent ugly black signals curling into the sky, men at the threshing rigs, facing a common danger, stopped their machines, loaded milk cans, barrels of water, and burlap sacks into any vehicle capable of transportation and turned out to fight the fire. Farmers rallied from miles around to join in the battle against the crackling flames that licked their way devastatingly forward. 1 · 4 Working in the terrific heat and heavy acrid smoke, the men followed the fire line beating out the flames with their wet sacks. T h e "water monkey" drove along with his tank of water tò resaturate the sacks which readily dried out in the scorching heat. 1 · 5 Sometimes the work of these men was unusually successful in limiting the range of these fires; on other occasions, their efforts failed. T h e Daily News of Aberdeen, South Dakota, on September 30, 1905, reported that the city was almost surrounded by four large fires, all started by sparks from threshing engines. 1 ·· T h e following week the same newspaper reported that great clouds of smoke in the northwest near Leola, South Dakota, were caused by fires set by two steam threshing rigs. In describing this prairie fire, the paper said: "The fire got beyond control and on Friday was traveling northwest in a sheet of flames twelve miles wide. Some houses were burned and cattle were lost, but the amount has not yet been determined. . . ." 187 Not all of the fires started by agricultural steam engines were caused by sparks from the smokestack. Sometimes as an engineer moved across a field, a sudden jar would shake a few hot coals out of the ash box below the firebox. These coals could ignite a fire which would break out several minutes after the machine and the men had moved on to another field. Hot boxes on the separator could start fires in the straw around the machine. 1 · 8 Carelessness on the part of members of the crew sometimes caused fires to break out unexpectedly. A match falling into a load of bundles might easily be pitched into the threshing machine where it was ignited as it went past the cylinder teeth. Failure to extinguish cigarette butts before throwing them away created another fire hazard. 109 T o eliminate the dangers of smoking around the threshing rig, many of the engineers and firemen chewed tobacco or resorted to the snuffbox. As the custom threshermen with their steam rigs invaded the grain fields each fall, they carried heavy responsibilities in matters of supervision. In addition, they were surrounded by working conditions that could at times be most unpleasant. Long hours of work were accepted as a matter of course. They were the first to ready the machines in the morning, and they invariably rode the last wagon to leave the machine at night. Repair work, such as calking flues, repacking pumps, and changing grates in the firebox, was done by the light of a kerosene lantern. It was not unusual for the engineer to

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work on his engine all night in order to continue threshing the next day. Thomas Campbell of Montana recalls that he spent many nights calking flues, setting valves, and doing other engine repair work.170 Ordinarily these men shared the living accommodations of their crews, the only difference being that they spent fewer hours in sleeping and eating. Since much of the moving was done at night, the engineer usually arrived at the farmhouse or cook car so late that only "left-overs" remained on the table. The extremes to which the engineers were exposed varied from the cold, dry sandwiches that they ate at their machines to what one thresherman described as "eating sow belly and drinking hot coffee in a two-by-four kitchen until the sweat dripped from my brow in streams as big as the overflow to a J . I. Case engine. . . ." 171 The secretary of the Thresherman's Association of Dunn County, North Dakota, observing the work of the steam engine operator, reported in 1914 that the custom thresherman experienced more hardships than any other laborer on the farm. Custom threshermen were burdened with responsibilities and faced with numerous problems, but it is apparent that they would never have endured these hardships, worries, and disappointments unless they had been compensated in part by genuine satisfactions. But even the horny-handed men who lived this life seem unable to define the intangible and elusive motives which called them back to the threshing ring year after year. Speaking in generalities, they claimed to be victims of the "threshing fever," or that "thrashin" was in their blood. E. W. Hamilton, who as editor of the Canadian Thresherman spent thirty-five years observing and studying these men, suggests that "the lure of operating a threshing outfit served to keep the Old Guard in the field until old age forced them to retire and in many cases their sons became inoculated with the bug and once it got into a man's blood it was harder to kill than leprosy. . . ." 172 Once when a veteran steam thresherman was squinting along the edge of the flywheel to make sure the engine was square in line with the separator, he was asked by a newspaper reporter why he stayed on the job. The oldtimer shifted his cud of tobacco, expectorated copiously, and replied: Well sir, I reckon, I have swore off this dum threshing business a hundred times. Every year I say, "Well this is my last," but it ain't. . . . It ain't the money. . . . Lordy knows you don't get rich running a threshing outfit. Hustles me to break even lots of times. I reckon, I just naturally have a hankering to be oily and greasy and covered with dust and to be jawed at and work all day and half the night. That must be it. I swear off and durn if I ain't crazy as a kid just as the threshing season starts.173

Most of the steam-engine threshermen referred to their days in the threshing ring as "romantic," a term implying that a unique spirit

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enveloped the activities around a big rig. The engineer was proud of the smooth and almost irresistible power at his finger tips. Toward the end of day the bundle pitchers often worked extremely fast in their efforts to unload their wagons and get home for supper. As the bundles piled high on the feeder and the grain was hogged through the separator until the blower spouted black dust against the horizon, the engineer could appreciate the response of the governor and the short curt barks of the exhaust reassuring him that no amount of pitching could slug his threshing machine or reduce the speed of his engine.17* Evidently a sense of real achievement gave added satisfaction to the custom thresherman. To see the farmer jump on the side of the wagon box to examine the first bushel of grain to come from the separator was in itself recognition of the importance of the threshing operations. The fanner usually dipped his hands into the grain, allowing the dry kernels to slither through his fingers again and again like a miser enjoying his gold.176 This conveyed a silent tribute to the men who kept the threshing rigs in motion. At sundown when the driving belt flopped to a standstill and the last plume of smoke drifted from the engine's smokestack, the thresherman felt a sense of well-being, knowing that he had done another honest day's work.17· Mingled with these ennobling sentiments was the gambling spirit which pervaded the business activities of the custom thresherman. The stakes were unsually high. The owner of a five-thousand-dollar outfit was, in effect, gambling his investment and his mortgages in one big game to prove that he could beat all opposition and come out with a whole skin at the end of the season's run. If he were exceedingly fortunate, he might even pick up a neat bundle of cash as a personal reward for his efforts." 7 This element of speculation and suspense added excitement to the thresherman's game. This spirit was so strong that many adventurers who headed for the Alaskan gold fields around the turn of the century never reached the Klondike. En route through the West, they were shunted off by the lure of threshermen's gold into the grain fields of the Dakotas where they gambled with a steam threshing rig.178 To these rugged individuals, threshing became a kind of sport from which they could not escape. The smell of grain dust was attar to their nostrils, and grease and sweat and grime a soothing ointment to their bodies.17* Unquestionably many veterans of the threshing business became attached to a number of seemingly inconsequential things, none important in itself, yet in combination a strong influence capable of touching the emotions of the individual engineer. Such intangibles undoubtedly included the smell of drops of oil falling on the hot boiler, the black smoke that followed each shovel of coal, the easy

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rhythmic "tuck-a-tuck" of the engine when pitchers put the dry bundles into the feeder heads first, the grunting bark of the exhaust when the bundles were wet or went into the feeder crosswise, the hiss of escaping steam when the engine stood idle—all these built up fond memories for the agricultural iron horse. A Missouri thresherman after fifty-six years in the business said, "I love the whistle of the engine, the hum of the cylinder, and a yellow-legged chicken dinner as well as ever." 180 Farm engineers enjoyed discussing the subject they knew best— their threshing experiences. Their letters to threshermen's magazines asked: Was a compound engine more efficient than a simple engine? 181 Did the undermounted engines have advantages over the conventionally styled designs? 182 What type of valve gear was the best? 183 Could a traction engine pull more with a slipping clutch? 184 Was a steamer that could spin its wheels the best puller? 185 Does the piston stop at the end of its stroke when the engine is running? 18β What model engine was the easiest steamer? 187 Is the pressure on the bottom of a boiler greater than on the top? 188 These and countless other questions filled the conversation of the custom threshermen's fraternity. Much of the terminology and technological phraseology was woven into a language which only they could readily understand. Many custom threshermen stayed in the business because of special pride in their ability to do the community threshing year after year. Since they had done this work in a satisfactory manner for so long, they knew that their neighbors needed and depended on their services each fall. T o have refused to thresh for these people would have seemed like breaking lifelong friendships. 189 Since this bond of understanding had grown stronger with the years, many of the threshermen continued to follow the threshing ring much longer than they had originally intended. The three Winter brothers farming near Pipestone, Minnesota, threshed for their neighbors for thirty-eight consecutive years without losing a single job.190 They threshed out over 112,000 bushels for thirty-five different farmers during one season's run and recorded a total of two million bushels threshed during the thirty-eight-year period.191 Naturally, newspaper and magazine stories relating such special achievements tended to increase the determination of many threshermen to outdo their competitors. Numerous claims were printed challenging anyone to show a better record of bushels threshed in a season or a lifetime. Some of the threshermen accepted these challenges and presented evidence backed by the seal of a notary public and signed by a list of worthy witnesses. When the American Thresherman conducted a contest in 1926 to locate the oldest thresherman in the United States in point of years of service, the winners from six

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different states averaged fifty-five years, and the longest single period was sixty-one years.192 This record, however, was later broken by James Morrill of Mankato, Minnesota, who spent seventy-two years on various rigs. For sixty of those years he owned a part or full interest in the threshing outfits, having operated a score of engines and twenty-one different separators.193 Since the number of bushels of grain threshed per day provided a standard of measurement which everyone could understand, it came to be regarded as an index of considerable significance. Each crew of men made the day's threshing figures a matter of frequent conversation. The men inquired whether the day's total had beaten a previous record; excuses were freely given if the day's showing was poor, and hopes were always high that the morrow might establish a new standard of achievement. The number of bushels was much like the score in an athletic contest, the various outfits vying with one another in their efforts to demonstrate superiority. This spirit of competition created an intense loyalty to a particular outfit, often expressed in an insatiable desire to out-thresh any other rig in that section of the country. The custom thresherman also entered into this spirit of competition, because increased efforts on the part of his men resulted in better financial returns for a season's run.1®4 Although this type of competition added zest to the rivalry among threshermen, the figures in themselves were not significant, because no formal rules for threshing were ever adopted. Since the conditions under which the records were made varied in length of day, condition of grain, and size of crew, the results were usually quite meaningless. Threshing figures that found their way into newspaper columns were often misleading because they represented the best rather than the average threshing performances. The custom threshermen did not brag about the unfortunate days when inclement weather, tough straw, breakdowns, and accidents reduced the number of bushels to such a miserably low figure that no one around the rig with any selfrespect cared to discuss the unpleasant subject. Unfortunately for the custom thresherman, competition among various steam rigs was not always friendly. Introduction of new threshing outfits into a farming community meant that the threshermen already established were going to lose some of their business. Since the loss of a few threshing jobs might easily mean the difference between profit or loss for the year, each thresherman tried in advance to get his regular customers to promise him their threshing jobs. Farmers were often reluctant to give these assurances, because they wanted to get threshed early to avoid losses to their crops by wet weather. As a result, they frequently let out their threshing to the first custom rig that came along.

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Sometimes a farmer became dissatisfied with work done the previous year or became involved in arguments over payment of his old threshing bill. Adding these resentments to his own notions that regular custom threshermen charged too much for their services, he would often buy a second-hand threshing outfit with the intention of threshing his own grain and that of enough of his neighbors to pay for his machinery. T o secure any kind of a run he would usually cut his price to underbid his competitors, a move which often brought financial hardship to all threshermen in that section of the country. Complaints against the price-cutter were serious enough to indicate that this problem was a general one. A thresherman who had operated his rig in Kansas for seven seasons stated that the year 1910 was the worst he had experienced, and added diat he lost five hundred dollars because of the price-cutters." 8 A protest from Missouri indicated that price-cutters were threshing for one and a half cents for oats and three cents for wheat. 19 · Deploring the same conditions in Minnesota in 1913, a thresherman fumed: "These durn price-cutters make me so durn mad I could leave the country." 197 T o control the number of threshing outfits in a community and to elevate the threshermen's ethics was difficult, because there were always a few men who refused to cooperate with the majority opinion. In addition, the fanners who were interested in getting their work done at lowest cost encouraged price-cutters to stay in business by patronizing them. Frequently they hired migrant custom threshermen to do their threshing, overlooking the fact that a few of these traveling custom threshermen were neither trustworthy nor reliable operators.198 There were just enough undesirable custom threshermen in some sections of the country to spoil the work for conscientious workmen. Occasionally a big-mouthed roisterer got hold of a rig and tried to subdue the earth. He would steam into a farmer's yard as if he owned it, fill u p the barn with horses, let his men smoke in the hay, raid the garden, the hen coop, and the feed bin without permission, keep a card party going each night until nearly time for the morning whistle, blow dirt into the water tank and grain into the straw stack, cuss everything and everybody, and finally pull out much to the relief of the farmer and his family.199 T h e bitterness of competition among custom threshermen can be seen in the methods used to get what was considered a fair share of the threshing jobs. On some occasions a man buying a new steam rig was warned that if he went to work his machinery would be destroyed. Some men would fight with every means in their power, foul or fair, to take a job away from a competitor. 200 When a custom operator in Indiana decided to furnish everything, including men and teams, and thresh for six cents a bushel, other threshermen in that area felt un-

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kindly toward him because his use of improved methods secured him most of the good jobs. His enemies placed several railroad spikes inside the wheat bundles, wrecking the separator to the extent of several hundred dollars. Again in Ohio, three sticks of dynamite placed in a bundle would have blown the machine to pieces and perhaps killed half-a-dozen persons if they had not been discovered in time.201 An engine in Texas was destroyed in 1907 when dynamite in the firebox exploded. The engineer later explained that he had left the platform just a few seconds before the explosion, "otherwise it would have shot me away like a cannon ball. . . . " 202 Custom threshermen with their large steam traction engines and separators operating in a highly competitive system were faced with a dilemma which proved difficult to solve or avoid. If they cut prices for threshing to satisfy the farmers and meet the challenge of pricecutters, they would operate at a financial loss and be unable to pay for their expensive machinery. On the other hand, if they raised prices by mutual consent, the farmers, believing that a monopoly of threshermen had conspired to rob them of their just reward, would buy rigs of their own. Sometimes a group of farmers in a community bought threshing outfits on a cooperative basis with each family paying its share of the original purchase price as well as of the cost of operation and maintenance. These threshing rigs were called "company" machines as distinguished from the outfits owned by a custom thresherman. Although company machines did not come into general use until World War I, when the custom thresherman began to raise his prices to cover his increased operating expenses, the use of cooperative outfits had been discussed and advocated for many years. The Northwestern Agriculturist in 1903 predicted that it would not be long before the use of big steam rigs would be limited to a few large farms, because it cost about one-fourth of the crop to get it threshed by custom threshermen. In addition, most of the labor would be furnished by the farmers themselves, who would be more careful in saving the grain than the "unscrupulous threshermen in their hurry to do a lot." 20i Some of the farmers believed that the big steam threshing rigs were too expensive to maintain on the farm, when bad weather and breakdowns delayed the work in the field. Wallaces' Farmer in 1906 suggested that the use of smaller cooperative threshing machines would minimize the problem of boarding the crews and would relieve the farmers from the large threshing outfit, which is a "burden too heavy to bear." 204 One Iowa farmer writing to the American Thresherman in 1909 protested that he was "sick and tired of hearing people kick and bellyache about their miserable lot as threshermen on the ground that they are not getting enough for their labor." 103 Another mal-

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content complained that threshermen work only forty days in the year and then spend the rest of the time riding around in automobiles and smoking cigars, whereas the average farmer has to work every day, ride behind "an old plug of a horse and stick to a corn cob pipe." 20e These grievances, both real and imaginary, encouraged many groups of fanners living on average-sized farms to organize into cooperative threshing rings. At an organizational meeting, the membership of the ring was determined, and an assessment levied upon each member in order to purchase the threshing outfit and hire an engineer to operate it during the fall. A president or manager was chosen, as well as a treasurer and timekeeper. In most cases no constitution was adopted, but the rules of procedure and the method of carrying on the business were discussed and accepted by the membership. T h e two major policies concerned the price to be charged for threshing and an equitable system of exchange labor. T h e usual practice called for each member to assume an equal share of the first cost of the threshing rig. In addition, each member of the ring was also charged the going rate for custom threshing in the community. This meant that the farmer who had the most grain to thresh was required to pay the largest amount of money to the treasurer. Labor was exchanged between members of the threshing ring; usually each furnished one man and a team for each forty acres of threshable grain on his farm. 207 After the threshing season, a settling-up date was set, and a final business meeting was held to square the accounts. At this meeting, the treasurer presented each member with his threshing bill, and made the adjustments necessary to equalize the discrepancies in the amounts of labor furnished by each member during the season. Since the organization was based upon a spirit of cooperation, policies could be initiated by common consent. If the group wished to go out and do custom work, they could do so and divide the profits. If one of the members was unable to pay his threshing bill on the date for settlement, this obligation could be postponed. Another advantage of the cooperative threshing system was the removal of the farmer's anxiety and worry about when he would be threshed. Each farmer could calculate almost to the day when the threshers would arrive. As the cooperative rings were relatively small, the work could be done in good season. One member of an Iowa cooperative group stated in 1915: "I know of four other company rigs around here. We think this is the best way to thresh as we can thresh when we are ready and do not have to wait until the grain is spoiled." 208 One of the pleasantest features of the cooperative threshing ring

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was the congenial relationship not only among the men who worked on the crew, but also among the entire group of farm families. These associations merged with a common interest to create a friendly social atmosphere. On the final settling-up day, all of the families met at one of the farm homes for a big dinner or picnic. While the men were holding their business session, the women prepared the dinner. Henry Bossman of Sheldon, Iowa, in recalling the day of settlement wrote: T h e men sat around a long table, often out of doors, the ladies visited, the young fry ran wild around the farm yard and some of the young people paired off. And then it was all over, but the comradeship of a big job well done would linger on in our memory. Each of us had the good feeling of having been needed by his fellow man, and of being respected as a good worker and a good sport. I don't know of a better way to weld together a group of people than to have them on a steam threshing rig year after year. You didn't have to wonder whether you could depend upon your friends, you had been partners on the threshing crew, how better could you test a friend than that. 209

This spirit of cooperation is largely responsible for the few steam rigs still in operation. A cooperative project born forty years ago is still carried on by eight farmers near Merrill, Iowa. Helping in the work today are some third-generation members of families of the original founders. These farmers say they will carry on until the old steam engine falls apart, because as one told a newspaper reporter, "We lose touch with each other in the grim days of winter when snow covers the farms and roads, and in the spring and summer we are so busy we often forget about our neighbors, but at threshing time we get acquainted all over again when we work, sweat, and eat together." 210 As might be expected, the problems associated with threshing were too complex to be solved in their entirety by a new system. T h e chief weakness of the cooperative method was its slowness in completing a job. With the use of twenty-eight-inch separators and a labor force comprised of farmers who went home every night to do the chores, a small threshing job, which should have been done in a few hours, tended to drag on for days. If bad weather set in, the farmer's wife found herself cooking for threshers for several weeks—a disagreeable task which could have been greatly minimized had a big custom outfit been hired in the first place. In addition, many farmers were poor bookkeepers, a fact which often resulted in failure to make adjustments for the inequality of labor. If one man was required to do more work than his neighbor, a grievance could easily arise. T o complicate matters, most of the farmers in the cooperative ring were not experienced threshermen, a situation which could result in inefficient work.

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T h e saga of steam power in American agriculture included more than an account of the use of steam engines to drive threshing machines in the grain-growing sections of the country. This power was likewise applied to the plowing of stubble fields and the breaking of prairie lands with much the same intensity that marked grain threshing. T h e full force of steam power was required to conquer the tough sod of the West which had, in certain areas, defied assaults of agriculturalists for over half a century. 211 T h e United States Indian Service at Fort Belknap Agency, Harlem, Montana, purchased a large Reeves plowing outfit in 1908 to facilitate this work.*12 In 1905 one of the men who saw the triumph of steam power attempted to put his thoughts into words. Men lived and garnered, men lived and died, But the ox-plow held full sway 'Til the swifter strength of the horse was tried And the plodding ox gave way . . . There came to the plowing a giant power Invisible, hot as fire, And the work of days was a single hour T o this servant who would not tire. The labor of old is a by-gone dream, And our fields are now plowed by the giant steam. 213

Farmers, quick to see the advantages of steam plowing, encouraged custom plowing outfits to come in and break up the land. 214 When farmers offered to pay three and four dollars an acre to get this work done, many custom threshermen saw an opportunity to increase their incomes by selling their old traction engines and buying plowing engines, which could be used for breaking during the spring and summer and for the threshing run in the fall.215 After 1903 the race to rip u p the raw prairie sod began in earnest. 216 Big steam plowing outfits, consisting of twenty-five- to forty-five-horsepower engines, steam plows with ten to sixteen bottoms, cook cars, water tanks, coal wagons, and blacksmith shops on wheels, moved out to blacken the grasslands which had for centuries cushioned the hooves of buffalo herds. These outfits swarmed over the countryside tearing the sod apart and rolling it over in massive molten waves. In western Kansas in 1908 a custom plowman reported that these outfits were so numerous it was almost impossible to get enough help to keep all the plowing machinery running at the same time.217 Edwin Haselhorst of Millard, South Dakota, recalls that on a still morning in June 1909 he counted the smoke columns of ten plowing outfits breaking up the prairie sod in his community. 218 The editor of the Dakota Farmer observed in 1908:

Company advertising emphasized power of early traction engines.

Frick "Daniel Boone" traction engine, 1885.

Page portable engine driving a sawmill, 1858. Courtesy F. Hal Higgins, Walnut Creek, Cal.

Threshing with steam power in California, 1874. From California Magazine, June 1947. Typical threshing scene with Frick engine in 1918 wherufarmers had problems s i m i l a r to those in World War II.

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11 χ 11-inch cylinder, simple 25-horse traction engine from 1906 Case catalogue.

Sixty-five-horsepower Case traction engine built in 1913.

THE HEYDAY OF STEAM POWER ON THE FARM

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Where a year ago the coyote and jackrabbit were undisturbed except by an occasional herd of range cattle and the whoop of a passing cowboy and "outfit," towns have sprung up, post offices, schools, newspapers and civil government established, and great traction engines are plowing up whole townships daily. . . . 2 l e

In an effort to get the land broken up in time to see the spring flax crop, many of the plowing engines were equipped with locomotive headlights with nickel and silver-plated reflectors, which enabled them to keep moving twenty-four hours a day. A newspaper reporter for the Saint John's Globe of New Brunswick, Canada, crawled up into the tower of the courthouse at Faulkton, South Dakota, one night in July 1909 to see lights flashing like the search lamps of a Mississippi River steamer, but all moving steadily in straight lines. Each light marked a powerful steam traction engine pulling twelve or sixteen plows across the level plains. The reporter observed: Horses cannot work day and night but iron and steel need no rest. Take out your watch and time one of these moving lights. If you can guess the matter of a third of a mile at that distance you can tell how long it takes to overturn an acre of sod. It should not exceed ten minutes. A few days ago, Thomas Mitchell, driving two rigs of twelve plows each, broke a full quarter section of land in three hours over two days. There are not less than thirty outfits in Faulk County alone and at least 1,000 of these steam plow rigs have been making their way back and forth across the prairie land of the state turning over 25,000 acres of land every day. . . . 220

Reports from various parts of the United States affirmed the frenzied efforts to accelerate the speed of plowing and breaking. One steam outfit near Rexburg, Idaho, broke sixty acres of heavy sod in a twenty-four-hour run, and a Reeves thirty-two-horse engine averaged thirty acres a day near Buchanan, North Dakota, in the summer of 1911.221 An exceptionally big day's work was done near Albion, Wyoming, in 1911 when a forty-horse Reeves cross-compound engine, pulling sixteen bottoms and two grain drills, plowed and seeded sixty-five acres in one day.®22 One quarter section of South Dakota sod was broken in 1910 in twenty-two hours with three steam outfits working continuously.223 There are no figures to indicate what proportion of the new land in the western states from Texas to Canada was broken up by the use of steam traction plows. However, the observations of the people who rode these engines across the fields and the farmers who owned the land give some estimate of the extent of this type of mechanical farming. One farmer living in north central South Dakota estimated that 60 per cent of the prairie sod of his county was broken by steam plowing outfits.224 An engineer who spent the four years from 1907 to 1910 breaking near Mercer, North Dakota, states that, in his opinion, one-

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third of the land in that region was plowed for the first time by means of steam power. 225 A member of the staff of the Threshermen's Review, riding through the prairie provinces of Saskatchewan and Alberta in 1909, was convinced that 50 per cent of the breaking done that year was by means of steam traction engines. 226 In some sections of Oklahoma and Kansas, the number of plowing outfits increased to the point where competition resulted in cutting prices so low that only excellent management and good luck could net a profit. 227 Men who handled the steam plowing outfits were usually good engineers. They were operating big machinery with the engine working under a maximum load almost continuously. T h e amount of wear on a plowing engine was sometimes as high as nine or ten times that resulting from powering a stationary threshing machine. Many of the plowing engines lasted only four to six years before they needed to be completely rebuilt and reconditioned. 2 2 8 Because of the intense strain, the engine had to be kept in almost perfect condition, or it would soon loosen u p and pound itself to pieces. One designing engineer of the Avery Company of Peoria, Illinois, described a successful engineer as one who was careful, intelligent, industrious, and who knew his engine. He continued his description: H e should stop his engine four or five times a day, throw out his traction gear clutch and let his engine run slow to see that everything is working properly; oil all parts which are most likely to need it; and see that all boxes and connections on the valve gear are not loose. But the poor engineer will stop about every half hour, get his monkey wrench, make adjustments in something that does not need it and try it again. 2 2 9

Since the engineer was responsible for the successful operation of a very expensive outfit, poor judgment would result in inefficiency and financial disaster. Plowing engines manufactured by threshing machine companies east of the Mississippi River cost from $1,600 to $3,500, and some of the large Pacific Coast traction engines were as high as $5,000 to $6,000.23° T h e other parts of the outfit, the plows, harrows, discs, coal wagon, water tank, cook car, trap wagon, blacksmith tools, and miscellaneous equipment—added an extra $500 to the cost. 231 T h e Canadian Thresherman and Farmer in 1906 thought the capital invested in a steam plowing outfit would average $5,000.232 I n addition, the cost of maintaining a plowing engine in the field represented a daily expense of considerable proportion. Lynn W. Ellis, of the United States Department of Agriculture, after a careful study of over five hundred reports made by the operators of steam plowing outfits in the Midwest, concluded that the cost involved in breaking an acre of sod in the Dakotas in 1905 to 1909 was about two dollars. This amount did not include the initial cost of machinery

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but covered only interest, depreciation, and repairs on equipment, labor, board, fuel, and oil.233 It is obvious that any mismanagement by the engineer or any delays caused by bad weather, mechanical breakdowns, and accidents of various kinds would easily turn a potential profit into an embarrassing loss. The record books of B. G. Rosen of St. Paul, Minnesota, who ran a forty-horse undermounted Avery engine pulling twelve breakers in North Dakota, revealed that his minimum daily expenses in 1908 amounted to over forty dollars. Since he received four dollars an acre for his work, the outfit had to plow more than ten acres a day just to meet operating expenses.234 His itemized daily expenses were: An engineer A fireman A tank man Two blacksmiths Two plow men A cook Oil and grease Board for the crew Fuel Repairs, plow shares, etc. Total cost per day

. . . $5.00 per day . . . 3.00 . . . 4.00 . . 8.00 4.00 . . 3.00 . . 2.00 . . 4.50 . . . 6.00 . . . 8.00 .. $47.50 235

Engineers found financial problems other than those involved in operating their machinery. At times excessive rains made plowing conditions unfavorable; in some areas the ground was so hard and dry that a pickax would scarcely penetrate it, while in other regions the loose soil destroyed all traction. Steep hills, rough ground, and soil full of stones were additional hazards. Under adverse conditions such as these, the breaking often became so rough that farmers refused to pay for the work which had been done. One of these irate farmers during the dry summer of 1910 in Faulk County, South Dakota, stated that the devil himself could not have done a more abominable job in the field.238 In the southwestern states traction engines were employed for breaking sod as well as for plowing stubble lands. Since many farmers preferred to have the plowing done as soon after harvest as possible, it was not unusual to begin plowing on one side of a field before the headers had completed the harvesting on the same quarter of land. J. N. Fiske who farmed eight thousand acres in Thomas County, Kansas, in 1908 had his men simultaneously harvesting, threshing, loading a train of cars with grain, and plowing with two steam plowing outfits on a section of land.237 T h e manager of the Buffalo-Pitts branch house in Houston, Texas, in 1905 observed that the steam

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plow liad come to stay because the weather was too hot for plowing with horses. He boasted that many of his customers were plowing seventeen hundred acres annually with one engine. 238 As the ground in summer was often dry, disc plows such as those manufactured by the La Crosse, Texas, Moline, Emerson, and Sanders companies were substituted for moldboard plows to cut through the hard soil.239 Some of these cut a twenty-foot swath and covered forty-five acres a day.240 If the plows were unsuited to the soil, or the engine too small for the job, the custom plowman wasted time and money. But when the machinery was adapted to the working conditions, the prairie giants could roll ahead turning over as much ground as could be done by eighteen men and fifty-four horses in a similar length of time.241 Although plowing by steam power was limited in general to the period from 1900 to 1915, the application of steam power to the turning and tilling of the soil was of special interest to people who witnessed the passing parade of farm machinery. When the first plowing outfits were introduced in a community, people traveled for miles on foot or in horse-drawn vehicles to see the performance. Many of these people walked behind the plows for long distances to see the breakers slash through the virgin sod and roll it over in long even furrows.242 The slow methodical surge of the behemoths in the fields was equally impressive when they lumbered along, shattering the air with mushrooming rhythmical blasts of black smoke.243 These iron beasts of the prairies voraciously drank over seventy barrels of water a day while devouring almost three thousand pounds of coal, as they completed their daily course of fifteen or twenty miles.244 T h e owners of steam traction engines continually tried to increase the utility of their machines by using them for as many jobs as possible. An Indiana thresherman, interested in increasing the amount of farm work which could be performed by mechanical power, surprised his neighbors in 1891 by hitching his steam engine to a binder and cutting fifteen acres of grain a day.245 This novel experiment was rather impractical because the light load did not warrant the expense involved in operating such a large engine. When several binders were hitched behind the engines, large acreages could be cut in one day. Mechanical failure of one machine, however, held up the entire outfit, and the system was never practical. Some steam-engine owners used their engines to pull a string of loaded wheat wagons to the nearest elevator. Others, on occasion, freighted logs, ore, and lumber with steam engines during the slack season of the year, or pulled stumps out of cut-over timber lands. 24 · Many of the engines were used to advantage in moving buildings or grading rural roads. An engineer in Nebraska said he was kept very busy in 1915 because he was road-grading for the county for twelve

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247

dollars a day with fuel and water furnished. Additional jobs included digging wells, baling hay, filling silos, shredding corn, digging drainage canals and shelling corn. 248 In some of the southern states the steam from traction engines was sometimes used to sterilize the soil to kill fungi which caused bed rot in tobacco plants. 210 On some occasions engines were used to heat school rooms when the regular hot water system failed. 250 Farmers were also known to smoke fish by placing it in the smokebox of a wood-burning engine. 251 Owners of traction engines frequently picked up extra work by sawing lumber during the late fall and winter months. A Canadian in 1908 plowed five hundred acres of land, threshed eighty-five thousand bushels of grain and sawed three hundred thousand feet of lumber. 252 Although the large sawmilling companies cut the bulk of the pines and hardwoods in the large timber tracts of the country, there remained countless small lots of trees and areas of second-growth timber in practically all of the states. There lumber could be secured at relatively low prices.253 Portable circular saws were used to advantage; they could be moved readily as needed. 254 Wood slabs provided economical fuel for the engines, and steam furnished smooth dependable power for sawing. Amos Harold, foreman of the Aultman-Taylor sawmill department in 1906, stated that three horsepower was required to saw every thousand feet of hardwood in a ten-hour day. At this rate, a fifteen-horse engine could saw five thousand feet of lumber in usual dimensions during the average day's run. However, more sawyers fell short of this amount than exceeded it.255 Most of the small sawmill operators did custom work. Letters appearing in the threshermen's magazines indicate that sawing lumber was often more profitable than threshing. A typical observation from Illinois in 1906 explained: After threshing and sawing for three years, we consider the sawmill by far die most profitable end of the business. We use four men, and saw from 3,000 to 4,500 feet per day. We reccive from $5.50 to $6.00 per M. feet. We use slabs for fuel and have no trouble to keep steam except sometimes in winter when there is snow on the ground. . . . Our lumber consists of white burr oak, hickory, black oak, water oak, and the softer woods such as white and red elm, sycamore and cottonwood. . . . 2 6 e

Marked similarities existed in the sawmill and threshing business. Most threshing-machine companies manufactured sawmills which were advertised and sold by dealers of steam engines, plows, and other farm machinery. Even though sawmill owners had less capital invested and a smaller payroll to meet than did custom threshermen, the problems of operation in the two jobs were much the same. Hard outdoor labor was performed in all kinds of weather, accident hazards were omnipresent, and the incentive found in earnings for work

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FARM

well done was strong. T h e sawyer, instead of tending to a threshing machine, faced such problems as swaging and filing the saw, giving proper pitch to the teeth, adjusting the lead, and leveling the mandrel. If a saw carried too much speed it would "snake" and heat at the rim; if the speed was too slow it left its course and heated around the center eye.257 Success in sawing generally depended upon the skill of the engineer, sawyer, log turners, and off bearers rather than upon the size of the machines employed.-"18

Steam power proved practical for sawing lumber. From

Scientific A m e r i c a n .

Chapter VII DISTRIBUTION, FINANCING, AND SALE OF STEAM TRACTION ENGINES THE successful application of steam power to American agriculture was facilitated by an elaborate distribution system, which bridged the gap between the manufacturers of steam traction engines and the farmers who bought the machines. This system gave the factory officials an opportunity to keep in touch with their customers. Without dealers to furnish repairs and salesmen to advertise directly to the consumer, a company could not long remain in business. Most of the manufacturing companies had more men employed in distributing their products than they had production workers in the factories. 1 T h e number of men engaged in advertising, sale, servicing, and distribution in the J. I. Case Threshing Machine Company in 1906 was so great that the company declared "there is not a spot in the civilized world where grain is grown that is not touched or can be quickly reached by the departments of our organization." 2 The home office at the factory became the center of this distribution system. There members of the board of directors formulated general policies, and a superintendent managed the detailed work of the advertising, sales, collection, and purchasing departments. T o encourage business and to meet the demands of the trade more efficiently, manufacturing companies established branch houses in their trade areas. These houses carried a stock of the company's machinery in warehouses, and a supply of repair parts from which quick deliveries could be made to customers living within trading distance. 3 Under this plan all territories in which the companies operated were divided into blocks or units for which a single branch manager was responsible. This block system later became the general pattern of American industry. Upon it was built the comprehensive organization of storage and service, which has been erroneously attributed to the automobile industry. 4 Branch managers had charge of all business within their territory. They made crop forecasts, took care of local publicity, and secured information about business prospects which was helpful to company officials. A branch manager for the Huber Manufacturing Company, writing from Lincoln, Nebraska, reported in 1904 that lack of mois155

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ture would cripple the sales of threshing machinery there. "Everyone is afraid to buy," he observed, and he added, "the only sales we will make will be to people who need a steam engine or separator when it is absolutely necessary." 5 By performing such services, the managers played an important role in the formation of the company's policies. When Samuel E. Barlow, treasurer of the Huber Company, wrote his quarterly report to the board of directors in 1895 he said, " O u r branch manager in Oklahoma City reports that the prospect in that territory is excellent. He is confident that the business will continue to be good during the rest of the month. He predicts that he will need fifty more steam engines and separators before the threshing season begins. . . ." · In addition, branch managers were expected to understand the operation of the machinery in the field, to note criticisms made by customers, and to suggest improvements. "Keep me posted as to the kicks and defects of our plowing engine," wrote the general superintendent of the Huber Company to a branch manager at Lansing, Michigan, in 1906. 7 T h i s kind of responsibility was not ignored, for one branch manager of the company, writing to the home office that year, reported that the Port Huron Company's drive wheels were 100 per cent better than those of Huber's. "Now get busy," he added, "and make corrections so the reputation of our engines will not suffer. . . ." 8 T o promote the sale of new machinery, the manager directed a number of traveling salesmen, most of whom were directly responsible to him. T h e Rumely Company in 1912 had sixteen branch houses, each of which had an office force of two to twelve men and a traveling group of five to twenty-five men. 9 These salesmen sent to the branch manager's desk a stream of letters filled with business and personal problems. One traveling man for the Case Company in the Memphis, Tennessee, area in 1906 suggested that a sample engine be sent to him for demonstration purposes; 10 another described his troubles over a cash discount sale; 1 1 still another requested a fifty-dollar loan and threatened to resign because his expenses were greater than his salary. 12 T h e number of branch houses varied from four or five for small threshing-machine companies to as many as sixty-three for the J . I. Case Threshing Machine Company in 1914. 13 During the thriving days of the steam-engine business, the Case Company had branches in twenty-nine states with eleven in North Dakota, five in Iowa, and four each in Montana and Minnesota. Seven were established in Canada, four in South America, and one each in Mexico and Puerto Rico. 1 4 If the branch managers were the arm of the manufacturer's distribution system, local dealers were the hand which reached out to the

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individual consumer. Local implement dealers, as retailers, took orders and delivered the steam threshing rigs. Prior to 1900, dealers often sold many different makes of machinery, handling goods manufactured by competing companies. An implement dealer in Des Moines, Iowa, in 1899 sold Deering binders, Monitor drills, Nichols and Shepard and Huber steam engines, wagons, stoves, twine, real estate, horses, buggies, hardware, caskets, wallpaper, organs, and sewing machines.1® As the competition between the threshing-machine companies increased, the local dealers were asked to refrain from selling machinery of two different concerns which were in direct competition. All agreements provided for payment by the company of a percentage commission for all sales made by the dealer. Contracts usually stipulated that the manufacturer pay commissions of 10 per cent for each steam engine sold, 15 per cent for each threshing machine, and 25 per cent on all repair parts sold for cash. On the other hand, dealers agreed to pay freight charges on all machinery received, to store and care for the goods until sold, to deliver the machines, and to be responsible for securing adequate collateral on all promissory notes signed by purchasers.1· Although most other provisions were identical in all dealers' contracts, clauses relating to commissions varied considerably. Some companies placed higher list prices on their machinery and so were able to offer their dealers commissions as high as 25 or 30 per cent of the purchase price.17 The Case Company, however, inaugurated a sales policy in 1902 fixing the dealer's commission at 10 per cent.1* By lowering the list price and encouraging sales, Case dealers offset the advantages of dealers who received higher commissions but made fewer sales. This policy proved very successful, if measured by the increased number of dealers who signed Case contracts. In 1890, this company had nine hundred dealers in the United States;19 in 1906 the number had risen to six thousand,20 and in 1912, to ten thousand.21 Dealers selling steam traction engines sometimes thought their choice of occupation most unfortunate and their lot most unhappy. They were accused of being middlemen, who lived off the labor of others and secured large commissions on the sale of high-priced farm machinery. Eager to defend themselves, they asserted that they faced a host of enemies intent on destroying them financially. When some manufacturing companies sent out their own salesmen to sell threshing outfits direct to customers, dealers regarded it as a theft of their legitimate business. One dealer claimed, "the manufacturers run the whole thing and make all the money. They want to cut their price and all reductions in price will come out of the dealer's margin. . . ." 2 2 If a thresherman bought his engine direct from the fac-

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tory by correspondence, many of the dealers accused the purchaser of resorting to the mail-order system and called it a communistic method of doing business. 23 Some dealers vigorously opposed the Parcel Post Bill proposed in 1910, because they said it favored the big trusts which employed no dealers and paid no commissions. 24 During a dealers' convention in Cedar Falls, Iowa, in 1912, over a thousand people built a huge bonfire in the city square of all the mail-order catalogues they could find.25 Some dealers opposed company advertising in farm magazines on the ground that it would "create in the minds of the readers distrust of the dealer and act to mold sentiment in favor of direct buying and elimination of the middleman." 2β Some manufacturers, like the Minneapolis Threshing Machine Company, tried to prevent risky sales to irresponsible customers by inserting a clause in the dealers' contract which stated: "You are entitled to your commission when the notes are fully paid." Dealers regarded this as a great injustice. They insisted that this new commission certificate plan placed undue hardship on them. T h e dealer, they said, would have to wait until the promissory notes were paid before he would receive his commission. One dealer explained in 1903: "I have finally come to the conclusion that the less contracts we sign the better, for the so-called modern contracts of late years are a whirlwind for the manufacturer and a death-bringing cyclone for the retail dealer. . . ." 27 Lamenting the ill fortune of an implement dealer, a speaker at a dealers' convention in Nebraska in 1899 insisted that these men had more difficulties, stifier competition, and smaller net profits than any other legitimate business in Nebraska. H e observed: "As a flower of the field so he flourisheth for the wind passes over it and it is gone and the place thereof shall know it no more. . . . I will venture to assert that . . . there were as many implement dealers who failed in Wakefield, Nebraska, as all other men combined. . . ." 28 In a jocular mood, one dealer recalled that he once attended a dealers' convention where he ran short of cash. He went to the branch manager of the company for whom he had done a good business to cash a small personal check. T h e branch manager refused. After the dealer returned home, he received a letter from the manager stating, "Yesterday, a young fellow professing to be yourself called at our office. We suspected him immediately as being a fraud and our suspicions were confirmed by his attempting to borrow a considerable amount of money on a check or draft signed by your name. You will do well to look out for this fellow." 29 In spite of the persistent complaints made by many dealers, their problems were probably neither greater nor less than those of other

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businessmen. Individual fortunes fluctuated with the changes of the business cycle and with the usual amount of good luck or misfortune that befell the implement dealers. Although financial risks were usually great, dealers, as a whole, continued to receive rather generous commissions from threshing-machine companies. The financial statement of the Nichols and Shepard Company of Battle Creek, Michigan, for 1882 reveals that 20 per cent of receivables were charged to commissions.30 During the thirty-two year period, 1879 to 1910, the Gaar Scott Company of Richmond, Indiana, sold $48,292,000 worth of machinery; total commissions on these sales amounted to $4,214,200, or approximately 9 per cent. 31 Traveling salesmen were a very important link in the chain of agencies comprising the distribution system which brought agricultural steam engines to the farm. Valise in hand, they swarmed over the countryside canvassing prospective customers. Thoroughly schooled in factual information about their product and speaking from a rich background of experience, these salesmen praised their own line of steam threshing machinery with considerable eloquence. At the same time, they conscientiously related the weaknesses of their competitor's products. While disseminating this information, they evaluated the potential customer's financial status, analyzed sales opportunities in the community, and, by means of daily reports, kept their branch managers and home offices well informed about news from the field. Little skill was needed to sell farmers low-priced implements such as wagons and binders. But to persuade a man to buy a fourthousand-dollar threshing outfit, and perhaps to mortgage everything he owned, was a real selling job that called for an expert. As a result, most "Knights of the Grip" were men of considerable intelligence, who had a practical knowledge of the mechanical problems confronting operators of steam traction engines. F. Lee Norton, general superintendent of the J. I. Case Threshing Machine Company, hired hundreds of men to sell threshing rigs. He states that in addition to a clear eye and a good set of credentials, a salesman had to demonstrate that he could operate and repair steam engines in the field if necessary.32 Letters from the salesmen themselves reveal that this ability was a prime requisite. One traveler in Tennessee wrote in 1906 to his branch manager: "I think it best to stay over and work on the engine tonight as they expect to use it tomorrow. Besides I have to line up all the pulleys on the separator and get everything in running order." 33 In addition to understanding machinery, the successful "machine man" on the road possessed a rugged physique, tireless energy, and the patience to overcome hardships, disappointments, and adversity.

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Bascom B. Clarke, editor of the American Thresherman, recalled that as a traveling salesman for a threshing machine company he worked early and late. When the roads were too bad to drive, I rode horseback and when the horse couldn't get through I walked. I worked on until my health was broken from typhoid fever, I had my discouragements all right and sometimes the other fellow licked me hard, but the contest instead of putting me down and out only nerved me to try agfain.3« Exposed to all kinds of weather, these men traveled in the rain, crossed dangerous streams, and suffered from the heat and dust of the road. In winter they often shivered in sub-zero weather and fought their way through snowdrifts and raging blizzards.38 Of all the irritations confronting traveling salesmen, none was more disconcerting than the absence of security and stability in their work. Like an army man, he had to be prepared to move at any moment, never knowing what instructions he would receive in the next mail. While the local dealer could stay at home with his family, the traveling man found himself catching midnight trains and riding slow freights. Often he arrived at his destination, registered at a hotel at three or four o'clock in the morning, only to find that his competitor had registered ahead of him and perhaps already had the order.36 One of these salesmen sent into North Dakota complained, "Today one eats at a two dollar house with a room warmed with steam, tomorrow one eats in the only hotel in a one horse town with cow hide and oxtail soup and stale bread for dinner and sleeps between two thin cakes of ice covered with snow in a garret." 37 A salesman who spent several years on the road selling Port Huron steam engines remarked in recalling such experiences that "it was a dog's life." 38 In spite of these hardships, however, salesmen kept on the move. A few lines of doggerel in a farm implement magazine attempt to express the determination of the "Drummer and His Grip." Though the rain and sleet are falling, and the roads are awfully muddy. Though all men "hard times" are bawling Though a fellow's nose gets ruddy Though the river may be frozen and the frost may bite and nip They can never stop the advent of the drummer and his grip. Though the trains may all be smashing Though the horses all go lame. The drummer, like the bed bug, Will get there just the same.

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And when his time is over Will come sailing from his trip For he always makes connections Does the drummer with his grip.3»

The methods employed by threshing-machine salesmen around 1900 were somewhat stereotyped. After reaching a town, the salesman either borrowed a horse and buggy from the local implement dealer, or hired a liveryman to take him out to see prospective customers. Sometimes the salesman had a list of names from the company; at other times he had to canvass without any advance information. T h e salesman usually tried to learn all he could from the liveryman about the best prospects in the community. If the liveryman thought there was a chance to get a sizable cash tip, he might be very cooperative and helpful. When the sale was actually made, he felt that he was entitled to a fee of ten or fifteen dollars.10 After reaching the home of a prospect, the salesman attempted to ingratiate himself with the potential customer. Sometimes he helped feed the hogs, milk the cows, or even run a binder in order to cultivate the farmer's friendship. Many of the salesmen, realizing that the average fanner knew little about steam traction engines, appealed to his visual senses by displaying pictures of engines painted in bright colors and resplendent in shining brass. Emphasis was placed upon the pleasing lines of the boiler and the comfortable operator's seat, and the handy tool box. Of course, if the prospect were a veteran thresherman, the salesman would speak in more technical language, quoting dimensions of the machine parts and explaining the superiority of the engine over the products of the rival companies. When an old rig was involved in a trade-in deal, a long discussion usually ensued in which the thresherman attempted to get the highest possible price for it. Generally speaking, the salesman never expected to sign u p a customer on his first visit He expected to make from three to seven trips to a farm to close a sale. In some cases, the salesman provided a jug of liquor to encourage the farmer to sign on the dotted line. 41 When the sale was finally made, terms of settlement were drawn up. T h e order was then forwarded to a credit manager at the home office, who checked over the information and verified the security given to back u p the note. If all papers were in order, the steam rig was shipped C.O.D. to the nearest railroad station and final settlement was made before the machinery left the flatcars. Because several weeks elapsed between the time of sale and the date of delivery, the purchaser had an opportunity to cancel his order. As a result, each salesman tried to prevent a rival from persuading a customer to cancel his order and buy a machine manufactured by a different company.

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Most salesmen admitted that the fierce rivalry between the manufacturing companies lowered their ethical standards considerably. When thirty or forty different salesmen called on a customer in an effort to clinch a sale, the sanctity of a contract and other business scruples were subject to serious violation. One favorite trick of the trade was to claim that a rival manufacturing company was going out of business because of its production of inferior engines and separators. 4 Some salesmen deliberately violated instructions from the home office warning them not to sell steam threshing rigs to those who owned no property and had little hope of ever paying for them. These salesmen made good records during their first season. Not until payments were in default a year or two later would the company become aware of the shady tactics of their representative. Machines sold under such conditions invariably fell into the hands of threshermen who lowered threshing rates to a point which brought hardship to all threshermen in that section of the country. Β. B. Clarke in his editorials in the American Thresherman vigorously attacked the threshermen who cut prices and the salesmen who sold to irresponsible parties. 43 T h e Dakota Farmer in 1892 related the case of a salesman in South Dakota who sold a steam engine to a man who had no security and was already deeply in debt. When the salesman was asked if he considered this good business he replied, "I happened to hear that his wife's father has given him a good span of horses and 100 head of sheep. If I get there first they are mine. I know I can sell a machine to him. Since he is no hand with machinery I shall clean him out in a year. If I do not fleece him some one else will rob him, so what difference does it make?" 44 A rather unusual example of a salesman's originality occurred when a smooth agent toured Montana in the 1890's. On Sundays if he got the chance, he would spell off the local preacher. He could preach a pretty fair sermon, but he always closed with a strong sales talk about the steam traction engine he was selling. On Monday he would get out early and pick u p the orders before his rivals could put in an appearance. 4 5 In fairness to the overwhelming majority of salesmen, however, it must be observed that they were a group of hard-working men, who served their employers to the best of their ability. They increased the volume of business by boosting sales and acted as roving messengers who secured valuable information for their superiors. A salesman's report from the field in 1906 warned, "I discovered that the man you speak of has left the country and left a big debt for his brother-in-law to pay, so from that I would say he is no good. . . ." 46 T h e Farm Implements magazine in 1899 eulogized the machine salesman as "a

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man to be trusted and loved by all, even the hotel girls. He is always happy, and presents to all outside appearances the brightest side of life, carrying sunshine with him wherever he goes." 47 In return for services rendered, traveling salesmen were paid a regular monthly salary and expenses. A new man usually started out at $60 or $70 a month, with an opportunity to earn up to $140 or $175 a month as a reward for exceptionally good work.48 T h e number of salesmen employed varied with the size of the company and the aggressiveness of its sales department. Some manufacturers set up as a goal the total volume of business expected the following year and then hired enough salesmen to meet that quota. In 1905 the J. I. Case Threshing Machine Company had 485 men on the road. 49 By 1912 this number had increased to 900.M Since the sales force did not push the work in the winter months, many of the men worked only eight months out of the year, from March to October. 51 In addition to their sales work, many of these travelers made collection tours during the late fall and winter. When the threshermen's promissory notes were not paid promptly, and the debtor failed to respond to letters sent out by the collection department of the manufacturing company, a collector was sent out. It was his job to encourage payment of the account, or to make satisfactory arrangements to renew it or get additional security to back up the unpaid notes. Since the financial life of the manufacturing companies depended upon the amounts receivable, the work of collectors was indispensable. T o be successful, these men needed insight and a good understanding of human nature. They were required to evaluate a debtor's financial resources and determine his ability to pay his obligations. They knew when to entreat, persuade, and plead, or when to insist, demand, threaten, or intimidate. Only the most capable collectors were able to squeeze money gently out of a custom thresherman and at the same time keep his good will toward the company. T h e difficulty of the collector's job, like that of the salesman, depended in great measure upon business conditions. When crops were excellent and prices good, collections were relatively easy, but when crops failed and the price of grain declined, collections became a serious matter. The droughts of 1890 and 1895 were particularly severe. The annual treasurer's report to the Board of Directors of the Huber Manufacturing Company in 1895 stated that every possible effort had been made to effect collections on receivables, but with discouraging results. The report explained that since the wheat crops had failed in many states: It has been all but impossible for many of our customers to pay. It is also difficult for them to borrow the money in the country banks for the short crop makes the banks short of loanable funds. We are having an especially

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hard time to collect money in Nebraska, Minnesota, Colorado, Kansas, and Missouri. Unless we carry over the past due paper, we will have to foreclose in many instances where we thought we were reasonably secure. . .

During the early nineties, collectors were mindful of the economic conditions which characterized this era of agrarian discontent. The period 1870 to 1897 saw a steady decline of wheat and corn prices.53 Northwestern wheat-growers received as low as forty-two to fortyeight cents a bushel for wheat; the cost of raising this amount was fifty-six cents.54 Meanwhile the farmer showed little interest in the overproduction theory, and failed to recognize the influence of large exports from Russia, Australia, Canada, Mexico, and the Argentine on world wheat prices. He preferred to blame high freight rates, restricted currency, and the unfair grading of grain at local elevators for the hard times. Alleged high prices of fuel, lumber, fencing, clothes, and farm machinery were attributed to the nefarious practices of middlemen, bankers, irresponsible trusts, and an indifferent federal government. 55 Not until the late nineties did better times come to the farm. The average thresherman did not have enough money on hand to buy a steam traction engine and the other machinery which it powered. As a result, the manufacturing companies financed customers in whole or in part by extending long-term credit. By selling on time, by extending credit, and by collecting deferred payments, these companies assumed many of the functions of a banking institution. In this sense the manufacturing companies not only increased their sales, but also performed a distinct service to the buyer of machinery. Terms of sale and credit were most liberal. An editor of a farm implement magazine observed in 1890 that there was nothing sold in which the line of credit was as long and the terms as easy as it was for farm machinery.56 Salesmen, as a rule, were instructed to see that the purchaser of a steam engine made a substantial down payment in cash and paid freight charges on the machine from the factory to the nearest railroad terminal. The rest of the indebtedness was incorporated in notes falling due at various intervals during the following three or four years at from 6 to 10 per cent.57 These principles, however, were not always observed because of tough competition, the eagerness of salesmen to push sales, and the lack of uniform business policies of the manufacturing companies. As a result some customers made deals virtually on their own terms; many of them made no cash payments at time of purchase and agreed only to meet the freight bill at time of delivery. The Robinson Company of Richmond, Indiana, sold eighteen steam engines in the spring of 1910, for which they received $1,500 in cash as a down payment on three machines; the other fifteen engines valued at over $35,000 were covered entirely by

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promissory notes.58 An implement dealer in Nebraska, after selling threshing rigs and other machinery for thirteen years, remarked that the extension of credit during that time varied from 75 to 94 per cent of the value of total sales.*® T h e annual treasurer's report to the directors of the Huber Manufacturing Company in 1894 stated that the Avery Planter Company planned to sell no threshing machinery to buyers who could not make a good cash payment and give A-l bankable paper. T h e report added that "if they insist on the cash payment in every case they will not get much trade. . . 60 As if to add to the liberality of many of the contracts of sale, some salesmen and dealers were careless about acquiring adequate security with which to back u p the purchaser's notes. The soundness of the negotiable paper varied according to the practice and experience of the several manufacturing companies. In many instances, security consisted of nothing but the machinery itself. Of seventy-one steam engines sold by the Robinson Company in 1910, forty-two of them carried no security but the machine itself; twelve included real estate; eight covered proceeds from crops, five included other types of farm implements, and four listed livestock as security."1 In some instances, the security was worth much less than the value of the loan. For instance, one Robinson note for $840 listed as security a mare, "Minnie," twelve years old; a bay mule named "Dan," ten years old; and a set of buggy harness.· 2 Because agricultural steam engines were usually paid for out of the earnings from use of the machines, the long-term credit sales remained a necessary part of the financial policy of all threshing machine companies. Although this was a boon to thousands of customers, the system of easy credit in some cases produced most unfortunate results, especially among people with little judgment in business matters or no sales resistance. Such individuals often bought new steam threshing outfits at prices far beyond their ability to pay. As a result, the purchases were made as a speculative proposition rather than on a sound and practical basis. The unnecessary risks often jeopardized the financial position of the buyer and caused the manufacturing companies untold trouble and expense to collect the farmers' debts. T h e desire to purchase a steam engine became one of the farmer's most deadly and insidious temptations. The idea preyed on his mind and sapped his youthful virtue. As a boy he admired the large red threshing machine and the big engine which filled the barnyard full of strawstacks and the men full of chaff and profane language. 68 T o own a rig was the apex of mundane glory. When the boy grew to manhood, he found it difficult to resist buying an outfit on credit. T h e man who once fell victim to this temptation seldom developed

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sales resistance later. It was often said that in every farming community there were men who had to be blindfolded when a threshing rig came in sight, lest they be seized with an uncontrollable mania to mortgage something and buy it. 84 An Iowa farmer disregarded the weeping protests of his wife and bought a steam outfit by mortgaging everything he possessed including household furniture, beds, and bedding. 95 Another custom thresherman bought thirty-eight steam traction engines over a period of years before he could break himself of this acquisitive habit.6® When an Indiana veteran of twenty years' experience was asked when he was going to quit buying steam threshing rigs, he replied, " I can't. There is a Keeley cure for drunkards, but none for the thresherman. . . ." 87 In many instances, the liberal credit policies of threshing-machine companies not only permitted purchases by people who were unprepared financially to make such a large investment, but occasionally also allowed sales to unreliable and dishonest individuals who had no intention of ever paying for the goods. These transactions invariably reappeared to plague collection departments of the companies. In spite of the fact the Huber Manufacturing Company was conservative in its sales policy and made vigorous efforts to avoid unnecessary risks in the extension of credit, correspondence of the company's collection department reveals that undesirable customers were never successfully eliminated. Writing to one of these unreliable debtors in Indiana in 1907, a Huber official admonished, " W e have discovered that you have been buying an engine every year from different companies and that they have had to take them back because you never intended to pay a dime on them." Gs A collector writing from Fargo, North Dakota, when forwarding an unpaid note to the company to be charged to profit and loss, added: This man is no good. He went broke at Donnybrook when he was in business and for awhile operated in his wife's name but he's quit and gone to Minot where he is running a cheap hotel and boarding house. T h e engine has been completely worn out and is worthless. T h e attorney who had this note reported that he could see no possible way to collect it. 6 9

Regarding a debt in Kentucky, a collector advised the home office that "this man is a young upstart with big ideas which will never materialize. He bought the outfit against his father's wishes. When I went out to see him, I learned that he had left home. If he can be located I think he will need to be pushed hard." 70 Debtors who skipped the country were familiar to most collectors. A letter from Indianapolis relates in similar despair, " I was unable to locate Mr. Rawlings who has left his engine and clover huiler and vanished from view, apparently never to return to pay his obligations." 71

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Some w ily customers evaded financial responsibility by misrepresenting their assets. Real estate was sometimes listed as collateral at four or five times its actual value. 72 Others evaded their responsibility by transferring property into their wives' names before they signed promissory notes which included this property as a collateral.73 Some of the most unpleasant moments of a collector's life were spent in efforts to handle foreclosures which included livestock as chattels. In this type of settlement, the collector was responsible for rounding up the cattle or horses and getting them into town where they could be sold or shipped to market. T h e collectors, most of whom did not pretend to be cowboys, were not too skillful in handling horses, especially the unbroken, three-year-old broncos. In addition, mortgaged livestock sometimes died from disease, starved during the severe winters, or strayed away before the mortgage was foreclosed. As a result, the collector sometimes reached town with only part of his collateral or showed up with the wrong animals and had to return them to the farmer. Since companies pushed collections during the winter months, traveling collectors shivered in the cold as they hustled along over the snow-covered roads with their chattels on the hoof. A collector working out of Fargo, North Dakota, in 1908 was advised on one occasion to investigate the holder of a promissory note, to look over the status of the security, and to evaluate the livestock. After an investigation the collector replied: I cannot see how we can get anything out of this fellow who is no good financially and is absolutely worthless. The Gaar Scott engine which we held as security has been sold so we are helpless. You ask about our equity in livestock? Well, the horses are all dead. The only livestock Mr. Ingalls has is his wife and when I saw her burning "Russian" coal and living like a filthy tramp, I wondered why in the devil we ever granted credit to these people. 74

T o protect the manufacturing companies, collectors were usually placed under a bond of indemnity. One collector who had spent years on the road, and who believed that this regulation was a reflection upon his personal integrity, wrote the home office in 1898 saying that the company need have no cause for alarm, because "according to all my experience, when a man has finally succeeded in making a collection in North Dakota, he is too d d tired to steal the money." 75 Perhaps it is natural that the satisfactory collections received little publicity while the exact opposite was true of the unfortunate experiences. When collections were most difficult the travelers on their circuits complained that there was no class of men on earth who could shut off a collector and stand off a bill as successfully as a custom thresherman. One collector complained in 1879:

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These threshers have a notion that their signature on a note is no more binding than the same signature on a straw stack, and the traveler doesn't know as it is. He cares not for protest or law suit and the only way to pin him down is to take a chattel mortgage and then take good care he doesn't sell the mortgaged property. When I asked one debtor when he expected to pay his note he replied, "Mister, I am no prophet," and cowed and broken in spirit I turned my face sadly toward home.™

Since the promissory notes provided that the title to the machinery should remain in the manufacturer's name until paid for, many customers believed that they had merely borrowed the machinery and when unable to pay for it, the manufacturing companies could come and reclaim their goods. When a collector tried to force a collection by threatening foreclosure in 1902, the debtor replied that he had received so many bills that he needed a special sack to carry them home. He added, You want your money, which is only natural, and I have not got it, which is more natural than ever. Who has any money at this time of the year, I would like to know. You say that in case I do not pay, you will sue, and I will say go ahead and sue. . . . I have been sued before. 77

When the young man failed to pay any part of his obligations during the next year, the collector sent him another notice. The young man replied that he had taken a lawyer's advice and bought all the machinery necessary when he was a minor so he would not have to pay for it. He boasted, "I am thinking of going into the implement business myself and if you ever start farming just give me a call." The collector was advised to stop in and give him a good beating and to endorse ten dollars on the note for each licking administered until the debt was paid. 78 A collector for the Colean Company writing from Chicago Heights, Illinois, in 1908 lamented, "This farmer is the devil and then some. He refused to sign the note and told me I could go to a place reputed to be much warmer than here. I thought I would be torn limb from limb. . . ." 79 The collecting agents were confronted by a number of surprises. One traveler claimed that he had been threatened by large men and chased by bulldogs.80 Another, when presenting his claim at a farm home near Rockford, Illinois, in 1897, thought he would have no difficulty, because the man of the house was not at home. The farmer's wife looked at the note, then at the collector and went into the house. When she came back the collector turned to receive, not the money, but a pail of hot water the woman poured over him. As he ran for his horse and buggy, he felt the additional sting of a horsewhip. 81 On a few occasions, the thresherman received support from his

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local friends. When a collector tried to foreclose on a threshing rig in Kansas, the owner insisted that he be allowed to ñnish his season's run. The justice of the peace came to the thresherman's rescue. He issued a warrant charging the collector with petit larceny, fined him three dollars for stealing a two-thousand-dollar threshing rig, and then turned the machinery over to the thresherman to finish his work.82 However, the collector was not always outwitted. One man wrote to the home office enclosing a sum of money, adding that he was forced to wait until his debtor went in swimming. Whereupon, at my direction the sheriff grabbed all his clothes, contents, gold watch and plug of chewing tobacco. On auction sale, we realized sufficient to pay your claim in full. I find your claim to be $40.14. I remit. I feel I ought to have $10 for this work.8®

Correspondence carried on by the heads of the collection departments at the factories facilitated the work of the traveling collectors and helped them complete their settlements. These letters, voluminous in quantity, were sent to the debtor, to local county officials, to lawyers, and to all those who might be in a position to report information relative to the particular collection in question. In some instances over three hundred letters were written by the collecting agent at the home office before a final settlement could be arranged. 84 These letters were written in a style indicating that psychological factors were considered by the collecting agent. The first letters were somewhat conciliatory, treating the debtor with a degree of respect and confidence. Initial letters expressed great surprise that the payments were not made when due, hinting that perhaps the money was already in the mail for which thanks were expressed in advance. When no payment was made, the letters took on a more serious tone, pointing out that the collector regretted the failure of the customer to lift the note which had been carried much beyond the ordinary discretion of the company. Usually a plea was made for an immediate cash payment because the money was needed to run the factory; the present operating expenses were especially heavy; the credit board would not permit the collector to carry the paper further; and the patience of the company had become exhausted to the point where it urged the debtor to get his funds together with the aid of his local friends to pay off the obligation. When these tactics failed, the collection department hinted that certain steps would be taken which would prove disconcerting and embarrassing to the person in default. This series of letters stated that unless payment was made within three or four days, the company would act for its own protection." Many letters included this warning:

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W e arc now going to take action and our traveler has been instructed to enforce collection unless you act immediately. W e dislike to write in this plain language but it seems that you pay no attention to ordinary letters. It is now up to you to move or take the consequences. . . . 8 e

T h e collecting agent of the Port Huron Engine and Thresher Company, in writing to a delinquent customer in Logansport, Indiana, in 1913, issued a grim threat: W e are writing you this letter to give final warning that unless you make a partial payment on your obligations we will send our special collector out to call on you and then you will have to face the serious consequences. Better get busy and stop beating around the bush. We must have our money and we are going to insist upon it if necessary. . . . 87

If these strong letters had no effect, the next step was a notification that foreclosure proceedings would be started to collect the amount listed on the unpaid notes. T h e manufacturing companies as a last resort turned the collection over to an attorney who took the matter to court and sold the machinery at a sheriff's sale. Since the court costs and attorney's fees added materially to the cost of the collections, most of the threshing machine companies were not eager to initiate legal proceedings. In addition, too many court cases gave the company a reputation of being a hard concern with which to do business. T h e lawyer's fees usually were 10 per cent of the amount of cash collected, with the court fees added to this as extra costs. When an Illinois lawyer collected $1,687 for the Huber Company in 1910, the lawyer's fees were $150 and the court costs amounted to $46.00.88 Many of the farmers and custom threshermen who lost their machinery, and sometimes their homes as well, thought that the manufacturing companies showed little mercy for the debtors in these unfortunate circumstances. They expected the companies to extend credit indefinitely and to make reasonable concessions in their collection policies whenever the thresherman had hard luck and coulcl not pay for his outfit. These people claimed the companies could afford to be more lenient in collections since they received good interest on their promissory notes. In 1897 the editor of the Advocate of Valley City, North Dakota, estimated that the threshing machine companies received over $350,000 in one year in interest on threshing machinery sold in that state. 88 Some claimed that the foreclosures amounted to more than the value of the original loan, especially when land had been given as security on notes. In some cases this was true. For instance, the Nichols and Shepard Company listed their original investment in sales made in three North Dakota counties in 1910 as $4,900, while the land received in foreclosures on these sales was $10,300, over twice

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the value of the original investment. The president of the Minneapolis Threshing Machine Company was frequently quoted as saying that this company did not make money on sales, but made their profits on foreclosures on real estate.91 Some of the debtor threshermen believed they were mistreated by the manufacturing companies when the collecting agents asked them to turn over the proceeds from the sale of livestock.»2 Others objected when the company insisted on collecting 50 per cent of the gross earnings of the threshing machine until the promissory notes were paid. 83 When a custom thresherman in Iowa was murdered in 1910 by his oldest son, leaving a blind wife, considerable resentment was felt when the foreclosure by the company left the helpless survivor penniless.94 These experiences convinced some people that in the whole range of sacred and profane literature there was no theme so omnipresent as a good healthy mortgage. 85 T h e unpaid mortgage reared its ugly form like a nightmare to torment perpetually the miserable ones held within its grasp. It was terrifying when the interest went unpaid; it was a devil of destruction when payments failed altogether. Those caught in the strangle hold of a mortgage pleaded for some form of clemency, usually an extension of time in which to extricate themselves from their financial woes. T h e sad letters written by the threshermen faced with foreclosure enumerated a long list of reasons for their financial dilemma. Some had bad luck with the machine, clostly repairs, poor threshing weather, and stiff competition from rivals. Others lost their hogs from disease, had their crops destroyed by hail, or had sickness in the family. One thresherman writing from Kansas in 1910 entreated, "Don't close me out, can't you help me in this crisis. Maybe you don't know I have a sick baby in the house. . . . " 8 · While the losses sustained by threshermen who were foreclosed caused considerable hardship, these financial settlements did not always result in a corresponding financial gain for the manufacturing company. On the contrary, the debtor's loss was shared on many occasions by the company. A new threshing rig leaving the factory represented an investment of several thousands of dollars, yet when the company officials foreclosed four or five years after the sale of the machinery, they received a worn-out engine and separator that had lost most of their original value. For this reason, most companies initiated an aggressive collection policy in order to protect their equity in the machinery before it evaporated through depreciation, neglect, and mismanagement. Financial losses resulting from the unwise extension of credit can be seen in the amount of money in uncollected promissory notes.

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T h e Northwestern Manufacturing and Car Company of Stillwater, Minnesota, overextended its credits and scattered its negotiable paper to the four winds. When it went bankrupt in 1884, the receivers in a financial statement reported that the company had been unable to collect $1,300,000 in notes signed by farmers who had bought threshing machines and steam traction engines." The business records of the Nichols and Shepard Company of Battle Creek, Michigan, in a summary report covering the business activities from 1900 to 1917, list a total of $835,468 in judgments and notes which were noncollectable, worthless, and charged to profit and loss.98 Failure to collect an adequate amount of money from previous sales often caused financial embarrassment for manufacturers. Their business histories reveal the close margin of profits and numerous financial crises that occurred. The Nichols and Shepard Company in writing to one of its collection lawyers at Alexandria, Minnesota, in 1874 inquired, "There are thousands of our accounts that we hold against parties that are past due. Do you think we can coax or scare them into giving more security?" 89 The reports of the treasurer of the Huber Manufacturing Company reveal the scarcity of cash funds. In writing a report to the directors in 1891, the treasurer confessed that "We are compelled to borrow money quite extensively on account of heavy pay rolls, and other requirements of the business." 100 A similar report in 1896 read: We have called the attention of the Board at several recent meetings to the extreme difficulty we are having in getting funds to meet pay rolls and maturing notes and accounts. We are practically at the end of our string and there is an absolute necessity at this time to cut off every expense that is possible. There are 306 men on our pay roll for tomorrow, which it will require $5,000 to $6,000 in currency to pay off. We have, by special favor of friends of the company succeeded in arranging for $4,500 in currency but we are not prepared at this time to say where the balance will come from or whether it will come at all. I have done everything within my power to meet our bills. I have been on the go early and late and at all times to find out who has money and where to make an effort to secure it. I recommend that the shop be practically closed down for an indefinite time. It is not a question of whether we want to do this but an absolute necessity as it appears from the way matters are. I feel just as much interested in giving employment to labor as any other member of the board, but it is not a question of sympathy but of life or death for the Huber Manufacturing Company. . . , 101

Convinced that the farm implement companies could not afford the rising costs of production, certain businessmen urged manufacturers to oppose legislative measures which might prove inimical to their interests. F. E. Myers, president of the National Association of Agricultural Implement and Vehicle Manufacturers, in an address before

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this organization's eleventh annual convention, meeting in Chattanooga, Tennessee, on November 16, 1904, stated: I am opposed to the closed shop because I believe it is wrong in principle and that every man has a right to work where and for whom he pleases. . . . It is a matter for congratulation that during the past year no legislation detrimental to the manufacturing interests of this country has been placed on the statute books. The Eight Hour Law and Anti-Injunction Bill were so vigorously opposed by the National Association of Manufacturers aided by individual members of this association that they failed to get beyond the confines of their respective committee rooms. They will, no doubt, be resurrected at the next session of Congress and the fight will have to be resumed, but the power and influence of associations like ours have been felt by our legislators and there is no apparent probability of these bills, with the aroused public sentiment on this question soon securing a place on the statute books of the country. 102

Most of the manufacturing companies realized that their major problem was not new methods of collection of debts but the prevention of unwise sales to unreliable customers. As early as 1872, Clement Russell of Massillon, Ohio, called a convention of threshingmachine manufacturers and suggested that they secure mutual protection by reforming their method of making sales and establishing a uniform system of demanding more cash as a down payment and a shorter length of time on credit terms.10" The Association of Thresher Manufacturers tried repeatedly to institute a more conservative system of sales policy, but the fierce competition existing among the large number of companies made reform virtually impossible. As a result, the eagerness to stress sales continued to dominate business policies, and too liberal credit was extended to those who should never have entered the threshing game. T h e American Thresherman as late as 1916 was complaining that the manufacturing companies were not careful enough in selecting their customers. On one occasion the editor observed that there were half-a-dozen rigs in his own county which had been taken back because the payments could not be met. Referring to one man who had already lost two rigs, he added, "There seems to be no necessity to be stung so many times in the same place. . . ." 104 The financing of steam threshing rigs after 1900 was complicated by the farmer's desire to buy automobiles and trucks. According to E. Dana Durand, director of the census in 1910, there were 3,723 autos manufactured in 1899, and 127,289 in 1909.105 The Northwest Farmstead estimated that farmers bought 25,000 cars in 1909 and not less than 100,000 in 1913.10· By 1908, the International Harvester Company was building a two-cylinder, chain-drive farm Auto Buggy mounted on high wheels designed to pass easily over tree stumps and

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deep-rutted roads.107 The threshermen's magazines began advertising Mitchell automobiles as early as 1906, usually picturing a beautiful woman gliding over the countryside behind the right hand steering wheel of a roadster.10® The Rambler Company of Kenosha, Wisconsin, in 1910 suggested reasons why farmers should purchase autos: At day's end let work and worry end. Consider the joy of a Rambler owner who, when evening comes deserts tired horses and tedious tasks, joins his family and is off to town, to friends, theater and library. Strongly enthused by the stir of speed of the journey, he returns refreshed at leaving familiar things behind. 109

Farm implement dealers provided the first distribution facilities for the sale of automobiles. The early gas buggies were added to the dealer's line of wagons and farm implements. M. M. Baker, one of the large machinery dealers in Peoria, Illinois, in 1908 sold Colean steam engines, Hart-Parr tractors, and Glide, Stoddard-Dayton, Mitchell, and Maxwell automobiles. His business correspondence for these years reveals the threshermen's interest in the horseless carriage. A farm engineer in Oreóla, Illinois, in 1909 wrote that "I am in the threshing business and now I am crazy about buying an automobile. Send description and prices of your touring models." 1 , 0 Others wanted to trade in their old steam engines and plows as payment for cars.111 Still others traded their secondhand autos in as the first installment on steam threshing outfits.112 The Henry Ford Motor Company advertised in Farm Implements in 1910, "Mr. Implement Dealer, are you going to sell automobiles? If so are you going to sit back and let your competitor do all the business? We want good dealers in every town to represent the most popular high-grade car on the market, the Famous Ford Automobiles." 113 A Minneapolis implement dealer was selling a hundred Ramblers a month in the summer of 1909.1" The auto craze alarmed many manufacturing concerns who feared the credit system of the country was being endangered. Eastern money interests in 1910 were complaining that the tight money market was due to the farmers' heavy investment in automobiles. Stories circulated about the hundreds of western farmers who had mortgaged their property to buy motor cars, thus portending financial disaster.115 It was alleged that these autos were expensive, their upkeep costly, and their use devoted only to pleasure. It was said that they tied up capital, piled up debts, and made money scarce.116 Farmers received criticism for the economic waste involved in buying automobiles which frequently broke down or failed because of cracked cylinders, faulty ignition systems, excessive carbon deposits, and a multitude of other functional and structural weaknesses.117 Besides, the cars were weird in appearance. They sighed steadily, snorted,

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choked, gurgled, and at times something went wrong with their stomach which resulted in "spasmodic rumbles that seemed to threaten instant extermination of both vehicles and drivers." 118 Threshing-machine dealers complained of a double standard in which farmers paid cash for their automobiles but expected the machinery companies to extend four-year-credit terms to threshermen buying steam engines and separators. 11 · Barton W. Currie of the Country Gentleman, who interviewed hundreds of dealers explained that auto salesmen talked winsomely, but they did not talk long credits. T h e farmer was told that to buy a car he must plunk over the cash out of his own wallet or go to some other fellow and borrow the cash. . . . Thousands of farmers borrowed the cash to purchase automobiles when dynamite wouldn't have moved them to borrow the cash to pay for implements. They borrowed from banks and they borrowed from usurers; they sold cattle and horses; they plastered die ir meadows and homesteads with mortgages. 120

If the farmer's cash was drained off by the auto companies, there would be little money left to buy steam threshing outfits. Apologists for car-buying farmers were equally vocal. Wallaces' Farmer in 1910 insisted that automobiles were not a rich man's fad designed to kill off the drivers; on the contrary, farmers needed motor cars for business, pleasure, health, and to keep the boys on the farm. If eastern financial interests were worried about extravagance, "let them inaugurate a campaign against the great brewing and distilling interests. . . ." 141 On another occasion the same editors stated that the eastern bankers "need not lose any sleep worrying over die western farmer. He is abundantly able to take care of himself." 122 The Northwest Farmstead in 1911 affirmed that it had no knowledge of any farmers who went into debt to buy autos.123 By 1915, the threshingmachine manufacturers were convinced that the automobile had come to rural America to stay. Furthermore, if any changes were to be made in financing, it should be in the direction of more cash sales for heavy farm machinery rather than in an extension of longer credit terms. T h e fundamental cause for the financial problems which harassed both the thresherman and the manufacturing company lay in the fact that custom threshing as a business never operated on a sound economic basis. T h e men who bought the steam threshing outfits did not get enough money in return for their services to pay for their new machinery, to meet depreciation costs, and to build up a cash reserve sufficient to overcome such hazards as poor crops, repair costs, and the countless reverses which appeared unexpectedly. 124 Most of the men who bought steam threshing outfits did so without definite ideas on how they were going to make profits. Many were

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attracted to the business because of a certain element of glamour in the work, and as a result they failed to pay close enough attention to profit and loss. In fact very few of these men kept any kind of a cost system, while the majority operated solely by rule of thumb. The bookkeeping and accounts usually consisted of a notebook in the engineer's greasy overall pocket. On these pages a few figures written with a blunt pencil indicated the number of bushels threshed and the hours of work put in each day. A threshing rig was the most expensive of all farm machinery, and in proportion to the number of days operated in a year, represented as much of an investment as any ordinary business in a small town. The financial accounts, however, were kept by men who knew about as much concerning interest charges, depreciation costs, inventory reserves, and the double-entry system of bookkeeping as they did about the vocabulary of their physician when he talked Latin. Because of these inadequate business practices, the thresherman usually charged for his work in even cents on a bushel, whereas in many cases, a fraction of a cent on a bushel would have meant the difference between a profit and a loss. In addition, the threshing rates were generally too low when considered in the light of the financial risks involved. T h e representatives of the local threshers' unions of Minnesota, meeting in a convention in 1898, agreed to set their threshing rates at two cents a bushel for oats, three cents for barley, four cents for wheat and eight cents for flax.125 A custom thresherman in South Dakota in 1900 reported prices quite similar, with oats at three cents, wheat at four, and flax at seven cents.128 Although these rates were increased somewhat following the turn of the century, the prices charged for threshing prior to World War I seldom went above six cents for feed grains and nine cents for wheat. As competition became more intense and the number of threshing outfits increased, many operators cut their prices in order to get jobs. One thresherman in 1906 complained that his brothers in the field did not charge enough for their work; yet he was getting only four cents for threshing feed grains and five cents for wheat.127 An Iowa thresherman grumbled in 1907 that he was paid only one and two cents for threshing oats. He had threshed for twenty-one years and reached the conclusion that "we are the biggest fools on earth." 128 Another farm engineer in Indiana in 1910 insisted that anyone boasting about threshermen's profits was "nothing but an old bag of wind." 128 The threshermen's work also involved financial risks in the purchase of steam engines and threshing machines which were much greater than commonly supposed. Most customers in buying machinery assumed that they could use the machinery each fall; yet the crop failures frequently left the rigs standing idle while the interest on the

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notes increased and the principal came due with embarrassing regularity. Then, too, most threshermen failed to foresee the number of threshing bills which they would be unable to collect from the farmers for whom they threshed. Some of the threshermen had as much difficulty in collecting their thresh bills as the manufacturing companies experienced in collecting from the threshermen. A custom operator in Illinois in 1910 muttered that "it is almost impossible to collect our bills." 130 Another miscalculation made by the average thresherman was his failure to discount the costs of depreciation of his machinery from his total income. Most of these men left their expensive rigs standing beside a grove of trees or in fence corners unprotected from rain which rusted the metal, and the sun and wind which cracked off the protective coat of paint. In western Canada less than 10 per cent of the machinery was housed, while the percentage in most areas in the wheat belt of the United States was probably not much better. 131 Philip S. Rose, engineering specialist writing for the American Thresherman in 1907 pointed out that a steam traction engine standing idle out of doors deteriorated from rust almost as fast as when it was at work. He stated that an engine costing $2,800 depreciated at a rate of four hundred dollars a year.132 Unfortunately many of the owners of steam rigs failed to allow a large enough margin of profit on each day's work to create a substantial profit for the season's run. Since the daily expenses in operating the threshing outfit were high, the small margin over and above these amounts was not sufficient to cover emergencies. A Texas thresherman operating a $2,500 rig in 1899 estimated his daily expenses in shock threshing as fifty-eight dollars per day.138 T h e personal records of a custom thresherman who operated in North Dakota reveals that the engineer bought his outfit in 1905 at a cost of $3,500 on four-year credit. The daily cost of operating this rig in 1908 was: 1 1 1 1 1 10 4 2

engineer separator man fireman waterman and team spike pitcher bundle teams and men field pitchers cooks food for the crew fuel and other miscellaneous supplies

$6.00 per day 5.00 3.00 6.00 3.00 50.00 10.00 3.50 10.00 6.00 $102.50 cost per day 134

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M. T . Austin, a thresherman in southern Kansas, one of the few men who kept a systematic record of accounts, retained a detailed list of figures which covered his operations during the years from 1902 to 1909. A summary of these records shows that he threshed 674,000 bushels of grain during 408 days of work. His total receipts were $21 300. His expenses included $11,065 for labor, $2,787 for coal, $256 for oil, $1,132 for repair bills, and $516 in interest charges for a total of $15,761, leaving him a net profit of $5,542 for the eight years of work.135 Since he wore out one outfit and bought a new twenty-twohorse Minneapolis steam engine and separator during this time, it is evident that his $692 average annual income was used primarily for paying for his machinery. Apparently this $21,000 business resulted in excellent service for the farmers for whom he threshed, reasonable wages for the laborers, a good business for the threshing-machine company which sold him the outfit, and plenty of vigorous outdoor exercise for the custom thresherman. These large overhead expenses meant that each custom operator had an excellent chance to lose money through inefficient use of the outfit or from general mismanagement. Since many inexperienced men tried their luck in the threshing game, their lack of knowledge of the business resulted in many financial losses. Unskilled engineers, poor care, bad water, mismanagement, and a desperate desire to keep going at all hazards added to the difficulties. Collectors on the road often attributed the financial failure of threshermen to these handicaps. "It is the same old story," wrote a collector in Montana. "These fellows are such poor managers that they do not earn a dollar. . . ." 13 ° As in all business ventures, however, there are some men who can and will make money. This minority, scattered very thinly across the grain-growing states made enough money in good years by excellent management to offset the losses during the poor threshing seasons. Naturally this group of threshermen furnished most of the testimonial letters quoted in the manufacturing companies annual catalogues. In 1905 the Northwest Thresher Company included such claims as that of a thresherman near Edgely, North Dakota, who had a run of thirty-eight days and booked $3,300 with a net profit of $1,861 for the year.137 Another engineer near Flandreau, South Dakota, wrote in 1914 that he had threshed for forty years and never made a season's run without making some money.138 During World War I, when the prices of grain soared to higher levels, the threshermen raised their threshing rates to about eleven cents for feed grains, sixteen cents for wheat, and eighteen cents for rye. At these prices a thresherman near Millard, South Dakota, during the fall of 1918 did a gross business of $13,208, with $6,000 net earnings. 130

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Aside from this select circle of elite threshermen, the men in the business were generally no more than breaking even in their endeavors, or were operating at a loss. In most of the small towns, the businessmen tended to regard the thresherman as a poor risk for extension of credit. The farm of a thresherman was too frequently symbolized by a set of unpainted buildings, neglected crops, a few half-starved cattle, and a big steam rig parked in a yard full of machinery. The percentage of unsuccessful threshermen is unknown, but the financial mortality rate ran high. The threshermen themselves referred to the meager profits. One of these men, writing from Nelson County, North Dakota, in 1899, explained, "I can say that I have made considerable money, but I know for a positive fact that I am one in ten that has done so." 140 Another thresher in the same state reported nine years later that he had run three different rigs but had come to the conclusion that where one man made a success of it, a dozen went to the wall.141 In writing to the American Thresherman in 1905, a thresherman expressed the opinion that he was well within the bounds of reason in saying that nine-tenths of the farmers who bought threshing machines wished they had not done so because they neglected their farms, had no end of worry, and seldom made any money with their outfits.142 The opinions of men who were not actively engaged in the threshing occupation were much the same. A staff writer for the American Thresherman wrote in 1915 that "if one is to look around at the average men who operate threshing rigs, the thing that impresses is that threshing from the threshermen's standpoint is a financial loss." 143 J. L. Mowry, an agricultural engineer of the University of Minnesota Farm School, asserted in 1915 that "I can say unqualifiedly that the traction engine has not been a paying investment in the past." 144 E. W. Hamilton, a staff writer for the American Thresherman and later editor of the Canadian Thresherman, in an address before the machinery department of the Farm Equipment Institute in Chicago in 1936, said: I have watched the custom threshing business for more than thirty-five years and during that time I have come in contact with thousands of threshermen in both the United States and Canada. I have discussed the matter of earnings with hundreds of them and my observations are that three out of every five have lost money in one way or another in their operations. 148

Even though the unhealthy financial condition of the threshing business forced many operators into bankruptcy, there were others who were willing to purchase steam rigs and try their luck. It may seem strange that men would buy expensive machines to engage in work in which the chances for making a profit were doubtful. Per-

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haps the aggressive advertising methods used by the threshingmachine companies encouraged many to try this experiment. Since the manufacturers were building machinery to be sold in a highly competitive field, they supplemented their traveling sales force with special advertising campaigns to impress the potential customer with the desirability of the ownership of steam traction engines, separators, and other machines used in power fanning. T h e principle of good advertising was as old as the industry itself, but the steam-engine boom which fostered intense competition among rival threshing-machine companies tended to refine the techniques of advertising and to initiate devices by which information could be disseminated more effectively. As the companies increased in size, the importance and scope of the advertising grew correspondingly until the manufacturers were spending about 1 per cent of their gross income for this purpose. 146 Most of the expenses for advertising originated at the advertising department in the home offices of the respective companies. This department attempted to secure the interest of the people for whom the products were intended. Most of the advertising was carried through the mails in the form of circulars, pamphlets, catalogues, calendars, lithographs, repair lists, engine engravings, letter heads, personal letters, and questionnaires. In 1890, the J. I. Case Threshing Machine Company spent $30,000 in printing, besides $7,000 on postage stamps.147 In 1906 the same company, using its own printing press capable of turning out fifty thousand circulars each day, used several carloads of paper in furnishing supplies for the advertising department. 148 In the same year the advertising manager wrote to the postmaster of Winnipeg, Manitoba: "We are today dispatching 20,000 circulars to your office." 149 Determined to make use of every available sales help, the advertising departments showered the farmers with their annual catalogues. In 1902 the Minneapolis Threshing Machine Company sent out over one hundred thousand of these.150 Companies catered to their trade by publishing catalogues printed in French, German, Russian, Spanish, Polish, Norwegian, and Swedish. There were innumerable ways to gain the attention of a prospective customer. Advertising departments mailed out souvenir watch fobs designed in the shape of a particular steam-engine model, and stickpins of the same style were also used to advantage. Some salesmen carried a cylinder tooth ground down to a razor edge which they used in a shaving demonstration to show the quality of steel used in its manufacture. 151 Some of the best advertising appeared in the threshermen's monthly magazines. T h e American Thresherman and the Threshermen's Re-

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view, the most prominent, contained forty to ninety-six pages. T h e journals devoted over half of the space to well-illustrated advertising by the threshing-machine companies. T h e J. I. Case Threshing Machine Company in 1908 spent five thousand dollars for the advertising carried in the American Threslierman,152 This type of literature was one of the most effective means of advertising, since the circulation was primarily among those who owned and operated the steam engines. During the spring and winter months, these men had time to read the glowing claims which encouraged them to trade in their machinery for the improved models. T o add a distinctive touch to the advertising, some of the companies emphasized their trade-mark as a symbol of power, stability, and reliability. T h e Avery Company featured a bulldog, the Gaar Scott people emblazoned the Tiger, and the Case Company seldom failed to remind the reading public that "Old Abe," an American eagle, represented the supreme quality of their line of machinery. 153 T h e Aultman-Taylor Company of Mansfield, Ohio, showed that their separators saved all the grain by picturing a starved rooster minus most of his feathers, with the caption, "fattened on an Aultman-Taylor straw stack." 154 Eager to capitalize on the connotations of various words, most of the manufacturing companies gave names to their steam engines which denoted power and superior performance. T h e Robinson engine appeared as the "Conqueror," the Frick as "Eclipse," the Geiser as "Peerless," the Port Huron as "Rusher," the Minnesota "Little Giant," the Harrison "Jumbo," and the Monitor "Champion." T h e names for separators were chosen to imply speed and efficiency, such as the Russell "Cyclone" thresher, the Minneapolis "Victory," and the Robinson "Bonanza." Some of the unique advertising tricks included the offer of a hundred-dollar prize to the man who could relate the best hard luck story of his attempts to find a substitute for a wind stacker. Another offered two hundred dollars in gold to the thresherman who could make the best-looking straw pile with the blower on his separator. 155 For a time the Case Company offered to send pictures of "Jay Eye See," the famous race horse owned by the founder of this company, to all who would write in for them. 156 Considerable imagination was evidenced in arranging for public displays to advertise the steam traction engines. T h e Avery Company headed a corn festival parade down the streets of Peoria, Illinois, with a return-flue engine pulling a float upon which a King and Queen for the day were riding. 157 On one occasion the Case Company gave a twelve horse nickel-plated traction engine to the proprietors of a circus company on the condition that the engine be used to pull the

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menagerie cages through the streets of the cities staging the show. The company also furnished an engineer for an entire year.168 A favorite advertising scheme was to grant free rides in wagons pulled by the steam engines. In one of these good-will gestures, a Stevens traction engine pulled sixteen wagons with four hundred people seven miles.158 As a demonstration of power on the drawbar, the Northwest Thresher Company of Stillwater, Minnesota, fired u p one of their fifty-one-horse double-cylinder engines and pulled a string of ten dead engines weighing over 133 tons through the streets of the town.180 Since the steam engines and threshing machines were shipped by rail on flatcars, the manufacturing companies seized the opportunity to advertise their products while the goods were moving to their destination. Special trains with the newly painted threshing outfits decorated with bunting, placards, banners and flags made an attractive display. Notices of the trains' itineraries, sent out in advance, encouraged people to turn out for the special event. Within a few miles of a station, the engineer of the locomotive blew the whistle several times to announce the arrival of the train. At the station advertising circulars and hand bills were showered over the crowd from the wind stacker on one of the threshing machines, while souvenirs, cigars, and lemonade were passed to the crowds that gathered. The Avery Company usually lined up a complete threshing rig on the cars at the rear of the train to demonstrate the machines running under full speed. As a test of ruggedness several fence boards were fed into the cylinder of a "Yellow Fellow" separator, which ground the lumber into sawdust and blew it out of the blower.1®1 Many of these trains carried forty or fifty carloads of steam threshing outfits.102 In May 1900, the Minneapolis Threshing Machine Company shipped out 175 carloads of machinery in four trains.163 When the same company shipped a trainload of fifty cars of threshing machinery valued at $150,000 to Lincoln, Nebraska, in 1915, one of the officials of the company revealed his command of hyperbole: Folks said it was long enough for the engineer to be whistling for Nebraska towns while the machine crowd in the special car attached to the train were still flirting with the girls in Iowa who came to see the "big doings." It rained so hard during the whole trip that the spectators had to wear hip boots and came on rafts through the Platte River country but they were there by the thousands all along the way.18«

Working against tough competition, each dealer and advertising manager attempted to take advantage of every opportunity to encourage the sales of his machinery. As a result, the machine men showed up on almost every occasion when a big crowd of people assembled. A branch manager of the Gaar Scott Company exhibited

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his traction engine at a farmers' picnic near Rockford, Illinois, and sold a full threshing rig.1®5 When the threshermen's convention met in Oklahoma City in 1898, many of the manufacturing companies set u p exhibits or paraded their machinery up and down the streets of the city. In these parades many of the separators were decorated with flags and were used as band wagons.1®· Although some of the companies were slow in entering their machines at state fairs, the excellent opportunities to impress the public and to make sales on the grounds led to an increased use of this type of advertising. By 1906 four-fifths of these concerns had entered their machines at the annual fairs in the grain-growing states. 1 " T h e men in charge of advertising were not content to part their machinery under a tent as an exhibit to be roped off from the curious crowds. They moved their traction engines into some nearby field where under a full head of steam they vied with one another in plowing contests or demonstrated their superiority by performing various tests of handling and operation. During the South Dakota State Fair of 1913, over 160 acres of land were plowed as a demonstration during fair week.188 When the Minnesota Thresher Company ran one of its traction engines around the Minnesota Sute Fair Grounds in 1885, one of the newspaper men who saw the self-steering straw-burner in action wrote that it "waltzed around over the soft and uneven grounds, a king among the pigmy engines around it." 1β · The Avery Company appeared at the Iowa State Fair at Des Moines in 1906 with four steam traction engines with plowing attachments. lliese exhibition engines cut up all kinds of didos and climbed blocks of wood twenty-nine inches high. A litde boy of twelve or thirteen years operated die engine with perfect ease and made it fairly dance a jig . . . but the stunt that created [the most] interest . . . was the steam plowing outfit, consisting of a twenty-two horsepower engine and the ten big plows. Every once in awhile a good looking representative would announce that a plowing exhibition would be given in an open field where the ground was as hard as some men's conscience who sell machinery and write newspaper articles. The field was in the fair grounds and 10,000 people would swarm around to see the engine tear up a strip of land several feet wide without a hitch or bobble. . . .17°

T o show how quickly the engine could be started, stopped, and reversed, the Huber people ran the rear wheels of the machine over planks which teetered over a central fulcrum. The engine could be run forward and backward without causing the teeter planks to touch the ground on either side of the center block.171 At the St. Louis Fair in 1899, the Frick engineers ran their engine up on a large block of wood and then let the wheel down to within three inches of the ground where it was held in a fixed position by means of the lever

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only." In a similar demonstration to reveal the sensitive control of the throttle, the Northwest Thresher Company at the Wisconsin State Fair in 1906 ran one of their sixteen-horsepower single-cylinder engines up on to an inclined plank. An egg was placed upon the plank in front of the drive wheel and the engine allowed to move forward until the egg shell was cracked but not broken. After the egg was cracked, the engine was reversed again without crushing the egg. Another stunt was to open the back case of an open-faced watch which hung on a solid post. Then the engine backed against the crystal of the watch until the back of the case snapped shut without the slightest damage to either the crystal or the watch.173 After the Case Company manufactured their rear-mounted traction engine in 1898, with the rear axle located behind, rather than beneath the boiler, the increased weight on the front wheels made it less susceptible to rearing up in front than the conventional style engine. The company used this argument to prove that the Case engines were better hill climbers, and to demonstrate this fact built a large inclined plane at a forty-five-degree angle leading u p to a platform some twelve feet in the air. The Case engine was run halfway up this ramp, then stopped, before proceeding to the top of the incline. The sign above the platform challenged all the other companies by declaring, "Case Engines are the only real hill climbers." 174 The Case people insisted that no other company accepted this challenge, although the Reeves and Geiser Companies later made the same test.175 Merrill C. Meigs, vice-president of the Hearst Publishing Company of Chicago, recalls his early experiences as an engineer operating one of the Case engines during these demonstrations. He remembers the intense interest of the spectators as they anticipated the overturning of the engine. Usually, the steam calliope of the American Threshermen's tent nearby furnished the incidental music for this demonstration, creating a dramatic scene with tremendous advertising potentialities.17® This performance was repeated every twenty minutes at the Spokane, Washington, Interstate Fair in 1908, where over sixty thousand people saw the demonstration. 177 Although the practice of awarding medals and cash prizes for exhibiting the best steam traction engines at the state fairs diminished around 1900, the principle of judging the merits of these machines was revived with the inauguration of the Winnipeg contest in Manitoba during the summer of 1908. These trials originated in the mind of Burness Greig, an Englishman who was concerned over the failure of the British agricultural manufacturing companies to develop the Canadian trade.178 In an effort to draw attention to the opportunities for using more mechanical power on the plains of the western provinces, Greig persuaded the Winnipeg Industrial Exhibition Associa-

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tion to sponsor a series of plowing contests. Winnipeg was well situated for the power machinery trials because it stood at the gateway of a rich agricultural empire stretching westward for a thousand miles. The soil was heavy and the sod so tough that great amounts of power were required for plowing. Horses were high in price and could not be secured in sufficient quantity. Since the farms were large and the seeding period was short, huge plowing engines were regarded as essential to successful wheat raising.179 Although the original plans called for limited competition, the immediate popularity of the first trials resulted in a contest of international proportions. Invitations were sent out annually to all manufacturers of steam and gasoline engines, requesting their participation in these contests to determine the best agricultural engines in the different sizes and classifications. Railroads offered special passenger rates to fair visitors, while local businessmen furnished entertainment by providing horse races, art exhibits, and the "biggest dog show ever held in western Canada." 180 Realizing that the manufacturing company which carried off the largest share of the prize awards could capitalize upon the great advertising value, the struggle to win these laurels caused some of the fiercest competition ever to appear in the annals of mechanical power in American agriculture. No efforts were spared to secure special recognition from the judges. Company engineers and machine experts designed and added the latest improvements to their steam engines. T h e machines were shipped to Winnipeg several weeks before the trials began in order to test the plowing outfits under normal conditions and to make any necessary last-minute adjustments. T o avoid using the local alkali water, the companies shipped in fresh supplies by rail. T h e first days of the contest were spent testing the engines on a friction brake to determine their horsepower on the belt and to evaluate their efficiency of operation while providing a stationary power. The real struggle for supremacy occurred during the plowing trials in which the mammoth steam engines and tractors surged across the virgin prairie sod toward their respective flag markers a mile distant. As the engineers struck their respective furrows, turning over a quarter section of Canadian soil in a single day's demonstration, a corps of college professors as judging officials with detailed score charts in hand checked the performance of each machine. A complicated point system was used for judging performance on the prony brake test, the plowing contest, as well as for the general design of the engines. Points were deducted from final scores for such penalties as more than two operators on the engine, for each stop made after beginning the test, for insufficient water to run eight hours, for developing hot bearings, for having knocks in the engine, and for vibration of various

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light parts of the machine."11 This data was subsequently compiled and the winners announced by telegraph. In describing the Winnipeg contest, Lynn W. Ellis and Edward A. Rumely wrote in 1911, Clouds of smoke and hissing steam; a broad prairie strctching for miles without a break . . . throngs of eager spectators; the song of vibrant steel and the cracking roots of age old sod—imagine all this, add to it the sight of a score of monster engines pulling leviathan plows, and you have a faint picture of the Winnipeg plowing contest. Shiny prows of steel, cleaving the waves of a sea of prairie grass, long furrows lost in a haze, lines of fluttering flags to guide the engineer on a straight course; huge twenty-ton engines mere dots on the landscape, and you have the impression of distance . . . In the night a steam tractioneer steals away with his engine to caulk a flue. Yonder a dim light shows where a torn gasket is being replaced on a gas tractor. . . . In the stillness, the sound of a stealthy file betrays the purpose of a plowman to get an edge on his rival as well as his plow. . . . Their iron steeds have been put in the final pink of condition. The night before the supreme test the men sleep in their clothes on the field, one eye open for prowlers from rival camps.182

The intense rivalry in these contests proved one of the major causes for their abandonment after the 1913 trials. The envy among the companies bred strife, trickery, and ill will. The machinery experts handling the engines were accused of using unfair practices, while the judges were charged with bias in making their awards. Clever advertising men purposely clouded the issues each year to suit their own purposes. Although the mass of data collected was so extensive that it could be understood only by the specialist, the general public still demanded more information with which to aid the judges in giving more accurate decisions.183 In this sense overtechnicality helped kill the annual contest. Growing tensions arising in Europe during the crises of 1914 also tended to divert public attention from the competition on the Canadian plains and focused it upon a more important struggle taking shape on the European continent. Fortunately, the results of the Winnipeg Motor contests were not all negative. On the contrary, the emphasis placed upon practical demonstrations during the trials made testing a regular part of every agricultural machinery factory. It made designing engineers more conscious of economy, ease of handling, and accessibility of engine parts. It advanced the manufacturing industry many years ahead of its previous rate of development, and indirectly benefited the farmers by providing more reliable farm machinery. Furthermore, these contests demonstrated rather convincingly that the gasoline tractor was destined to be the farm power unit of the future. J. B. Bartholomew, president of the Avery Company, in evaluating these contests stated in 1917 that the six annual Winnipeg trials cradled and nursed the

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tractor industry into reality. 184 Although unknown to many of the best-informed machine men of the day, these dramatic contests on the fields of Manitoba paraded a cavalcade of steam traction engines before the public in its last great public demonstration; henceforth, the attention of potential customers began to turn toward the newest addition to the power family, the gasoline tractor.

Chapter V i l i THRESHERMEN'S ORGANIZATIONS A N D SCHOOLS of steam traction engines quite generally agreed that some form of united action was necessary to solve their most serious problems. Convinced that their financial positions were insecure, that their work was not fully appreciated, and that enemies threatened them from all sides, many of the custom operators sought a greater sense of security in local threshermen's organizations. During the 1880's, these groups began to meet voluntarily on a community or county basis to discuss the adoption of uniform threshing rates. If this could be achieved, the prices charged by threshermen could be raised to a reasonable figure without the fear of being underbid by price-cutters within their own ranks. As a result, some of the mortgages that hung like a thundercloud over the heads of the threshermen would be dispelled and an era of prosperity would begin. With these hopes in mind, a number of local thresher associations were formed throughout the grain-growing states. During the fall of 1889, a few custom threshermen living near Red Wing, Minnesota, formed an organization to establish a uniform schedule of prices. 1 In 1890 a similar group near Decatur, Illinois, agreed to thresh at a rate of four cents a bushel for wheat and two cents for oats. 2 Most of these preliminary efforts met with little success, however, although they pioneered along a path which led to significant future developments. Following the panic of 1893, a group of men representing the threshing-machine companies, in cooperation with local threshermen, organized the Northwestern Threshermen's Association, with headquarters at Minneapolis. T h i s association pledged its membership to improve the threshing business by demonstrating that cooperation was better than competition; that uniform prices would prove more profitable than cut-rate prices, and that limiting a company's sales to reliable and competent men would benefit both manufacturer and consumer. 3 Several of these associations were formed in Minnesota. Vehement protests were made by the farmers, who called special meetings in the Northwest to organize against the alleged thresher188 OWNERS

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men's trust. T o fight this monster of privilege and to stamp out the Northwestern Threshermen's Association, the farmers held a meeting in Minneapolis in 1894 at which they organized a Grain Grower's Convention and adopted the following resolution: Whereas, a trust is organized by the manufacturers of threshing machines and their agents which is now trying to rope in the threshermen of the country, therefore be it resolved that we request every member of this convention to do his utmost to dissuade the threshermen from joining the trust, and where organized all local organizations resolve not to patronize any members of such trust and Ave request every local alliance in the state to take action in this matter. 4

In replying to this resolution, C. T . Gotshall, manager of the Northwestern Threshermen's Association, wrote to Ignatius Donnelly, one of the organizers of the Grain Growers Convention. He stated that there were no real reasons why one group of farmers should boycott the threshermen who were also farmers. He warned that replacing the custom threshermen with inexperienced men would prove extremely unwise since the quality of work done would deteriorate while the cost would remain the same. A thresherman supporting Gotshall made the point that the thousands of members óf this organization were not thieves and monsters but flesh and blood like everyone else.5 Well aware of the ineffective efforts of the local and regional threshermen's associations, Charles £ . Miesse of Chicago in the late nineties adopted some of the methods employed by the agrarian movements to organize a National Thresher's Protective Association.· This organization provided for the banding of threshermen into local associations or secret lodges. Administrative policies were directed by Grand Lodges located at the state capitals, while a Supreme Lodge and its national officers residing at Chicago unified the organization. Lecturers were sent out from the state offices to help organize the local lodges in the counties and assist with promoting the welfare of individual threshermen. T o make the movement more attractive, secret sessions were held, a password was used, and elaborate titles such as Second Supreme Vice-President, Grand Marshall, and Supreme Chaplain were given. Initiation fees of $7.50 and annual dues of $3.00 were conveniently included in the bylaws of the local constitutions. A monthly journal, the Thresher World, became the official organ of the organization. This magazine, claiming circulation of twenty-five thousand in 1902, reached over four hundred lodges scattered across Kansas, Nebraska, Iowa, Minnesota, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Texas, and the Canadian provinces of Manitoba and Ontario. 1 Editorially, Miesse rushed to the aid of the oppressed threshermen. He declared that he heard the threshermen's Macedonian cry to

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"come over and help us," and that the Supreme Lodge would do everything possible to spread the glad tidings to all in need. If a member of the National Thresher's Protective Association should perchance yield to temptation and prove unfaithful to his pledge by cutting prices, he was to be forgiven and extended the right hand of fellowship with a solemn reminder to "Go and sin no more. Remain steadfast, do not be deceived by false reports," advised the editor. "Do not be influenced by what you hear or see, or by what others may do. Stick to your schedule of prices. It is your only salvation." · For a time the association flourished, with a membership growing to about twenty thousand representing fifteen states.· Thi$ success was short-lived, however, and the organization had passed out of existence by 1906.10 T h e threshermen's failure to pay their annual dues contributed to the decline of the organization. At the national convention held in Chicago in 1904, the treasurer reported that in spite of the systematic and persistent efforts made to collect national and state dues, results had been very disappointing. When only twentyfive hundred dollars could be gathered from this source in 1903, the association in desperation agreed to give their promoters 25 per cent of all dues that they collected.11 Unfortunately this decision created a group of high-pressure, oily-tongued promoters who gave the impression that the association was more interested in collecting money than in solving the problems of the men operating the threshing rigs.12 Since there appeared to be too many unscrupulous men within the administrative branch of the organization, most of the threshermen refused to continue their support." The inability of the threshermen to organize successfully was due in part to a lack of faith in early state and national leaders, whom they regarded as strangers. In addition, suspicion and distrust among the threshermen made cooperation virtually impossible. In spite of the talk favoring collective action, the owners of steam traction engines had no leaders in their own ranks who could command respect and inspire a sense of idealism that would weld them into an effective association. Fortunately this leadership finally came from the men who owned and published the three outstanding threshermen's periodicals: James A. Stone of the Threshermen's Review, Saint Joseph, Michigan; Bascom B. Clarke of the American Thresherman, Madison, Wisconsin; Ε. H. Heath and E. W. Hamilton of the Canadian Thresherman, Winnipeg, Manitoba. Since these men had at one time been threshermen themselves, they understood the problems of the farm engineer and were able to speak his language. These editors had made many personal sacrifices in behalf of the custom threshermen, and the men in the field accepted them as members of their

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own group. Because of this relationship, the editors could advise, suggest, criticize, and admonish without being seriously misunderstood. Although the editors of the Threshermen's Review and the Canadian Thresherman were interested in the welfare of the owners of steam rigs, it was Bascom B. Clarke of the American Thresherman who appeared as the real champion of these men. In so doing he became the most widely known and best-loved friend of the threshermen. After working as a traveling salesman for the Robinson Company of Richmond, Indiana, and later serving as general agent for the Port Huron Company of Port Huron, Michigan, Clarke d&ided to enter the publishing field at Madison, Wisconsin. By borrowing four hundred dollars to add to his own two-hundred-dollar reserve, he put out the first issue of the American Thresherman in 1898." Combining a gambling spirit with the boundless energy and imagination of a circus showman, he was able to tap the advertising gold mine of the threshing-machine companies during their heyday. He was fearless in soliciting advertising. Writing to M. M. Baker of Peoria, Illinois, in 1910 he complained that he had hammered away at a Pacific Coast manufacturer for ten years in an attempt to sell ads but without jarring him loose for the price of a subscription. "I am wondering how you ever happened to hook u p with the dead ones . . . but if you can induce these people to buy an ad, nudge them up agin the rate sheet, and don't let the Christmas issue of the American Thresherman go by without at least an illustrated page of their engines. . . ." " In 1900 he collected forty thousand dollars in advertising alone,1* while six years later this amount had almost doubled. 11 He also built u p the annual circulation to fifty-two thousand. 1 · As a salesman, he withheld neither his own money nor that of his friends in his advertising campaigns. In 1901 he was spending over a thousand dollars a week to promote his interests at the state fairs of the Middle West. 1 · He sponsored a series of free concerts for the fair crowds, presenting on several occasions some of the best talent on the music faculty of the University of Wisconsin. T h e instructors of second mandolin, violin, and cello, and a harpist with a thousanddollar harp appeared, while the soloist "captivated every one present and brought tears to the eyes of her audience by her wonderful singing." 20 For the sake of variety, Clarke showed up on one occasion with a group of thirty "phantom negroes" to entertain the crowds. As a standard feature of the show, a steam calliope boomed out its accompaniment to the J. I. Case inclined-plane demonstration. As the crowds gathered, the representatives of the American Thresherman signed u p the customers on the subscription blanks.

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This magazine was worthy of the ballyhoo. Behind a cover illustrated with a steam traction engine or the face of a beautiful woman, were eighty to a hundred pages of well-written and timely articles with special features for every member of the family. In editorials Clarke was at his best. He could launch vitriolic attacks or plead a just cause with equal skill. Master of the allegory, he mixed sacred and profane allusions to suit his fancy, but at all times his prose was clear, interesting, and intensely convincing. When a certain manufacturer accused the editor of being a highwayman and a parasite living off the advertisements of the manufacturing companies, Clarke replied: This highly flavored stuffing desired for the goose might not taste so bad if smeared over the tail end of a gander. We have as much right to demand the killing off of the manufacturers' conventions as they have that of the threshermen. . .

When a malcontent accused Clarke of being a liar, a thief, and a drunkard, he promptly published the letters with enough comments to present the accused in the role of a martyr crucified for the cause of justice. Needless to say, the editor won the admiration of the custom threshermen to such an extent that he was consulted about problems ranging from matters of jurisprudence to his latest recommendations for a good corn cure. Shortly after 1898, when Clarke was getting his magazine well established, the threshermen were still struggling ineffectively to organize into county and state brotherhoods through which they would set uniform threshing prices and discuss policies which concerned the threshing business. These groups were conventional in organization and in procedures, with officers who called local meetings and encouraged each thresherman to join the brotherhood and pledge to abide by the rates which had been adopted for the coming season. Quick to see an opportunity for giving assistance to this movement, the editors of the threshermen's magazines used their publications to disseminate information and to urge cooperation among the custom threshers. They toured the country appearing before local and state conventions and supporting the cause with liberal financial contributions. Many a thresher received a free subscription to the American Thresherman as a reward for joining the state brotherhoods. In 1911 Clarke made a plea for assistance by saying that he turned every dollar taken in from subscriptions and advertising into the work of the threshermen's organizations. We are getting tired of carrying the white man's burden ull alone in the field work . . . heretofore it has cost $25,000 a year for this publication to carry

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on our organization work and in return the gross receipts at conventions would not exceed $1,000 a year. . .

Under this type of leadership, the threshermen's brotherhoods grew in numbers. State conventions which ran for two or three days were held in fifteen different states where officers were elected, constitutions adopted, and numerous committees named to work on special problems. 23 Regional conventions were also held. For many years the Southwest conventions at Wichita, Kansas, attracted between one and two thousand threshermen from several states.24 Programs followed the traditional pattern, an invocation, the mayor's welcome, a few band numbers, followed by a series of speeches given by representatives of the threshermen's publications, manufacturing companies, agricultural colleges, and state governments. The evening sessions included a banquet and a variety of entertainment such as musical productions, operas, comedians, and wrestling and boxing shows.'-s In the early twenties, Jack Dempsey appeared in one of these exhibition bouts in Michigan. W. E. Hamilton recalls that 2,500 to 3,000 men often attended the state conventions. "I have seen over 1,200 threshermen sit down to one of those banquets. They were a group apart from the regular stream of agriculture and they took a professional pride in their avocation. . . ." 24 Although the threshermen's brotherhoods were never able to establish uniform threshing rates on a state-wide basis and thus eliminate the problem of price cutters, much progress was made by these organizations along other lines. The most successful work was accomplished in the field of politics where the brotherhoods were able to influence many state legislators to support measures which were most favorable to the owners of steam traction engines, and to oppose unfavorable legislation. Because of the poor roads and frequent bridge failures, the brotherhoods of the several states demanded laws and appropriations to improve this situation. In Iowa in 1910, Governor Carroll called in members of the state threshermen's organization to assist with the Good Roads Convention which would propose ways to improve the highways of the state.27 A few years later the brotherhoods of the same state received considerable credit for appointing an investigating committee which ferreted out and exposed the graft which had been going on for years among officials who had been misappropriating road and bridge funds. 28 The Minnesota Brotherhood in 1915 sponsored a bill in the legislature which would make counties and municipalities liable for damage to life and property resulting from bridge failures.29 By insisting on better bridges during the nineties and early decades of the twentieth century, the threshermen were forerunners of the good roads movement.

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T h e coming of the automobile and truck gave new impetus to this cause. Whenever the state legislatures were in session, the brotherhoods were alerted lest some bill be passed which would be detrimental to the steam engine owners of the state. By taking prompt action, they defeated many of these measures. T h e president of the Iowa Threshermen's Brotherhood, in a letter to all threshermen of the state in 1910, informed the members that there was a movement to repeal the traction engine law and enact a more drastic one. He warned: Unless everyone who is interested in threshing machinery takes an active hand in the coming campaign, those who are behind this movement will succeed in their purpose and the traction engine owner will again be an outlaw upon our highways with no rights that the public are required to respect . . . call upon the candidates for the offices of senator and representative . . . be sure to vote only for those who are friendly to our interests.30

When an attempt was made to repeal the Nebraska Bridge Law of 1911, which stipulated that all new bridges built must support a load of twenty tons, the threshermen of the state led a successful fight to keep the law on the statute books.31 Over three hundred threshermen crowded into the assembly hall of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives in 1919 to protest the passage of a bill which would prohibit the use of cleats on the drive wheels of steam traction engines.32 The Indiana Brotherhood claimed in 1915 that its political action had saved feach thresherman in the state fifty dollars during a single year by maintaining their rights on the public highways. In addition it killed an ill-advised bill which would have required each thresherman to disinfect the machinery, horses, and men before moving from one farm to the next. 33 Since many states passed laws requiring the threshermen to carry liability or workmen's compensation insurance on all of their employees, the threshermen complied with the law. But they believed that the premium rates were much too high. T o save money, many of the state threshermen's brotherhoods established their own mutual insurance companies in an attempt to secure die same coverage at lower costs.34 T o insure the collection of their thresh bills from the farmers the custom threshermen favored the passage of lien laws which forbade the sale of grain until the thresh bill had been paid. At the regional threshermen's convention in Wichita, Kansas, in 1915, three thousand delegates voted to send their legislators a resolution calling for the passage of such a law.35 One of the most valuable services rendered by the brotherhoods, with the help of the threshermen's publications, was the spreading of information relative to the laws pertaining to the operation of steam traction engines. Since these laws varied in the several states

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and underwent frequent revision, the owner of the steam engines needed the assistance of these agencies which could quote and interpret the law in words that he could understand. Because of their size and weight, the agricultural steam engines were generally regarded as a menace to roads and bridges. Missouri and Kansas laws in 1899 stipulated that the owners of these engines must place planks one foot wide and three inches thick across all bridges and culverts which were crossed." T h e bridge laws of Iowa, Illinois, and Minnesota also required the planking of bridges. Any violation of the law was considered a misdemeanor and the owner of the engine was liable for any damages done to the bridge." T o safeguard the driver of horse-drawn vehicles, the laws in Illinois, Iowa, and Indiana in 1899 required that the engineer of a steam traction engine stop his machine when a team of horses coming from the opposite direction approached within a hundred yards. Furthermore, a man must walk ahead of the engine to assist the horses.*8 Kansas and Missouri laws directed the engineer to turn to the right, stop one hundred yards from the team, shut off the steam, and wait until the horses had traveled another hundred yards past the machine before moving the engine again. If a machine traveled through a town, a team of horses must be hitched to the front of the engine. Any violator of this law was subject to a fine rangine from five to two hundred dollars.** A similar law in Minnesota in 191S provided that an engineer who blew his whistle within five hundred feet of an approaching team on the highway, or who did not stop at least a thousand feet from such a team, would be subject to a hundred dollar fine.40 T o reduce the terror of night travel, the New York, Michigan, and Wisconsin laws in 1899 stated that a man with a red light must precede the engine at a distance of twenty to thirty rods in order to signal the engineer when horses were approaching." T h e Illinois law of 1910, being more specific, cai'ed for a "strong, clear red light." 48 A new law in Pennsylvania in 1915 provided a fine of ten to twenty dollars or imprisonment for any person operating a traction engine while in an intoxicated condition, 4 * and a Tennessee statute two years later required each owner of a steam traction engine to take out a six-dollar license to run an engine on the highway.44 Several states passed laws requiring the removal of all cleats on the drive wheels before traveling on the state roads. Some attempts were made to ban steam engines from the highways. In response to this restrictive legislation, the steam-engine owners and operators defied some of the laws as archaic and shouted their protests in no uncertain terms. They insisted that these laws were discriminatory and malicious in intent. Why should not these same laws apply to other vehicles which used the roads, such as dray

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wagons and automobiles? What was the purpose of highways and bridges if not to be traveled? Why should a person be required to haul a load of lumber with him whenever he intended to cross a bridge? One engineer stated that in every paper he picked up he saw somebody having a "conniption fit" about traction engines spoiling the roads. 45 Another added that he could not see why any legislator who favored such bad bills should be allowed to go free. He supposed that even if an engine could fly, someone would prohibit it from flying between the first of January and the last of December.4® An irate engineer from Illinois insisted that the legislative fool who deprived a traction engine of the use of the public highways should be made to fast on straw and water for one year until he could appreciate the source of his bread supply. 47 W i t h this kind of opposition, some of the laws were amended and a few repealed, but new legislation was passed from time to time to add to the concern of the owners of steam traction engines. For instance, most of the states held the owners of the engines responsible for damages resulting from fires set by these machines. 48 South Dakota required each thresherman to post a five-hundred-dollar fire bond with the clerk of the county court.4® About 1914 many of the states began enacting workman's compensation laws making the owner of threshing machinery liable for certain financial payments to those suffering injury or death while at work. T h e Iowa statute in effect in 1915 held the owner liable to the extent of three thousand dollars in event of accidental death to a member of his crew. 50 T o protect themselves the owners of the threshing rigs took out compensation insurance from either the old line or threshermen's mutual insurance companies. Legal matters, although technical and difficult to understand, were given considerable attention by most threshermen. A man could suffer financial ruin when caught on the losing side of a lawsuit. T h e threshermen's magazines often ran a legal column answering questions relating to specific court cases dealing with the right of contract, boiler laws, accident insurance, suits against counties and cities for damages for bridge failures, and other matters. T h e statutes of Minnesota, Montana, and Canada stated that all persons operating steam traction engines must obtain a license before they would be allowed to use their steam machinery. Licenses would be granted if the engineer was able to pass the examinations given by the state or regional boiler inspectors. Failure to obey this law in Minnesota carried a fine of from twenty-five to fifty dollars. 51 These regulations tended to limit the number of qualified engineers in some parts of the country at a time when there was already an acute shortage of experienced men to handle the ever-increasing

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number of steam engines which were being sold each year. Because of this scarcity, engineers' wages rose to four or five times those paid to the average nonskilled farm worker. In addition, the failure of many of the engineers to understand and solve their daily problems necessitated the servicing of more machines by experts sent out by the manufacturing companies. This added cost often ranged from twenty-five to a hundred dollars on each new steam threshing rig sold, and was eventually absorbed in an increased sale price of the machinery.82 Mindful of the need for more and better-qualified steam-engine engineers to operate the power machinery on the farms, several groups of men during the 1890's began to take a special interest in this particular phase of vocational training. William Boss, instructor in the Dairy School of the University of Minnesota, after teaching his students the fundamental principles relative to the use of steam engines in creamery plants, was asked in 1894 to teach a class in power machinery dealing with the operation of steam traction engines. For purposes of demonstration and experimentation, the school secured a traction engine of the most improved pattern for this class.53 Other state agricultural colleges introduced similar courses. South Dakota State College at Brookings,14 and Ohio State University at Columbus had special steam traction courses in their respective curricula in 1896." Most of the other state colleges in the major grain-growing states were offering these courses prior to 1910. T o give farm engineers a better understanding of the operation of steam engines, the Case Company in 1894 allowed these men to visit the testing rooms at the factory where the engines were checked and tuned up prior to shipment to the dealers. The visitors spent as much time as they wished observing and operating these engines, some farmers studying two or three weeks during the winter. This was good training for the men and excellent advertising for the company.5« As the average farmer or custom thresherman had no opportunity to attend a school of traction engineering, Professor D. D. Mayne, principal of the School of Agriculture of the University of Minnesota, and Β. B. Clarke of the American Thresherman collaborated to establish the first school of traction engineering designed especially for the operators of these engines. Any farmer or thresherman of good morals who could read and write and pay a tuition fee of five dollars was eligible to enroll. This school was held at the Minnesota State Fair grounds in St. Paul in June of 1906, with Professor Mayne in charge of administration. Clarke underwrote the project and advertised the school in the columns of his magazine. One hundred eighty-nine students attended this four-week session to listen to

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a series of lectures given by William Boss on the principles and operation of steam traction engines. Other courses included field practices by H. B. White, also of the faculty of the University of Minnesota, boilers and state inspection by F. A. Edwards, and gasoline motors by Philip S. Rose, head of the agricultural engineering department of the North Dakota State College of Fargo. T o supplement the lectures, twelve steam traction engines and one gasoline tractor were available for demonstration and shop work.57 On commencement day at St. Paul, one of the special attractions was a contest among groups of students to determine which group could line u p a steam engine and separator and put the outfit in readiness for work in the shortest length of time. A team consisted of an engineer, separator man, and belt man. In 1907, the winning team lined up the machine and set the separator in motion in three minutes and twenty-five seconds.88. The commencement program was often held in connection with the annual meeting of the State Threshermen's Brotherhood, which increased the attendance. Each graduate received an engineer's license which made him eligible to operate a traction engine in any state. In 1908 William Hays, the Assistant Secretary of Agriculture from Washington, D.C., delivered the St. Paul commencement address. He praised the school for providing this vocational training which would educate men toward the farm instead of away from it. He stated, "No other college nor department of agriculture nor agricultural experimental station has brought a fact more important to the entire country than this. . . Since the experiment in St. Paul proved highly successful, similar schools were held in following years at Fargo, Wichita, and Indianapolis. These were later incorporated into short courses given at the state agricultural colleges. Perhaps taking a cue from these events, the Case and Rumely companies sponsored two- and three-day threshing schools at several cities throughout the Midwest. Special instructions and demonstrations were given in the correct operation of the separator, the business end of a threshing rig where the money was made. 80 Many private schools throughout the country likewise saw the opportunity to establish special technical schools designed to provide training for students interested in steam, gas, or automotive engineering. For those unable to attend these schools, instruction by correspondence was available. The International Correspondence Schools of Scranton, Pennsylvania, founded in 1891, sent out materials relating to machine design, electricity, steam traction engines, and a number of other subjects. In 1900 this school was reported to have 130,000 students enrolled. Β. B. Clarke, ever on the alert to

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p r o m o t e new enterprises, established his Clarke's Correspondence School of T r a c t i o n Engineering which he advertised for what he termed a modest price of twenty-seven dollars in cash. 6 1 In addition, he ran a special feature in his magazine entitled " T h r e s h e r ' s School of Modern M e t h o d s , " a series of lectures given by P h i l i p S. R o s e to his engineering students at N o r t h D a k o t a Agricultural College at Fargo.® 2 Steam-engine operators received less formal instruction by r e a d i n g technical books which related to their jobs. Most libraries l o a n e d such books as Farm Engines and How to Run Them by J a m e s H . Stephenson; Rough and Tumble Engineer by H . M a g g a r d ; The Science of Successful Threshing by W i l l i a m Dingee a n d Wallace M a c G r e g o r ; The Musings of a Tramp Engineer by D o u g l a s R . D r u m m o n d ; a n d Operation of Steam Traction Engines by W i l l i a m Boss. A l t h o u g h the epoch of agricultural steam power virtually drew to a close in the 1920's, the ties h o l d i n g the custom threshermen together continued to exist. A l t h o u g h m u c h of the zest was gone, the owners of gasoline rigs still held local meetings to discuss threshing rates a n d labor wages. S o m e of the threshermen's magazines, greatly reduced in both size a n d circulation, struggled into the thirties before the combine destroyed what r e m a i n e d of custom threshing a n d b r o u g h t an end to these publications. Meanwhile the growth of the agricultural colleges, the b r o a d e n i n g of agricultural extension services, the establishment of m o r e county agents a n d the i n a u g u r a t i o n of F a r m B u r e a u programs a b s o r b e d the work formerly d o n e by the threshermen's organizations.

Chapter IX T H E DEVELOPMENT OF T H E TRACTOR AND T H E DECLINE OF STEAM POWER Bascom Clarke looked over the enrollment files of the first School of Traction Engineering held in St. Paul in the summer of 1906 and noticed that one-third of the students were studying the gasoline engine, he was greatly surprised to note the marked interest in this relatively new type of farm power. Cognizant that this trend might be of some importance, he announced with prophetic vision that "the gasoline engine is rapidly and surely worming its way into the hearts of traction power users . . . the steam is all right but keep your left eye peeled for the gasoline traction." 1 Unaccompanied by pronouncements, the gasoline motor, often called the first child of the twentieth century, began to emerge on the agricultural scene to challenge the steam-power monopoly. The gradual transition on the farm from steam power to gasoline power was part of another cycle of progress put in motion by the desire of the American farmer to do his work more easily, efficiently, and economically. It often happens that when a machine reaches its highest standard of perfection, a new invention is developed which possesses a greater potential for doing the same type of work. Such was the fate of the steam traction engine. Even though the steam enthusiasts never tired of mentioning that a good steam engine ran so smoothly on the belt that a glass of water placed on the drive wheel would not spill, that these engines had great overload capacity for providing power, and that they used relatively cheap fuel providing economical power when used in large units, these engines, nevertheless, possessed certain handicaps which were virtually impossible to eliminate. The engines were powerful enough, but they were also ponderous in size, clumsy to operate, and too heavy to handle on unfavorable ground or rough terrain. T o get power and traction, the steam-engine designers could not get away from the problem of weight. In wet fields, fifteen-ton engines required most of the power to move themselves.2 Five hundred to seven hundred pounds of iron and steel per horsepower delivered on the drawbar was the best ratio that the manufacturers could achieve. Furthermore, water consumption could not be reduced to WHEN

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less than thirty pounds of water per horsepower hour. 3 Great weight and bulk meant high-priced machines, another drawback to steamengine ownership. These weaknesses brought criticism from many quarters. A farmer in Michigan complained that he could not use a steam engine because the machine would roll over in its course among the hills of his fields.4 At the Winnipeg plowing contests of 1910, the big steam traction engines mired down in rain-soaked fields until many of them had to be pulled out by tractors of lighter weight, much to the embarrassment of the steam-engine operators. E. W. Hamilton, writing in 1909, stated that the steam engine could make a beautiful cost record under ideal conditions, but on the other hand, "given a locality where coal must be brought from a long distance and where water is scarce the use of steam as a motive power on the farm in many cases proves a distinct failure." 5 Allan MacDonald, of the MacDonald Thresher Company of Stratford, Canada, wrote to Henry Ford in 1928: In 1906, our company branched out and commenced die manufacture of steam engines, which materially aided the sale of our threshers. Then the war came along in 1914. Farmers no longer had rail fences to burn, coal was dear and it was a difficult problem to supply twenty barrels of water for an engine every day. . . , e

Aware of the handicaps inherent in the operation of steam traction engines, mechanical engineers began thinking about the hypothetical advantages of a successful gasoline motor. An owner of an oil-cooled gasoline tractor could avoid the freezing of water in the pipes, leaky flues, a choked injector, danger from explosions, burnedout grates, loose stay bolts, boiler inspections, engineers' licenses, boiler scale, and alkali water. The time lost in getting up steam and washing out the boiler would be saved. Since the hauling of water and coal would be unnecessary, extra equipment and manpower could be eliminated. A one-man tractor outfit, dispensing with the high-priced services of the assistants on steam-engine crews, appeared to be the strongest arguments favoring the introduction of gasoline power to agriculture. 7 With all these advantages in prospect, one may wonder why the gasoline engine did not emerge sooner to challenge the supremacy of steam power on the farm. In one sense, the late arrival of the gasoline tractor is in itself evidence that the steam engines were fairly satisfactory. As a writer for the Dakota Farmer observed in 1909, "The very success of steam power acts as a handicap to the gasoline tractor." 8 Another deterrent lay in the relatively recent discovery of petro-

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leum products. T h e gasoline engine was, of course, impossible prior to the discovery of the Pennsylvania oil fields in 1859, because it was not until the development of the oil industry that gasoline was made in commercial quantities available as fuel for internal combustion engines. T h e absence of an adequate fuel rather than a dearth of first-rate inventive ability was doubtless the major reason for the slow development of the gasoline engine.® T h e lack of suitable lubricating oil also retarded progress. In the days of low-pressure steam, animal and vegetable oils proved satisfactory, but when it came to lubricating gas-engine cylinders, it was apparent these oils were inadequate because they formed carbon when they decomposed under high heat and pressure. Again, the gas engineers were dependent upon petroleum products. In the early days of experimentation with gasoline motors, the Otto Company of Philadelphia had managed by 1876 to secure a virtual monopoly of the patents on this type of engine, and by means of high royalties prevented other concerns from entering the gas engine field. In consequence, very little effort was made to develop these motors until the patents expired in the early nineties.10 From a technological standpoint, however, the four-cycle Otto engine is considered the father of the tractor, automobile, truck, and airplane. 11 During the last quarter of the nineteenth century, the absence of a satisfactory carburetor to inject the gasoline into the cylinder, and a magneto and spark plug to furnish a system of ignition proved to be the two most difficult engineering problems. T h e development of the American gasoline tractor can be divided into three well-defined periods: 1876-1902 1902-1913 1913-1924

Experimental state of tractor development Manufacture of large gasoline and kerosene tractors Development of the small gasoline tractor to the advent of the all-purpose row-crop tractor in 1924

As might be expected, the experimental stage witnessed a parade of machines and a multiplicity of inventions which closely resembles the evolution of the steam traction engine of an earlier era. Among the early machines was William Patterson's two-cylinder gasoline tractor built in the shops of the Case Company of Racine in 1892. 12 Although this engine actually did a little farm work,13 the absence of an adequate ignition and cooling system made it impractical. T h e engine was started by firing a cartridge, a technique which was sometimes more successful in sending a cylinder head flying through the roof of the experimental shop than in starting the motor. 14 During the fall months of 1892, the Farm Implement News mentioned a gas tractor built by John Froehlich, an implement man of

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Froehlich, Iowa, consisting of a Van Duzen gasoline engine, a Robinson Company running gear, and a traction arrangement of the inventor's design. This vertical-type thirty-horsepower engine was incorporated into the Waterloo Gas Traction Engine Company in 1893, but only a few machines were made before 1900." In 1894, the Huber Manufacturing Company of Marion built a gas tractor to replace the steam engine. It was a lumbering giant, with one massive cylinder in a vertical engine which fired like a cannon, started like a stubborn mule and carried a heavy flywheel intended to keep it rolling, once the machine got under way. 1 · Other engines of the same period included a Best gasoline engine weighing fifteen tons, built in San Leandro, California, and some Otto tractors sold through the Winona Manufacturing Company at Winona, Minnesota. 17 In 1897 a well-known pioneer in the tractor industry, Kinnard and Sons Manufacturing Company of Minneapolis, Minnesota, entered the field. Four of these engines were sold in 1898, and twenty-eight "Flour City" tractors were manufactured the following year.14 T h e Hart-Parr engines, built at Charles City, Iowa, in 1902 and 1903, were the first really successful gasoline tractors built in the United States. They ushered in the tractor era of farming. 19 Charles W. Hart of Iowa and Charles H. Parr of Wisconsin met in 1892 as engineering students at the University of Wisconsin where they became interested in internal combustion engines. After building a few stationary engines at Madison in the late nineties, they moved to Charles City, Iowa, in 1900, and turned out their first tractor in 1902. During the following year they manufactured fifteen oilcooled, valve-in-head, slow speed, two-cylinder engines developing twenty to forty-five horsepower.20 These engines were crude, cumbersome machines built along lines quite similar to those of the ordinary steam traction engines. Although they lacked perfection, their performance was reasonably satisfactory. T h e first Hart-Parr engine was run for seventeen years by an Iowa farmer, while five of the fifteen built in 1903 were still in operation in 1930.21 In 1906 these engines were used for plowing, and in the following year in order to distinguish these gasoline engines from the competing steam traction engines, Hart and Parr adopted the name "Tractor"—a name subsequently accepted by the general public. 22 During the first decade of the twentieth century, the gasoline tractor began to come into more prominent use. In 1907 there were about six hundred tractors in use in the United States, one-third of which were Hart-Parrs with the rest divided among the KinnardHaines Company of Minneapolis, the International Harvester Company of Chicago, Transit Thresher Company of Minneapolis, and

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several smaller concerns. 23 E. W. Hamilton, after viewing the Winnipeg contests of 1908, stated that "Five years ago there were but two oil motors on the American market; today there are in the neighborhood of thirty good, bad and indifferent. We are in a swift race. We are attempting to do ten years' work in one." 24 W. C. Allen, the editor of the Dakota Farmer observed in 1909 that while the steam engines gave good service, the gasoline and kerosene tractors seemed to be more popular. 25 As the gasoline and kerosene tractors demonstrated their practicality, many of the manufacturers of steam traction engines went into the tractor business, convincing evidence of a change in the mechanical power industry. In 1910 the Minneapolis Threshing Machine Company built a large thirty-five-horsepower tractor, while the Rumely Company at La Porte, Indiana, came out with their "Kerosene Annie," the forerunner of the famous " O i l Pull" tractor line. By 1912, Rumely was manufacturing these engines at a rate of fifty a week.2® In 1911, J . I. Case, Aultman-Taylor, Gaar Scott, Buffalo-Pitts, Avery, and Reeves were building gas tractors as well as steam engines. 27 Unfortunately the tractor industry went through a period of growing pains similar to that experienced by the steam-engine manufacturers. Prior to 1913 many of the tractors were built from the same patterns as their steam predecessors, the only difference being that a gas engine was substituted for the steam engine and boiler. As a result the weakness of the steam traction engines reappeared to harass the operators of the gas tractors. These machines appeared on the market weighing twenty to fifty thousand pounds, unwieldy creatures that broke down as frequently as they ran, and dug their ponderous selves into countless mudholes in the farm lands of the West. T h e flywheel alone on some of the tractors weighed over a ton. 28 T h e Emerson-Brantingham "Big Four" thirty-horsepower tractor came out with drive wheels eight feet in diameter and tanks which held one hundred and ten gallons of water, seventy-seven gallons of gasoline, and five gallons of oil. 29 Professor H. W. Riley of Cornell University recalled that some of the tractors participating in the Winnipeg motor contest of 1913 were "monsters so large as to involve an enormous capital investment and so heavy that they did serious injury to the soil." 30 Many of these tractors were so difficult to start that occasionally engineers let them run all night rather than face this baffling problem each morning. 3 1 T h e instruction manual of the Hart-Parr Company listed nineteen rules to follow in starting the engine and thirteen rules for stopping it. 32 T h e Holt Manufacturing Company in Peoria, Illinois, had in 1911 more experts assigned to the j o b of starting en-

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gines than they had salesmen on the road. 33 These trouble shooters were often expected to operate the farmer's engine for two or three weeks in order to make the proper mechanical adjustments. 34 Since early tractor design was largely experimental, faulty construction resulted in breakage which caused high repair bills. T h e business correspondence of the tractor companies was swelled by complaints of broken crankshafts, warped clutches, burned out connecting rods, cracked gears, bent axles, dead magnetos, and worn-out engine parts.35 A Hart-Parr owner in Illinois in 1908 despaired: I have done everything possible to make our engine work. We hired the most competent engineer in the state, yet we had all kinds of accidents and trouble. I don't know what to do. We have run the engine less than thirty days but our expenses are so great that I am ashamed to meet the public. Sceam engine men warned me that we would be in for big repair bills. 39

Some farmers spent $500 to $1,500 for repairs in one year.37 When Philip S. Rose in 1914 sent out a questionnaire to 248 tractor owners, a Montana operator returned an answer sheet on which he indicated the nature of his repairs by writing "Everything." 38 Bankers often refused to lend money to men who had sunk $2,000 to $3,500 in a new tractor. Many of the tractors were discarded with as many as five hundred of them pulled into a single graveyard.39 Because of the over production of large tractors, many of which were not adapted to the real needs of the farmers, the gas-tractor business suffered an almost total collapse.40 It took years to dispose of the twelve thousand tractors built in 1912.41 Readjusting itself after this severe shakeup, the tractor industry switched to the manufacture of the small machines, a trend which led to such remarkable success that the steam traction engine was forced gradually to relinquish its role as the chief source of mechanical power on the American farms. In 1913, the Bull Traction Machine Company of Minneapolis introduced a small tractor advertised as "The Bull with a Pull." This was the forerunner of the small tractors to which practically all manufacturers were to turn within the next three years.42 In 1915, Henry Ford announced his entrance into the tractor field with the automotive system of mass production on the assembly line.43 The trend toward small light-weight tractors selling at less than a thousand dollars added a tremendous impetus to the sale of tractors. In 1914, there were 14,500 manufactured. The number jumped to 21,000 in 1915, to 35,000 in 1916, while the total number in use in 1917 was nearly 90,000.44 Progressive farmers welcomed the small tractor. In harvest time these versatile machines brought relief to horses, many of which were working with "heaving, panting flanks, and scalded shoulders in 100 degree temperatures." 45 The Kansas Farmer observed in 1914 that

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"it is pretty generally conceded these days that the need for power on the farm is such as justifies the use of a small tractor. . . ." " Tractor shows became the order of the day with a circuit of plowing demonstrations being held at such places as Fremont, Nebraska; St. Louis, Missouri; Hutchinson, Kansas; Champaign, Illinois; Sioux Falls, South Dakota; and scores of other cities. As many as fifty thousand people attended some of these shows to tramp up and down the fields watching the tractors perform. 47 At the Kansas Traction plowing demonstration held at Hutchinson in 1915, tractors were sold by the hundreds right at the show. Dealers and individual farmers pulled out their checkbooks and dropped down on their knees in the soft dirt to write their checks. One firm sold one hundred and sixty tractors during the demonstration. 48 T h e United States Department of Agriculture reported that 203,207 tractors were manufactured in 1920.48 T h e ever-increasing popularity of the small tractor from 1913 to 1920 convinced the manufacturing industry that the period following World War I was to be an era of gasoline po%ver rather than of steam. An executive of the Minneapolis Steel and Machinery Company in writing to Henry Ford on September 26, 1914, stated: It has come to my knowledge that you are building a small general purpose farm engine. There isn't any question but what the developing possibilities of the small tractor business are enormous. I speak from experience and from concrete knowledge of the facts gained by personal investigation in many states and from the organized information my company has gathered from all over the country, the facts are simply these: There are over two million farmers in the United States and Canada, every one of whom is a legitimate prospect for a small tractor, and they are all looking for a service-giving machine of stand up and deliver construction at a reasonable figure—to put it aptly, the right machine at the right place. You never saw the farmers so ripe for anything and plucking should not be long delayed. 50

The J. I. Case Threshing Machine Company, which had built over two thousand steam engines in 1911 and 1912, reduced its production to one hundred machines in 1921 and discontinued this line of machinery entirely by 1927." Most of the other steam-engine companies abandoned steam about the same time. In 1925, the Case, Huber, Aultman-Taylor, Geiser, and Minneapolis companies combined manufactured only five steam traction engines.52 During the twenties and thirties, the steam engines were slowly pushed aside to accumulate in junk yards or to rust out in solitude along the fence rows. The metal scrap drives during World War II almost eliminated these engines from the American scene. A few men who never lost their love for the steam engines were able to keep them by proving to the local scrap-drive authorities that these ma-

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chines were in working condition. Since World War II, on rare occasions, one of these engines can be seen at work on a threshing job or belted to a sawmill. In Minnesota in 1948 there were about six engines still in use. Because the operation of these engines is unusual, their performance attracts considerable interest. The Sioux City Journal, during the fall of 1947, described an old Russell engine which was still being run as a cooperative rig near Rochester, Minnesota. 53 The Des Moines Register in August of 1948 pictured a thirty-year-old Wood Brothers' steam engine at work near Boone, Iowa, with the comment that the engine was attracting wide attention. 54 In order to retain the memories of the days of steam power in agriculture, a few men have collected and rebuilt steam engines and separators, which they use to demonstrate at special threshing bees OT in connection with local fairs. Joe Rynda, Jr., of New Ulm, Minnesota, each year runs out his 1896 Huber strawburner traction engine and stages an old-fashioned threshing bee in Brown County. 55 T h e people participating in the work dress in the costume of the nineties to give realism to the performance. Over three thousand people turned out to see the 1948 event, some of them coming from Pennsylvania, Illinois, Nebraska, Iowa, and Wisconsin.5® In Lancaster County of Pennsylvania a reunion for steam engineers and threshermen is held each spring. The old-timers are urged to come uncollared, as there will be grease on the thirteen steam engines in operation and plenty of soft coal smoke in the air. Invitations suggest that everyone come hungry, as lunch will be served continuously. "Eat anytime or all the time," the announcement suggests. "Bring your wife, and family, friends, anybody." 57 During one of the steam threshing bees held in connection with Perry Hayden's wheat-tithing project at Tecumseh, Michigan, in 1944, twenty-five hundred people watched the demonstration of the use of threshing machinery which included horse powers, threshing machines, and steam engines provided by the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Michigan. 58 At the Wisconsin Centennial held at Milwaukee in July of 1948 over twenty-five thousand people visited the J. I. Case demonstration in the pageant of farm machinery which included the use of steam portable and traction engines.59 While the agricultural steam engines have become a collector's item, and steam-engine catalogues are rare, the memories of the past are not forgotten. Threshermen looking back over their experiences recall the faithful engines of past decades which lumbered across the plains glittering in bright paint and shining brass, a fine example of the mechanical workmanship of that day. An Indiana steam traction engineer when thinking of his former engine writes:

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What memories follow you? Of great bins of grain which you filled, small mountains of golden straw, smoke, dust, sweat, heat, long hard happy days and many times of worry and disappointment. You are like an old man who has worked long and faithfully, and has passed on, and leaves very few behind to note or regret his passing. You are gone, old rig, never again will your melodious chime whistle call the workers in the early morn, or the lively chuckle of your exhaust sound over the fields and barnyards, your smoke has faded and vanished forever. Yet, your memory will ever be fresh in the minds of us who have known you so long and well. . . , e o

Yet, the sentimental recollections of retired farm engineers do not reveal the full significance of the application of steam power to American agriculture. T o be sure, these men recall the days when they coaxed their rusty engines around straw piles or sighted their sod-busters down the long furrows on the prairies, but beyond these nostalgic reveries lie many other factors which are essential in estimating the importance of the agricultural iron horse. One of the primary concerns of farmers has been to provide the largest supply of the best quality foodstuffs for the people of the country and to do this job in the most efficient manner. Remarkable progress has been achieved, with the production of grain crops generally being more than ample. Meanwhile the amount of work required to produce these crops has declined. In 1800 about fifty-six hours of labor were needed to produce an acre of wheat. This time was reduced to fifteen hours in 1900, and to six and one-tenth hours in 1947."1 T h i s progress was not due alone to the introduction of steam power to the farm, but the agricultural steam engines set events in motion which eventually made power farming a reality. When steam power came to the farm, another link in the long cliain of mechanical progress was forged—a chain reaching back through two hundred years. A glance at the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries will reveal the importance of steam power. By 1750 men were using tools to manufacture goods, but progress was retarded because of the lack of a practical source of power to replace that furnished by men, animals, wind, and water. Steam was the answer, and it laid the basis for the industrial age. No doubt Henry Ford had this in mind when he said that the machine was merely the instrument which made power available for production. " T h i s is not a machine age, it is a power age." 02 When this power was utilized, great technological developments followed, production of goods increased, and the whole structure of western civilization changed. This cycle of progress, however, spread beyond the factory, for steam engines were used to improve transportation a n d commerce as well. Railroad locomotives were built and steamboats carried the

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cargoes of commerce. During the emergence of the power age, steam was likewise applied to agriculture, where the farmers needed a more satisfactory source of power. Since human and animal power proved inefficient and unsatisfactory, steam engines became virtually essential to many agriculturists, especially the large grain fanners. During the nineteenth century, therefore, steam power was used in factories, on railroads, in steamboats, and in farming. Each type of engine became an integral part of the power age, each was of tremendous importance. Without steam power American agriculture would have been retarded. Farming, as well as transportation, commerce, and most of industry, was carried on in the eighteenth century without access to steam power; all made phenomenal progress in the following century by using it. In each of these enterprises, steam did the work that already was being done, but performed it better, more rapidly, and in most cases more economically. The steam engine provided the first mechanical power for extensive use in agriculture. T h e American farmer had for almost two centuries found his source of power limited to the strength and endurance of men and animals. The arrival of the iron horse in the form of stationary engines in the early 1800's, portable engines in the late forties, and self-propelled engines in the seventies permitted much of the arduous farm work to be shifted to machines. Since steam was the only successful and practical power available for agricultural purposes during the nineteenth century, its utilization laid the basic foundation for the present-day era of power farming. In extolling the advantages of today's farmer with his automobile, truck, and all-purpose tractor, it is well to recall that the mechanization of the twentieth century emerged from the steam age of the preceding century. The use of steam engines for farm work was of considerable importance because it was one of the factors which made large-scale farming possible. As settlers pushed the agricultural frontiers westward across the prairie states during the 1840's and 1850's, and, following the Civil War, brought the plow to the vast acres beyond, profound changes took place. Cheap lands were acquired, Indians were subjugated, railroads extended, better varieties of seed and new milling processes developed, new markets found, and improved machinery manufactured. In this accelerated agrarian economy, the machines on the farms outgrew the available source of power. When, for example, threshing machines required twice as much power as was furnished by the old sweep horse powers, and the tough prairie sod yielded reluctantly to ox- or horse-drawn plows, a power bottleneck developed. Fortunately the agricultural steam engine solved this problem and permitted farming to be carried on so extensively

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that the production of grain crops reached unprecedented quantities. In addition, the advent of steam power relieved thousands of draft animals from the heavy work associated with drawbar and belt power required for the successful use of threshing machines, grinding mills, ensilage cutters, sawmills, irrigation pumps, road graders, freight wagons, and plows. In 1913, farm steam engines were producing power equal to that of approximately seven million horses and mules.· 3 These animals would have eaten the crop taken from almost thirty million acres of land, an amount of grain which could now be diverted to the production of slaughter cattle and hogs for human consumption.* 1 It must be remembered, however, that the total number of draft animals did not begin to decline until around 1924, when the small all-purpose tractor demonstrated its practicality. Agricultural steam engines permitted various farm jobs to be done more rapidly, thus eliminating much of the monotony in plowing with horses. Instead of the sulky or gang plow, huge engines pulling plows with ten to sixteen bottoms moved across the fields turning over the soil at the rate of thirty or forty acres a day.«5 In addition, the engines provided ample power to drive threshing machines equipped with self-feeders, blowers, and other laborsaving attachments. As a result, much of the unpleasant work around these rigs was eliminated. From the financial standpoint, the use of steam engines for agricultural purposes, affected the agrarian economy in various ways. Of course, the average American grain farmer did not own an engine. Even when steam was at the height of its popularity during the period 1908-15, it is estimated that only one farmer in twenty operated engines.·« At least 90 per cent of the steam power was furnished by individual custom threshermen or by groups of farmers who purchased engines on a cooperative basis. Since steam power was handled by those with special mechanical ability, the average farmer did not invest his money in threshing or plowing outfits, but paid for the services of those who were owners. Under this system, the majority of farmers in the grain-growing regions got their belt work done efficiently by improved machinery for approximately the same cost as it could have been done by horses. The capital investment of the custom threshermen, however, was heavy. These men, numbering about one hundred thousand in 1910, had from two to three hundred million dollars tied up in threshing machines, plows, and sawmills.«7 The problems of financing these purchases were serious. Since the steam-engine owners seldom secured enough money for the work performed by their machinery, it is generally estimated that only one

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out of five custom operators made a reasonable profit. The others broke even or lost money.48 The utilization of steam power tended to make farming less selfsufficient. Those who bought engines were likely to raise fewer work animals. Instead of feeding grain to horses, a larger percentage of the crop was sold on the market and the cash used to purchase manufactured products. More money was paid out for such items as coal, oil, water tanks, rubber belts, steel tools, and repairs. The farm buildings and yards of steam engineers became more cluttered with factory goods in the form of huge machines, surrounded with oil barrels, grease pails, valve packing, and bars of babbitt. Similarly fewer horse collars, sets of harness, and handy horse remedies were in evidence. Although extensive local horse raising was to continue strong well into the modern tractor era, a trend was appearing in which the small town horse doctor could see serious competition from the growing numbers of company experts and self-educated farm mechanics."* It was the steam engine that paved the way for the gasoline tractor and its development into the all-purpose farm machine of today. It is well to remember that the early gasoline tractors were built by the manufacturers of steam traction engines rather than automobile companies.70 As in most technological advancements, the pioneering work is the most difficult and requires the longest period of time. It took ninety years to bring the agricultural steam engine to its highest point of efficiency. The tractor apparently took the same stride in less than half this time, thanks in large measure to the men who were trained in the school of steam-engine experience. The benefits transferred from the steam age to the tractor era were many. When the major threshing-machine companies began to manufacture gasoline and kerosene tractors around 1910 these industrial concerns had large factories available, huge capital reserves, and a long list of customers. Production problems in the output of heavy farm machinery were solved; qualified engineers were available, improved materials were accessible, a machine-tool industry existed, and well-trained executives held key managerial positions in these companies. By changing a few blueprints, gasoline motors were built and mounted on the same chassis which carried the boilers of steam traction engines. The conversion from steam to gasoline tractor took place without long delays and the tractor industry was launched almost full grown. Furthermore, these companies during the last half of the nineteenth century had distribution systems with branch managers, dealers, and traveling men to do advertising, make sales, deliver machinery, and provide repair services. When the switch to tractor production came, the only change involved was the addition of new products to the already well-established line of goods. Dealers

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sold fewer steam engines, wagons, and buggies, but more tractors, trucks, and automobiles. T h e manufacturers of tractors of the twentieth century profited from lessons learned from their predecessors who had already gone through a period of instability characteristic in the development of new industries. Like the early railroad building, the application of steam power to agriculture had been a big enterprise with large investments, great risks, stiff competition, and numerous financial casualties. T h e farmers who bought the steam engines likewise went through the earlier cycle of storm and stress and again with similar results. In a day of unfettered private enterprise, rugged individualism, and gambling spirit, some companies and some farmers survived, but the rest floundered in a quagmire of bankruptcy with no government subsidies, loans, or agencies to cushion the blow. Nevertheless, a better method of financing the sale of farm machinery evolved out of this turbulent era. T h e unfortunate features of the manufacturers' long credit terms to those buying steam threshing rigs had to be eliminated. A cash system was substituted in most business deals, with the local banks, supported by the newly established Federal Reserve system, handling the farmers' loans and making collections. Psychologically, the steam-power epoch conditioned the farmers' minds to the desirability of power farming. T h e success of the steam engines broke down old prejudices. Young men rejected their grandfathers' veneration of the horse and eagerly welcomed the opportunity to learn more about mechanics. "You can't fix a dead horse with a monkey wrench" became a well-known axiom. 7 1 Over a period of years the young mechanics familiarized themselves with the principles of high-speed engines, the use of lubricants, steam pressures, complicated gearing, and different kinds of repair work. From technical books, threshermen's literature, schools, by practice and precept, farm engineers acquired mechanical sense. As more skilled operators were in demand, Philip S. Rose at North Dakota State College trained over seven thousand farm boys to handle steam traction engines. 7 - Professor J . B. Davidson of Iowa State College recognized the importance of this type of training when he observed in 1913 that "Farming is becoming more and more an engineering proposition. T h e efficient farm workman must needs become a more skillful engineer." 73 M. M. Baker suggested to one of his dealers in Bement, Illinois, in 1909, that he teach a young man to operate a Hart-Parr tractor. T h e work would not be difficult, "since he has had some previous experience with steam traction engines." 7 4 T h e modern farmer who does most of his work by mechanical power owes much to the technical training initiated during the days of steam.

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Mechanized agriculture did not develop spontaneously. Important pioneering leadership came from the American Society of Agricultural Engineers, a group of steam-engine enthusiasts who encouraged research in this type of engineering. The manufacturing companies entering the Winnipeg plowing contests foreshadowed the tractor demonstrations during the time of World War I. Threshermen supported legislation favorable to the use of steam traction engines and supported the efforts to establish more agricultural experiment stations and better roads. T h e combined efforts of these groups proved that the use of mechanical power on the farm was practical. Many experiments were made with such innovations as power take-offs, four-wheel drives, loading hoists, and caterpillar treads, which were later adopted by the tractor industry. T h e use of steam traction engines in large scale farming operations made a profound impact on rural life. When threshing rigs manned by large crews of men came into a community, they created a stir of excitement. T h e annual threshing activities counteracted much of the drabness and monotony in farm work. Some young chaps ran away from home to go threshing in the West.7* Others fell in love with the farmers' daughters, married, and became a permanent part of the agricultural society. In addition, the exchange of labor during the threshing season created one of the most striking examples of continuous community effort. For over half a century, this was the most highly socialized aspect of farm life, surpassing in importance and duration of time the other communal aspects of farm life, such as husking bees, barn raising, butchering, and hay baling. This cooperative spirit in recent years is of less importance because the modern farmer, with the use of all-purpose tractors, self-propelled combines, and hydraulic equipment, is more independent of outside labor. T h e men who operated steam traction engines or worked around them never forget their experiences. The importance, bigness, and intensity of the work gripped their imaginations and brought thrills that remain in almost hallowed memory. Those whose hands and overalls were soaked in grease and whose whiskers were singed by flames from the ñrebox today view the passing of their engines and a fabulous era with regret not unlike that felt for the departure of a lifelong friend. In reflection, the iron horse has been personified and graced with the attributes of a good companion. Even as the pioneer tried to make a living from the soil, the lumbering engine seemed to share his struggle; it too lived off the land, devouring firewood in the tree country, straw on the plains, and water from the streams. Man and machine matured, grew strong, remained indomitable in their prime, and then succumbed to a new era and a new generation. These men retire with mixed emotions. T o see the once proud

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prairie dreadnaughts reduced to scrap iron scarcely fit for a museum has made some of the farm engineers resentful that their work has not received more recognition. Why, some ask, has so much been written about locomotives and steamboats, but hardly a word about the steam engine on the farm? They see the immortalization of the plow, reaper, and tractor, and wonder why the steam engine which blazed a long pioneering trail leading to better days of power farming should go unnoticed. Other veteran threshermen are more philosophic. They readily admit, when the average young person of today proves ignorant of the steam traction engine, that the life of a farm engineer was not a spectacular one. These men could not boast of the dashing speed of the locomotive engineer nor meet a hero's death as did the man with the red handkerchief around his neck and his hand on the throttle of "Old '97." Denied the natty clothes of a steamboat captain and the awe-inspiring fog horn, the farm engineers had no one who could capture the imagination of the public, as did Jim Bludso when he stood on the deck of the exploding Mississippi River steamer "The Prairie Belle" and thundered above the inferno that he would "hold the nozzel agin' the bank till the last galoot's ashore." Perhaps it is the fate of the hard-working farm mechanics, as of the inventors of the wheel, that their names are not famous. Yet, life for these men was full of rich experiences and exciting incidents in an outdoor life they liked and in an enterprise which was tremendously worth while. Regarding mechanical progress as inevitable, they have enjoyed their share in making this possible. Now, as the steeds of fire and steam move off the field and their engineers follow reluctantly, who will say that they have not fulfilled their destiny?

NOTES CHAPTER I ι Η . Α. Washington, ed.. The Writings of Thomas Jefferson (New York. 1884), 1,548-51. 2 Paul L. Ford, ed.. The Writings of Thomas Jefferson (New York, 1894), IV, 340. * Ibid., p. S37. * Samuel Smiles, Lives of the Engineers, Boulton and Watt (London, 1904), p. 303. 8 Robert H. Thurston, A History of the Growth of the Steam Engine (Ithaca, N.Y.. 1939), p. 234. »Franklin Journal, V (March 1828), 187. ι Thurston, op. cit., p. 145. « Francis Trevithick, Life of Richard Trevithick (London, 1872), p. 38. » H. W. Dickenson and Arthur Titley, Richard Trevithick (London, 1934), p. 131. i · Letter dated March 15, 1813. See Trevithick, op. cit., pp. 61-62. » Letter dated April 26, 1812. See ibid., p. 43. »» Franklin Journal, II (December 1826), 367. Information taken from the Quarterly Review of London. 1S Encyclopaedia Londinensis, or Universal Dictionary of Arts, Sciences, and Literature (London, 1816), XLV, 689. i« W. D. Wansbrough, The Portable Engine (London, 1887), p. 5. i * Roger Burlingame, Backgrounds of Power (New York, 1949), p. 39. Here a "prime mover" is defined as an automatic machine which moves other machines without the intervention of animal or human power, i · Grevi He and Dorothy Bathe, Oliver Evans (Philadelphia, 1935), pp. 150-51. ι» Ibid., p. 184. ie Trevithick, op. cit., p. 46. ι» Ibid., pp. 46-47. so House Executive Documents, 25th Congress, 3rd Session, II, No. 345, pp. 1-472. « Ibid., pp. 376-79. Μ Ibid., pp. l O - l l . Ϊ3 Everett E. Edwards, "Sugar in the United States Prior to 1860" (MS, Washington, D.C., 1942), p. 4. ζ« Ε. M. Coulter, Georgia's Disputed Ruins (Chapel Hill, N.C., 1937), p. 91. 25 Lewis Cecil Gray, History of Agriculture in the Southern United States to 1860 (Washington, D.C., 1933), II, 740. 2« Alice Fortier, Louisiana (Madison, Wis., 1914), II, 513. 27 Gray, op. cit., p. 749. 28 Southern Agriculturist, VI (October 1833), 527. 2β United States Census of 1810, A Statement of the Arts and Manufactures for the year 1810, p. 38. Report indicates that as many as twenty-five planters were often served with one mill. s» Frederick Law Olmsted, A Journey in the Seaboard Slave States (New York, 1856), p. 669. s» Edwards, op. cit., p. 5. 82 Olmsted, loc. cit., p. 669. •J George R. Porter, The Nature and Properties of Sugar Cane (Philadelphia. 215

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1831), p. 185. See also Coulter, op. cit., p. 102. The crude wood rollers in the early sugar mills were later replaced with three iron rollers. T h e vertical grinding cylinders were turned by a central shaft or hub from which radiated several long levers designed on the principle of a ship's capstan. Animals hitched to these levers traveled in a circle transmitting their power to the rollers. Water wheels, windmills, and tidemills were also employed as a source of power. 34 House Executive Documents, op. cit., pp. 283-308. ss Ibid., pp. 280-379. »· Edward Barnwell, "On the Culture of Sugar," Southern Agriculturist, I (November 1828), 486-87. "Survey of Federal Archives in Louisiana Transcription of Liquor and Customs showing Imports into the Port of New Orleans, 1813-1833" (MS, Louisiana State University Library, Baton Rouge), pp. 1-6. 38 Fortier, op. cit., p. 514. « Edwards, op. cit., p. 6. *o Southern Agriculturist, II (February 1829), 60. « House Executive Documents, op. cit., pp. 304-8. Southern Agriculturist, II (February 1829), 61. Kathleen Bruce, Virginia Iron Manufacture in the Slave Era ( New York, 1931), p. 211. «« Coulter, op. cit., p. 100. •s Southern Agriculturist, VI (October 1833), 515. 4· Southern Agriculturist, VII (November 1834), 580. *τ De Bow's Review, VIII (September 1851), 306. Gray, op. cit., pp. 729-30. *B Monthly Journal of Agriculture, II J u n e 1846), 579. «o Herbert A. Kellar, ed., Solon Robinson, Pioneer and Agriculturist (Indianapolis, 1936), II, 364-65. 81 Olmsted, op. cit., p. 475. «2 United States Census of 1810, op. cit., pp. ix, x. »3 Southern Agriculturist, I (July 1840), 403-5. David Ramsey in The History of South Carolina from the First Settlement in 1670 to the Year 1808 (Charleston, S C., 1809), p. 518, stated that by 1808 water power had begun to eliminate manual labor in ginning cotton. 5« Southern Agriculturist, VI (April 1833), 161. 55 Gray, op. cit., pp. 704-5. See also United States Census of 1860, Agriculture, p. 169. se De Bow's Review, XXII (August 1857), 236. 57 Edwin Adam Davis, Plantation Life in the Florida Parishes of Louisiana, 18)6-1846 (New York, 1943), p. 142. es Ulrich Β. Phillips and James D. Glunt, eds., Florida Plantation Records from Papers of George Noble Jones (St. Louis, Mo., 1927), p. 169. 59 John Spencer Bassett, The Southern Plantation Overseer, as Revealed in His Letters (Northampton, Mass., 1925), pp. 82-83. eo ibid., p. 73. «ι De Bow's Review, II (July 1846), 154. «2 Ibid., III (October 1847), 157. «3 House Executive Documents, op. cit., p. 305. •4 Southern Agriculturist, VI (October 1833), 527. •5 House Executive Documents, op. cit., p. 221. •o Phillips and Glunt, eds., op. cit., p. 169. On the larger estates, as the machinery increased in complexity, there was a marked tendency to hire mechanics to operate the engines and to do repair work in the blacksmith shops. See the Butler Papers in the archival collection of the University of Louisiana Library, Baton Rouge.

NOTES

217

β' Southern Agriculturist, I (November 1828), 486-87. os Letter from Charles P. Roland, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, January 5, 1951. «» Affleck's Southern Rural Almanac and Plantation and Garden Calendar for I S i l (New Orleans, 1851), p. 109. •o House Executive Documents, op. cit., pp. 1-472. Hugh Quigley, "Industrial Power," Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences (New York, 1933), XII, 295. Following distribution of power listed in 1849: ten million horsepower as the total prime mover in the United States; 7,747,000 horsepower developed by animals; 1,100,000 horsepower used in industry. -2 Coulter, op. cit., p. 102. Also Southern Agriculturist, I (November 1828), 492. •3 Albert G. Seal, "John Carmichael Jenkins, Scientific Planter of the Natchez District" (Unpublished M.A. thesis, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, 1937), p. 35. William Walker, Gordonsville, Va., to George Frick, Waynesboro, Pa., September 12, 1858. George Frick Papers. Following citations will appear as "Frick Papers." "3 Farmer and Mechanic, II (April 1848), 189. ' • T . F. Cramer, Berryville, Va., to George Frick, Waynesboro, Pa., August 21, 1857. Frick Papers. " John Bowers, Richmond, Va., to George Frick, October 3,1858. Frick Papers. « James A. B. Scherer, Cotton as a World Power (New York, 1916), p. 203. ?» Franklin Institute, XVIII (1834), 353. Source mentions 323 steamboats on the western rivers in 1829. «β James Jackson, " T h e Rail-Road Steamer," Mechanics' Register, III (July 1838), 244. si Ransome, op. cit., p. 248. β2 American Farmer, XII (July 1831), pp. 158-59. 83 Family Magazine, IV (January 1836), pp. 29-30. 84 New York Farmer and American Gardener's Magazine, VII (February 1834), 49. ss Niles' Weekly Register, LI (December 1836), 275. se Monthly Journal of Agriculture, II (June 1846), 526. 87 Farmer and Mechanic, III (February 1849), 85.

CHAPTER II ι New York Tribune, July 30, 1850, quoted in Farm Implement News, III (September 1886), 10. ζ John G. Thompson, The Rise and Decline of the Wheat Growing Industry in Wisconsin (Madison, 1909), p. 24. 3 L. B. Schmidt, " T h e Agricultural Revolution in the United States 1860-1930," Agricultural History, VIII (October 1934), 26. * Robert L. Ardrey, American Agricultural Implements (Chicago, 1894), pp. 104-105. s William W. Dingee, "Early American Threshing Machines," Thresher World and Farmer's Magazine, IV (May 1903), 15. β Charles M. Marsh, "Threshers," Farm Implement News, III (September 1886), 11.

* Threshermen's Review, June 1910, p. 24. s De Bow's Review, II (July 1846), 103. » Country Gentleman, November II, 1858, p. 334. 10 Valley Farmer, November 1858, p. 334. 11 Farm Implement News, XII (December 1895), 4. These engines were ten feet in length and five feet wide. T h e flywheel was thirty-six inches in diameter with a

218

STEAM POWER ON T H E AMERICAN FARM

four-inch face. Orders were filled ir. two weeks and shipped from the City Portable Engine and Machine Works, Hamilton Street, Philadelphia. i - J o h n A. Haddock, Growth of a Century; As Illustrated in the History of Jefferson County, New York (Philadelphia, 1894), p. 44. is See Appendix, pp. 251-54. κ California Agriculturist, May 1876, p. 1. ι» Eleventh Annual Report of the Board of Agriculture of the State of Ohio (Columbus, 1856), p. 180. 1« Country Gentleman, February 27, 1857, p. 152. 17 Moore's Rural New Yorker, February 25, I860, p. 67. 18 Tredegar ¡ron Works Catalogue (Richmond, Va., 1860), p. 36. ι» De Bow's Review, I (July 1856), advertising section. so Emery's Journal of Agriculture and Prairie Farmer, October 14, 1858, p. 1. 21 F. W. Robinson Company Catalogue (Richmond, Ind., 1858), p. 8. 22 Ohio Cultivator, November 15, 1851, p. 338. 23 Bruce, op. cit., p. 318. 24 Moore's Rural New Yorker, October 1851, p. 12. 25 Indiana Agricultural Reports for 1856 (Indianapolis, 1856), pp. 425-26. 20 Country Gentleman, April 20, 1854, p. 246. 27 ibid., August 7, 1856, p. 89. 28 Prairie Farmer, November 3, 1859, p. 280. 2» Country Gentleman, April 5, 1855, p. 215. 30 Transactions of the New York Agricultural Society, XII (Albany. 1852), 135. si Country Gentleman, April 20, 1854, p. 246. 32 Cultivator, September 1855, p. 283. 33 Country Gentleman, July 13, 1854, p. 24. 3« Ibid., October 12, 1856, p. 331. Ohio Cultivator quoted in the Southern Planter, May 1858, p. 279. se Cincinnati Gazette quoted in the Southern Planter, p. 279. 37 The Food Question, Suggestions in a Letter to the Right Honorable Lord John Russell, on the Means of Increasing the Supply of Food Throughout the British Empire, Pamphlet (London, 1847), p. 8. 3β William Waller, "On the Application of Steam Power to Agricultural Purposes," Proceedings of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers (Birmingham, Eng., 1856), p. 81. a« Engineer, August 5, 1859, p. 99. 40 Waller, op. cit., pp. 80-107. 41 Rochester Chronicle (Rochester, Ind.), June 12, 1865, p. 2. 42 Iowa Progress (Des Moines, la.), July 18, 1872, p. 9. 43 Saint Louis Democrat and Western Rural, February 2, 1867, p. 38. 44 Yankton Press (Yankton, Dak. Ter.), March 1, 1871, p. 1. 45 Ibid., March 1, 1871, p. 2; August 9, 1871, p. 1. 4β Hebron Journal (Hebron, Neb.), October 4, 1877, p. 1. 47 Iowa Homestead and Horticulturist, June 1868, p. 197. According to figures taken from state census returns and published in the National Board of Trade, September 1877, p. 191, the population of Nebraska increased by 134,754 over a five-year period from 1870 to 1875, a gain of 109 per cent. During the same period of time, Kansas increased 45 per cent; Minnesota, 36 per cent; Missouri, 21 per cent; and Iowa, 13 per cent. 48 Everett E. Edwards, "Immigration" (MS, Washington, D.C., 1943), p. 1. 4» Schmidt, op. cit., pp. 173-74. so Winona Daily Republican (Winona, Minn.), September 1, 1873, p. 2. si J. R. Dodge, "Report of the Statistician," Report of the Commissioner of Agriculture for the Years 1881-1882 (Washington, D.C., 1882), p. 645.

NOTES

219

52 Charles Worthington, "Report of the Statistician," Annual Report of the Commissioner of Agriculture for the Year 1878 (Washington, D.C., 1878), p. 288. π Saint Paul Daily Press, March 19, 1870, p. 1. 54 James C. Malin, Winter Wheat in the Golden Belt of Kansas (Lawrence, Kan., 1944). p. 44. According to Rollin E. Smith, Wheat Fields and Markets of the World (St. Louis, 1908), p. 177, the wheat crop of the United States increased from 170 million busheb in 1860 to 307 million busheb in 1874. « Charles B. Kuhlmann, Development of the Flour Milling Industry in the United States with Special Reference to the Industry in Minneapolis (Boston, 1929), p. 20. s« Louis H. Gibson, Gradual Reduction Milling (Minneapolb, 1885), pp. 21-24. " Malin, op. cit., p. 189. T h e middlings purifier made use of a fan which blew a blast of air through the sieves to aid in the separation of the bran from the white flour. Gradual reduction was the process of running the wheat through the grinding rollers several times, which increased the amount of middlings. »» Merrill E. Jarchow, "King Wheat," Minnesota History, XXIX (March 1948), 16. Jarchow describes the milling of hard spring wheat. «β Arthur M. Schlesinger, New Viewpoints in American History (New York, 1926), p. 252. •o Henrietta M. Larson, The Wheat Market and Farmer in Minnesota (New York, 1926), p. 127. According to this study, the barrels of flour produced in Minneapolis increased from 30,000 in 1860 to 843.000 in 1875, and to 5,221,243 in 1885. By 1905, the mills in Minnesota were grinding approximately 115,000,000 busheb of wheat annually, enough to feed one-third of the people in the nation. «ι George W. Renn, Newville, Pa., to George Frick, October 7, 1869. Frick Papers. « J. S. Walker, Sabula, Iowa, to J. I. Case, Racine, Wis., July 6, 1869. T h e Case Business Correspondence, Racine, Wis. Hereafter citations will appear as "Case Correspondence." os American Agriculturist, June 1865, p. 183. β« Indiana Farmer, May 22, 1880, p. 1. E. J. MacEwan, " T h e Ideal Farm Horse," Twenty-Second Annual Report of the Secretary of the State Board of Agriculture of the State of Michigan 1882-1883-1884 (Lansing, 1884), p. 132, observed that a few Clydesdale and Percheron horses weighing from fourteen hundred to two thousand pounds had been imported into the United States by the eighties, but their numbers were not large enough to improve substantially the class of draft horses then on farms. A traveler, after passing through Illinois and Indiana in 1875, reported to the Willamette Farmer, October 8, 1875, p. 9, that he often saw scrub horses weighing eight hundred pounds working in the fields. See Walker D. Wyman, The Wild Horse of the West (Caldwell, Idaho, 1945), p. 103. « S. M. Ca ralas, Hagentown, Md., to George Frick, June 20, 1868. Frick Papers. Ca ralas complained, " T h e horse power runs too heavy for the horses and no farmer will have it on the place." M American Power Farmer, March 1944, p. 10. •τ Moore's Rural New Yorker, September 18,1875, p. 18. •β Cultivator and Country Gentleman, October 18, 1877, p. 664. T h e treadmill horse powers were horse-killers too. T h e inclined platforms required the horses to walk uphill. Because of the severity of the work, the horses were usually relieved every few hours. In addition, the horses were subject to the hazards of injury. If the brake on the treadmill failed to work, the horses could easily fall and break their legs. A former writing to the Cultivator and Country Gentleman, September 1, 1870, p. 547, explained that he would not permit his horses to be used on these machines because "if they are put to it occasionally they will not be sufficient accustomed to it to be either safe or effective; if kept constantly at it they would be good for nothing else . . . I have never known of a team of horses to work on one

220

STEAM POWER ON THE AMERICAN FARM

of these powers for any length of time without being materially damaged for other purposes." ·» Prairie Farmer, September 17, 1864, p. 178. το Cultivator and Country Gentleman, November 7,1872, p. 717. ί Minneapolis Tribune, June 21, 187$, p. 3. See also the Rochester Post, August 5, 1871, p. 2. 72 B. F. Stewart, Frederick, Va., to George Frick, September 12,1871. Frick Papers. With the law of supply and demand in full operation, the prices of horses rose to high levels. According to the Cultixjator and Country Gentleman, July 20, 1871, p. 453, horses which had sold for $150 a head were in 1870 often worth twice this amount. These high prices encouraged many threshermen to consider the purchase of a steam engine for threshing purposes. " W i l l i a m Dingee and Wallace MacGregor, Science of Successful Threshing (Racine, Wis., 1904), p. 21. *« Farm Implement News, III (September 1886), 10-12. 's H. R. Tolley, The Efficient Operation of Threshing Machines, Farmer's Bulletin No. 991, United States Department of Agriculture (Washington, June 1918), p. 5. « G . E. Etter, Bridgeport, Va., to George Frick, August 10, 1871. Frick Papers. 77 John Bowers, Martinburgh, Pa., to George Frick, November 22, 1864. Frick Papers. John Bowen, York, Pa., to George Frick, December 4, 1865. Frick Papers. 7» James H. Alexander, Dry Run, Ind., to George Frick, July 30, 1866. Frick Papers. 80 G. W. Bloom, Baraboo, Wis., to J. I. Case, September 1, 1867. Case Correspondence. ei W. Durant, Eaton, Wis., to J. I. Case, September 24,1867. Case Correspondence. 82 Samuel Hibbard, Waverly, Mo., to the Upton Company, Battle Creek, Mich., July 18, 1874. The Upton Company Business Correspondence. 83 Helen Clapesattle, The Doctors Mayo (Minneapolis, 1943), p. 139. β« Rochester Post (Rochester, Minn.), August 22, 1868, p. 3. 83 Wood and Mann Steam Engine Company Catalogue (Eaton, N.Y., 1868), p. 45. According to the Sixteenth Annual Report of the Secretary of the Michigan State Board of Agriculture (Lansing, 1877), p. 30, the Ames Company of Oswego, N.Y., announced that 2,500 of their farm steam engines were in use. e« L. B. Stern, Frederick, Va., to George Frick, October 25, 1867. Frick Papers. 87 Arthur Burbank, Hagerstown, Md., to George Frick, September 3, 1869. Frick Papers. es Moore's Rural New Yorker, January 27, 1872, p. 66. 8® B. F. Stewart, Frederick, Va., to George Frick, October 4, 1867. Frick Papers. »OL. M. Price, Hagerstown, Md., to George Frick, July 10, 1868. Frick Papers, ei David Burke, Halltown, Pa., to George Frick, November 1, 1869. Frick Papers. »2 J. M. Etter, Marion, Pa., to George Frick, March 11, 1869. Frick Papers, w L. L. Lamont, Baltimore, Md., to George Frick, January 21, 1869. Frick Papers. 94 Twenty-Sixth Annual Report of the Board of Agriculture of the State of Ohio (Columbus, 1871), p. 136. • 8 Leo Rogin, Introduction of Farm Machinery in its Relation to the Productivity of Labor in Agriculture of the United States during the 19th Century (Berkeley, Calif., 1931), p. 175. ®e United States Censtts of 1880, "Report of the Production of Agriculture," III, 435. Frank A. Walker. »7 Some of the most prominent threshing-machine companies manufacturing portable farm steam engines in the seventies were: Gaar Scott and Company, Richmond, Ind.; J. I. Case Company, Racine, Wis.; Nichols and Shepard Company,

NOTES

221

Battle Creek, Mich.; Rumely Company, La Porte, Ind.; Buffalo-Pitts Company, Buffalo, N.Y.; C. Aultman Company, Canton, Ohio; Russell and Company, Massillon, Ohio; Westinghouse Company, Schenectady, N.V.; F. W. Robinson Company, Richmond, Ind.; Harrison Company, Belleville, III.; Huber Manufacturing Company, Marion, Ohio; A. B. Farquhar Company, York, Pa.; H. Birdsall Company, Penn Yan, N.Y.; and the George Frick and Daniel Geiser Companies of Waynesboro, Pa. In addition, many of the steam engine manufacturers of the prewar era continued to build portable farm engines. Some of the more successful were: Watertown Steam Engine Company, Watertown, N.Y.; Ames Iron Works, Oswego, N.Y.; Wood, Taber, and Morse, Eaton, N.Y.; J. C. Hoadley, Lawrence, Mass.; Clute Brothers, Schenectady, N.Y.; C. and G. Cooper Company, Mt. Vernon, Ohio; William Heilman, Evansville, Ind. There were many smaller shops which built a number of portable agricultural engines, such as M. G. Moies and Company of St. Louis, Mo.; Liddell, Kepler, and Company of Erie, Pa.; English, Goodrich, and Dixon Company of New Philadelphia, Ohio; and G. W. Fairman, Albany, N.Y. »8 Threshermen's Review, November 1897, p. 16. 89 Reports on the Agricultural and Machinery Industry, Federal Trade Commission (Washington, 1938), p. 109. loo The M. Rumely Sixtieth Anniversary Catalogue (La Porte, Ind., 1913), p. 2. ιοί Seventy-fixte Years of Progress (George Frick Company, Waynesboro, Pa., 1928), p. 10. ιοί A. B. Farquhar, The First Million Is the Hardest (New York, 1922), p. 39. ios Jerome I. Case, Rodiotes, III., to Lydia Case, Racine, Wis., April 1852. J. I. Case Personal Letters (Racine). io* Jerome I. Case, Whitewater, Wis., to Lydia Case, December 8,1851. J. I. Case Personal Letters. ιοί Jerome I. Case, Galena, 111., to Lydia Case, April 12, 1852. J. I. Case Personal Letters. io» Jerome I. Case, Platteville, Wis., to Lydia Case, February 24, 1852. J. I. Case Personal Letters. ιοί Jerome I. Case, Janesville, Wis., to Lydia Case. November 4, 1851. J. I. Case Personal Letters. io» Jerome I. Case, Spring Prairie, Wis., to Lydia Case, February 18, 1852. J. I. Case Personal Letters. «β Jerome I. Case, Platteville, Wis., to Lydia Case, February 24, 1852. J. I. Case Personal Letten. " o c h a r l e s Dinkle, York, Pa., to George Frick, October 20, 1871. Frick Papers, m Thomas Goodman, Middletown, III., to J. I. Case, March 5, 1868. Case Correspondence. i ' 2 E. M. Reagen, Reading, Pa., to George Frick, July 14, 1868. Frick Papers. 113 B. F. Stewart, Frederick, Va., to George Frick, October 11, 1869. Frick Pape«, i n Charles W. Marsh, Recollections, 1837-1910 (Chicago, 1910), p. 201. i ' 5 Charles Ingalls, Gordonsville, Va., to George Frick, April 24, 1871. Frick Papers. ne Cultivator and Country Gentleman, November 22, 1877, p. 749. 117 F. F. Cowling, Alexander, Minn., to J. I. Case, September 16, 1873. Case Correspondence. 118 A. N. Wood and Company Catalogue (Utica, New York, 1860), pp. 10-11. 1,9 Augustin L. Taveau, "Modern Farming in America," Report of the Commissioner of Agriculture for the Year 1874 (Washington, 1874), p. 218. 120 Cultivator and Country Gentleman, August 25, 1870, p. 532. Conceivably, these fears were reinforced by some of the newspaper accounts of steam-engine explosions. According to the 10th United States Census Report, XXII, p. 64, sixty

222

STEAM POWER ON THE AMERICAN FARM

portahle engine explosions killed 143 people between October 1867 and December 1879. During the same period, 249 deaths were reported from locomotive explosions and almost a thousand from similar steamboat disasters. T h e Racine County Argus, Racine, Wis., reported in 1869 that "scarcely is the ink dry describing a railroad holocaust than a frightful report of a boiler explosion appears causing the loss of twenty or thirty precious lives on a steamboat on the western rivers." lai Cultivator and Country Gentleman, May 13, 1869, p. 377. 122 c . M. Giddings, " T h e Development of the Traction Engine in America," American Thresherman and Farm Power, October 1916, p. 30-31. iza Moore's Rural New Yorker, September 18, 1875, p. 18. 124 George Baker, Lancaster, Pa., to George Frick, August 27. 1869. Frick Papers, ι » James Wells, Hagerstown, Md., to George Frick, July 26, 1869. Frick Papen. a» American Agriculturist, May 1873, p. 173. 12T Cultivator and Country Gentleman, September 8, 1870, p. 564. In 1870 the prices of the following eight-horsepower farm engines were: Frick, $850; Case, $1,000; Wood, Taber, and Morse, $1,000; Landis, $1,050; Wood and Mann, $1.125. 128 C. Aultman and Company Catalogue (Canton, Ohio), p. 28. 129 Interview, Arthur G. Kellam, Racine, Wis., November 24, 1947. " o R. M. Carson, Madison, Wis., to J. I. Case, September 28, 1874. Case Correspondence. " i Wood, Taber, and Morse Catalogue (Eaton, N.Y., 1871), p. 31. " 2 T . A. Bland and T . B. Taylor, "Steam as a Motive Power," Northwestern Farmer, January 1870, p. 15. 133 Cultivator and Country Gentleman, January 26, 1871, p. 51. >34 H. B. Bauman, Gettysburg, Pa., to George Frick, May 17, 1868. Frick Papers. 135 Cultivator and Country Gentleman, November 7, 1872, p. 708. ΐ3β Wood, Taber, and Morse Catalogue (Eaton, N.Y., 1871), p. 10. >37 E. W. Hamilton, "Custom Work" (MS. A paper presented at a meeting of the Power Machinery Department of the Farm Equipment Institute, Chicago. December 3, 1936). isa Moore's Rural New Yorker, June 19, 1875, p. 396. 130/4. Gaar Company Catalogue (Richmond, Ind., 1869), p. 13. "o Tenth Report of the Indiana State Board of Agriculture for the Year 1868 (Indianapolis, 1868), p. 183. m Cultivator and Country Gentleman, September 29, 1870, p. 547. 142 Ezra Landis, Lancaster, Pa., to George Frick, June 17, 1871. Frick Papers. Landis stated that "I was out to the farm of Mr. Bar yesterday where I started his engine and assisted him until he could handle the machine fairly well by himself. . . ." 143 A. Gaar Company Catalogue (Richmond, Ind., 1869), p. 18. 144 Indiana Farmer, July 5, 1879, p. 4. 145 Ohio Farmer, December 15, 1877, p. 370. "«Ibid., December 15, 1877, p. 377. ι « George Parsons, Harrisburg, Pa., to George Frick, March 30, 1869. Frick Papers. " β Interview with Arthur G. Kellam, Racine, Wis., November 28, 1948.

CHAPTER III 1 The Monthly Report of the Department (Washington, 1875), p. 265. 2 Threshermen's Review, July 1899, p. 15. s Ibid., p. 16.

of Agriculture

for the Year 1875

NOTES

223

* Thirty-first Annual Report of the Ohio State Board of Agriculture for the Year 1876 (Columbus. 1876), pp. 624-26. A survey in 1875 of eighty-eight Ohio counties revealed that fourteen ¿armen threshed in the barn, thirty-eight threshed in the barnyard, and twenty-one threshed in the field. » Ohio Farmer, May 8, 1880, p. 290. «A. B. Fairbank, Middletown, 111., to J. I. Case, Racine, Wis., March 5, 1876. Case Correspondence. ι Harberl and Raymond Dealers Catalogue (Richmond, Va., 1872), p. 4. »Farm Implement News, LX (July 1943), 50. » A . C . Kellam, " T h e Steam Traction Engine—Neither Vanished nor Forgotten," Farm Implement News, LX (July 1943), 50-51. American Agriculturist, June 1876, p. 16. " Farmer's Review, August 26, 1891, p. 540. 12 Bascom B. Clarke, Fifty Years a Machine Man (Madison, Wis., 1930), p. 2. ™ Ibid., p. 5. A. C. Wood in Old Days on the Farm (Toronto, 1916), p. 135, recalled working at the head of the straw-carrier at threshing time when the dust was so thick it "could be cut with a knife." On a stack in the open field a breeze often brought some relief, but in the barn mow, where men worked almost against the roof, the air became stifling and at times almost unbearable. " The Monthly Report of the Department of Agriculture for the Year 1875 (Washington, 1875), p. 266. 15 E. W. Hamilton, "Custom Work" (MS. A paper presented at a meeting of the Power Machinery Department of the Farm Equipment Institute, Chicago, December 3, 1936). »« The Monthly Report of the Department of Agriculture for the Year 1875 (Washington, 1875), pp. 266-67. 17 Prairie Farmer, September 9, 1871, p. 284. is Merrill E. Jarchow, "King Wheat," Minnesota History, XXIX (March 1948), 14. ι» C. C. Collin, "Dakota Wheat Fields," Harper's New Monthly Magazine, LX (March 1880). 529. 20 Jarchow, op. cit., pp. M-15. Charles Worthington, "Report of the Statistician," Annual Report of the Commissioner of Agriculture for the Year 1878 (Washington, 1878), p. 289. « Yankton Press and Dakotaian, December 25, 1873, p. 1. 23 Bismarck Tribune, August 5, 1874, p. 2. 2« Valley City Times, December 9, 1880, p. 1. 25 Harper's New Monthly Magaüne, LX (May 1880), 534. 2· Valley City Times, December 9, 1880, p. 1. 21 Everett Dick, The Sod House Frontier (New York, 1937), p. 300. 2« Yankton Press and Dakotaian, September 6, 1877, p. 4. T h e price per acre paid by Cass and Cheney was less than one dollar. Jarchow, op. cit., p. 14, sutes that the land price was forty to sixty cents an acre. Horace E. Goodhue, of Northfield, Minn., who visited the Cass farm in 1884, reported that the price per acre was twenty-seven and a half cents. See "Bonanza Farming" (MS, Minnesota Historical Society, St. Paul). Letter dated August 26, 1884. 2» Goodhue, op. cit., p. 5. s® Jarchow, loc. cit., p. 14. si Cultivator and Country Gentleman, January 8, 1880, p. 19. According to the Hebron Journal (Hebron, Neb.), August 28, 1879, p. 1, the bonanza farmers in the Red River Valley necessitated the use of much new machinery. During the spring of 1877, the men on the Dalrymple farm were plowing over a section each week with the use of ten to twenty gang plows. T h e harvesting was done with a dozen or more binders moving across the fields simultaneously, while a foreman on horseback acted as machine expert to assist in any emergency. In 1879 the

224

STEAM POWER ON THE AMERICAN FARM

Dalrymple and Grandin farms used 400 men, 115 binders, and 200 teams in harvesting the crops. Harold E. Briggs, "Early History of Bonanza Farming in the Red River Valley of the North," Agricultural History, VI (1932), 31. Ohio Farmer, January 5, 1893, p. 11. Here figures were cited showing that, during the four-year period 1877-80, the average spread in wheat prices from the highest point to the lowest in each year was fifty cents per bushel. 3« The Monthly Report of the Department of Agriculture for the Year ¡875 (Washington, 1875), p. 269. 33 Cultivator and Country Gentleman, March 13, 1879, p. 169. se Prairie Farmer, June 9, 1877, p. 180. 37 United States Census of 1880, "Report of the Production of Agriculture," Frank A. Walker, III, 75. «s Goodhue, op. cit., pp. 4-5. se Bismarck Tribune, October 1, 1877, p. 1. «o Mary Dodge Woodward, The Checkered Years (Caldwell, Idaho, 1937), p. 93. «ι United States Census of 1880, loc. cit., p. 75. « Minnesota Stats Tidning, March 1879, p. 1. « Bismarck Tribune, August 24, 1879, p. 2. «« Northern Pacific Times (Valley City, Dak. Ter.), July 3, 1879, p. 4. « Yankton Press and Dakotaian, October 25, 1877, p. 2. " Dick, op. cit., p. 301. 47 Woodward, op. cit., p. 46. Moor head Advocate (Moorhead, Minn.), October 13, 1877, p. 2. Case Eagle (Racine), January 1927, p. 7. so Ibid., January 1943, p. 11. 51 John W. Scott, "The Pioneer Farmer," University of North Dakota Quarterly Journal, XIII (1922-23), 290-97. " F. Hal Higgins, "Men Who Matched Mountains," Implement Record, XI (April 1947), p. 68. 53 Wheat (San Francisco Produce Exchange, 1884), p. 34. " C h a r l e s Shinn, "The California Wheat Farms," American Agriculturist, February 1890, p. 68. »5 Northwestern Farmer, November 1, 1868, p. 253. =e California Farmer, January 8, 1874, p. 97. 57 American Agriculturist, February 1890, p. 69. ss Michigan Farmer, August 21, 1877, p. 2. se Rochester Post (Rochester, Minn.), October 12, 1872, p. 2. «"Pacific Rural Press, October 26, 1946, p. 331. 81 Hebron Journal (Hebron, Neb.), November 23, 1876, p. 3. «2 F. Hal Higgins, "Dr. Glenn's Million-Dollar Wheat Crop," Pacific Rural Press, October 26, 1946, p. 330. es Higgins, op. cit., p. 330. 8« Pacific Rural Press, May 6, 1876, p. 1. •s Higgins, op. cit., pp. 330-31. »«Ibid., p. 331. βτ Pacific Rural Press, May 6, 1876, pp. 1-2. 88 Higgins, "Men Who Matched Mountains," Implement Record, XI (April 1947), 69. β» Michigan Farmer, August 21, 1877, p. 2. Ό Willows Journal (Willows, Calousa County, Calif.), July 26, 1879, p. 1. τ» United States Census of 1880. Report on the Manufactures of the United States at the 10th Census. "Manufactures of Interchangeable Mechanism," Charles H, Fitch, I., Section VII, 77.

NOTES

225

« F. Hal Higgins, "Our Centennials and Agriculture," California, June 1917, p. 17. 73 Hebron Journal (Hebron, Neb.), Septem!>er 12, 187G, p. 3. '¡ibid., June 28,1877, p. 1. 70 Higgins, "Dr. Glenn's Million-Dollar Wheat Crop," Pacific Rural Press, October 26, 1946, p. 330. -a Implement Record, April 1947, pp. 67-68. " Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper, September 30, 1882, p. 87. 7 s Ohio Farmer, October 25, 1879, p. 259. ™ Pacific Rural Press, June 14, 1884, p. 48. so J. c. Hoadley, The Portable Engine (Lawrence, Mass., 1870), p. 9. «ι Engineering, May 23, 1873, p. 2. 82 California Agriculturist, May 1876, p. 1. 83 Pacific Rural Press, November 11, 1876, p. 320. 84 Ransomes, Sims and Head Portable Steam Engine Catalogue (Ipswich and London, Eng., 1878), p. 3. es Ibid., p. 18. Quoting Agricultural Gazette (St. Petersburg, Russia), March 22, 1875, p. 2. se St. Paul Pioneer Press, April 12, 1876, p. 7. 8T Stockton Independent (Stockton, Calif.), May 20, 1876, p. 5.

CHAPTER IV ι Self-propelled farm engines were often called "traction" engines. 2 E. W. Bryn, The Progress of Invention in the Nineteenth Century (New York, 1900), p. 265. s Robert H. Thurston, ed., Reports of the Commissioners of the United States to the International Exhibition Held at Vienna 1ST) (Washington), III, 84. «William Fletcher, English and American Steam Traction Engines (New York, 1904), p. 283. s Quarterly Journal of Agriculture, VII (January 1859), 127. β Ibid., pp. 127-28. * Genesee Farmer and Gardner's Journal, August 13, 1836, p. 259. 8 Illustrated London News, August 15, 1857, p. 166. β Quoting the Times (London), July 12, 1862, in House Executive Documents, 38th Congress, 1st Session, 1863-1864, V, No. 1184, 174. io George E. Waring, The Handy-Book of Husbandry (New York, 1870), p. 157. » Bradford Brinton, "Some Suggestions for Tractor Plowmen," Threshermen's Review and Power Farming, March 1914, p. 7. Union Agriculturist and Western Prairie Farmer, September 1841, p. 71. « Cultivator, September 1858, p. 278. n Moore's Rural New Yorker, November 6, 1851, p. 355. Plow, the Loom, and the Anvil, November 1857, p. 279. i« F. Hal Higgins, "How Pennsylvania Pioneered in U.S. Traction Farming," Pennsylvania Farmer, January 13, 1940, p. 7. i ' Ohio Farmer, September 1859, p. 134. « Working Farmer, November 1858, p. 261. ι» Ohio Farmer, September 24, 1859, p. 309. 20 Wisconsin Farmer, October 1859, p. 1. 21 St. Paul Weekly Pioneer and Democrat, November 1858, p. 1. 2! Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, and Agriculture, United States Bureau of Agricultural Economics (Washington, D.C., November 1937), pp. 83-84. 2» Wisconsin State Agricultural Society Transactions, 1858 (Madison, 1859), pp. 284-99.

226

STEAM POWER ON T H E AMERICAN FARM

Report of the United Stales Commissioner of Agriculture for the Year 1869 (Washington, D.C., 1870). p. 307. 25 Illinois Farmer, October 1, 1859, pp. 546-47. -o Marysville Directory (Marysville, Calif., 1859), p. 8. - 7 Higgins, op. cit., p. 7. os Report of the United States Commissioner of Agriculture for the Year 1869 (Washington, D.C., 1870), p. 311. 2» Illinois Farmer, April 1, 1860, p. 64. so ibid., Decomber 1858, p. 188. House Miscellaneous Documents, 38th Congress, 1st Session, 1863. Document No. 1860, p. xix. Horace Capron, "Steain Plowing," Report of the United States Commissioner of Agriculture for the Year 1870 (Washington, 1871), p. 403. ss R. W. Kinder, A Short History of Mechanical Traction and Travel (Surry, Eng., 1947), 1,21. 34 J. B. Irvine, "A Steam Wagon in 1860," South Dakota Historical Collections, X (Pierre, S.D., 1920), 371. ss Ibid., p. 373. so Floyd E. Bresse, "Overland Freighting in the Platte Valley, 1850-1870" (Unpublished M.A. thesis, University of Neb., Lincoln, 1937), p. 115. 3T Nebraska City News (Nebraska Citv, Neb.). July 19, 1862, p. 2. 38 Ibid., July 26, 1862, p. 1. 30 Ibid., p. 1. *o Irvine, op. cit., p. 374. -11 Nebraska City News, July 26, 1862, p. 2. *- Bresse, op. cit., p. II. ••3 "Ft. Riley and Santa Fe Steam Traction Engine Company; or Transportation by Steam across the Plains from the Missouri River to the Rocky Mountains." Memorial to the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States submitted by Edward Warner, Charles S. Miles, and Jesse Fryc printed by I.ange and Brothers, New York, 1866. Ramsey Collection of Miscellaneous Pamphlets, XXIV (Minnesota Historical Society, St. Paul), 3. Ibid., p. 16. 40 Monthly Report of the Department of Agriculture for the Year 1872 (Wash ington, 1872), p. 517. 40 Yankton Press (Yankton, Dakota Territory), July 19, 1871, p. 1. 47 Nciv Ulm Plaindealer (New Ulm, Minn.), July 14, 1871, p. 2. 48 Yankton Press, July 19, 1871, p. 1. 4β Sixteenth Annual Report of the Michigan State Board of Agriculture (Lansing, 1877), p. 296. so Letter from E. C. Foreman, Tacoma, Ohio, December 10, 1947. H. H. Eckley and William T. Perry, History of Carroll and Harrison Counties, Ohio (Columbus, 1877), p. 432. ·" John S. Donald, "Wisconsin's Pioneer Part in the Development of the Motor Vehicle and Farm Tractor," Madison State Journal (Madison), October 1916, p. 5. 53 Ibid., p. 4. 54 California Cultivator, October 25, 1947, p. 782. 55 Robert H. Thurston, Reports of the Commission of the United States to the International Exhibition Held at Vienna 187) (Washington, 1875), III, 83. se Pacific Rural Press, February 26, 1876, p. 1. 57 Cultivator and Country Gentleman, November 7, 1872, p. 708. •β South-Land Weekly, May 1870, p. 115. se Wright County Times (Monticello, Minn.), October 19, 1872, p. 1. •o Journal of Agriculture, February 3, 1870, p. 69.

NOTES

227

m Hestern Planter, Novellier 2, 1872. p. 443. See also The Rural Carolinian, July 1870, p. 650; and The /huerican Farmer's Advocate, September 1872, p. U. »2 Journal of the Franklin Institute, LVIII (July 1869), 31. ea Journal of Agriculture, February 3, 1870, pp. 69-10. «« F. Hal Higgins, "Cavalcade of the Iron Horsemen," Pacific Rural Press, February 20, 1937, p. 234. β» New England Farmer, September 1869, p. 428. «β Minneapolis Tribune, October 11, 1874, p. 5, and the Saint Paul Daily Dispatch, January 1, 1876, p. 1. «τ Ohio Farmer, November 12, 1870, p. 726. o» Russell and Company Catalogue (Massillon, Ohio. 1884), p. 13. 60 Letter from F. A. Wirt, advertising manager of the Case Company, Racine, Wis., November 11. 1947. ™ Goar Scott Company Catalogue (Richmond, Ind., 1879), p. 3. " C. and G. Cooper Company Catalogue (Mt. Vernon, Ohio, 1883), p. 86. Letter of D. Buchanan, Atchison, Kan., November 24, 1878. « Ibid., p. 88. 73 John Longnecker, Plainfield, Pa., to George Frick, Waynesboro, Pa., November 17, 1871. Frick Papers. 14 American Agriculturist, March 1879, p. 92. " C. and G. Cooper Company Catalogue (Mt. Vernon, Ohio, 1883), p. 77. flbid., p. 78. « Ibid., p. 79. ·» Ibid., p. 68. " Ohio Farmer, May 19, 1860, p. 159. so Cultivator and Country Gentleman, October 13, 1870, p. 649; Decemlier 15, 1870, p. 793. « Western Rural, July 19, 187S, p. 231. « Michigan Farmer, September 14, 1875, p. 297. 03 C. and G. Cooper Company Catalogue (Mt. Vernon, Ohio, 1884), p. 3. »« Ibid., 1883, p. 75. •s Russell and Company Catalogue (Massillon, Ohio, 1886), p. 17. • • J o h n White, Rockford, 111., to J. I. Case, Racine, Wis., October 3, 1878. Case Correspondence. " Cultivator and Country Gentleman, July 14, 1881, p. 451. •s Junction City Tribune (Junction City, Kan.), August 23, 1883, p. 1. »» Ohio Farmer, October 22, 1887, p. 267. •o Interview with Arthur G. Kellam, steam-engine expert of the Case Company, Racine, November 26, 1947. ·» American Power Farmer, March 1944, p. 11. »»C. and G. Cooper Company Catalogue (Mt. Vernon, Ohio, 1883), p. 86. ·» Ibid., p. 77. e < Joseph T . Rynda, Jr., "History of the Aultman-Taylor Wooden Wheel Traction Engine" (MS, Minnesota Historical Society, St. Paul, January 4, 1935), pp. 1-5. In July 1933, the Rynda engine, which was manufactured in 1877 by the Aultman-Taylor Company, was placed in the Henry Ford, Edison Institute Museum at Dearborn, Mich. ·» C. and G. Cooper Company Catalogue (Mt. Vernon, Ohio, 1883), p. 89. — Power, December 1884, p. 21. •τ Henry Ford and Samuel Crowther, My Life and Work (New York, 1922), pp. 22-23. Quoted by permission of Doubleday, Page and Co., Garden City, N.Y. »» Cultivator and Country Gentleman, July 14, 1881, p. 451.

228

STEAM POWER ON T H E AMERICAN FARM CHAPTER V

ι Minneapolis

Journal,

S e p t e m b e r 9, 1905, p. 5.

* Verne S. Sweedlun, "A History of the Evolution of Agriculture in Nebraska, 1870-1930" (Unpublished Ph.D. thesis, University of Nebraska, Lincoln, 1940), p. 105. s William Hurst and Lillian Church, Power and Machinery in Agriculture, United States Department of Agriculture, Miscellaneous Bulletin No. 157 (Washington, April 1933), p. 7. This study reveals the following comparisons: Harvested Acres Number of Farms 178,000,000 1880 4,008,000 234,000,000 1890 4,564,000 295,000,000 1900 5,737,000 324,000,000 1910 6,361,000 * Rollin E. Smith, Wheal Fields and Markets of the World (St. Louis, Missouri, 1908), p. 177. According to Joseph S. Davis, Wheat and the AAA (Washington: Brookings Institution, 1935), p. 2, the large wheat crops not only supplied the domestic needs of the United States, but from 1897 to 1903, net exports averaged 219 million bushels a year and constituted nearly one-half the world trade. s Hebron Journal (Hebron. Neb.), July 22, 1880, p. 3. «C. M. Harger, "Modern Wheat Harvesting," Harper's Weekly, June 29, 1901, p. 759. ? Hurst and Church, op. cit., p. 7. » Hadley W. Quaintance, "The Influence of Machinery on the Economic and Social Conditions of the Agricultural People," Cyclopedia of American Agriculture, IV (N.Y., 1909), 109. 9 Hadley W. Quaintance, "The Influence of Farm Machinery on Production and L a b o r , " Publications 16.

of the

American

Economic

Association,

IV (N.Y.,

1904),

10 Hurst and Church, op. cit., p. 7. 11 Ibid., p . 7. 12 Ibid., p. 11. 13 Dakota Farmer, August 1, 1895, p. 2. 14 Threshermen's Review and Power Farmer, is Indiana Farmer, S e p t e m b e r 7, 1878, p. 1. 18

S e p t e m b e r 7, 1915, p . 14.

E. W. Hamilton, "The History of the Development of the Combine," Com-

bine Year Book (Madison, Wis., 1929), p p . 5 - 6 . i t Ibid., p. 6.

i 8 F. Hal Higgins, "The Moore-Hascall Harvester Centennial Approaches," Michigan History Magazine, ie Ibid., p . 420.

X I V (1930), 419.

20 James Fenimore Cooper, The Oak Openings (Boston, 1848), pp. 478-79. zi F. Hal Higgins, "The First Hundred Years Were the Hardest for the Comb i n e , " Farm Implement

News, May 1, 1941, p . 33.

22 R. L. Ardrey, American Agricultural Implements (Chicago, 1894), p. 116. 23 Higgins, "The Moore-Hascall Harvester Centennial Approaches," Michigan History

Magazine,

X I V (1930), 428.

2« F. Hal Higgins, "The First Hundred Years Were the Hardest for the Com-

b i n e , " Farm Implement News, May 1, 1941, p . 34. 25 American Agriculturist, F e b r u a r y 1890, p. 69. 2β E d w i n S. Holmes, Jr., Wheat Growing and General Agricultural Conditions in the Pacific Coast Regions of the United States, U n i t e d States D e p a r t m e n t of

Agriculture Statistics, Miscellaneous Series Bulletin, No. 11 (Washington, D.C., 1901), p. 7.

NOTES

229

2? F. Hal Higgins, "The Moore-Hascall Harvester Centennial Approaches." Michigan History Magazine, XIV (1930), .426. 2 « Charles H. Shinn, "California Wheat Farms," American Agriculturist, February 1890, p. 70. 29 Ibid., p. 71. so Peter T. Dondlingcr, The Book of Wheat (New York, 1908), p. 92. si A letter from the Holt Manufacturing Company in the Threshermen's Review, October 1898, p. 2. 3Z F. Hal Higgins, "Our Centennials and Agriculture," California, June 1947, p. 16. See also Higgins', "Condensed Chronicle of the Combine," Implement Record, July 1949, pp. 22-23. George Berry of Visalia, Calif., apparently became tired of seeing his horses die from the heat as they attempted to pull the large combines through the wheat fields. T o solve the problem. Berry built a combine in 1886 and attached it to his twenty-five-horsepower Mitchell-Fischer steam traction engine. This was undoubtedly the first self-propelled straw-burning combine built in the United States. 53 Threshermen's Review and Power Farming, June 1915, p. 29. 3 » George F. Walsh, "Machinery in Agriculture," Cottier's Magazine, XIX (November 1900), 137. A combine built by Laufenberg in 1898 had a cutting bar of fifty-two feet, perhaps the widest swathed machine in the West. See also the Farmer, November 15, 1898, p. 372. »* Ray M. Denis, "Threshing in California," Threshermen's Review and Power Farming, June 1915, p. 29. *· Lillian Church, Partial History of the Development of Grain Threshing Implements and Machines, United States Department of Agriculture Bulletin, No. 73. (Washington, D.C., September 1949), p. 26. st Byron Jackson Catalogue (Woodland, Calif., 1878), p. 1. »» P. S. Rose, "Thresher's School of Modern Methods," American Thresherman, February 1911, p. 76. 3· Frank G. Kranich, " T h e Power to Thresh," American Thresherman and Farm Power, February 1917, p. 13. 40 T h e Sattley Stacker Company of Springfield, 111., and Reeves and Company of Columbus, Ind., manufactured popular swinging stackers which required the services of two to seven men. American Thresherman, September 1906, p. 10. «2 Case Eagle (Racine, Wis.), January 1927, p. 7.

American Thresherman, May 1898, p. 9. *o Buffalo Pitts Company Catalogue (Buffalo, N.Y., 1889), pp. 6-8. s» Threshermen's Review, July 1899, p. 15. American Thresherman, December 1906, p. 74. »3 Rogin, op. cit., p. 172. « Barlow, op. cit., 1895, p. 7. 65 Threshermen's Review, August 1899, p. 30. · · Lynn W. Ellis and Edward A. Rumely, Power and the Plow (New York, 1911), p. 283. « Ibid., pp. 283-84.

230

STEAM POWER ON T H E AMERICAN FARM

5»Farm Implement News, August 1885, p. 5. See also Farm Album, June 1949, pp. 8-9. i» Dakota Farmer, October 1889, p. 2. eo Arthur S. Young, "Pennsylvania's Part in Developing Power Machinery," Pennsylvania Farmer, January 10, 1948, p. 20. ei Jacob Price, Steam Plowing and Steam Freighting (Racine, Wis., 1890), p. 16. « San Jose Daily Mercury, October IS, 1887, quoted by D. L. Remington, "'Steam Plowing," Pacific Rural Press, August 16, 1890, p. 159. «3 Ibid., p. 159. '* Scientific American, September 27. 1890, p. 195. es Farm Implement Neu-s, January 7, 1893, p. 2. Quoting the Bozeman Chronicle, May 12, 1892. β« Rogin, op. cit., p. 44. ·» Dakota Farmer, January 1890, p. 8. «se Threshermen's Review, October 1898, p. 2. ·» E. W. Hamilton, "Plowing with Steam," Transactions of the American Society of Agricultural Engineers, III (St. Paul, 1909), 64. " Plowing with Steam (Case Company, Racine, Wis., 1904), pp. 1-10. » Lynn W. Ellis, Traction Plowing, Únited States Department of Agriculture Bureau of Plant Industry, Bulletin No. 170 (Washington, 1910), p. 7. " Farm Implements, January 1904, p. 54. ™ Minneapolis Journal, April 28, 1905, p. 4. " T . D. Ulrich, Marion, Ohio, to W. R. Teagarden, Tepee, Okla., May 23, 1907. Huber Company, Marion, Ohio. Huber Business Correspondence. 75 Kingsland-Ferguson Manufacturing Company's Illustrated Price List (St. Louis, Mo., 1886), p. 2. ™ Ibid., p. 3. " J . A. Thorpe, Sommerville, Tcnn., to Case Company, Racine, Wis., June 30, 1910. Case Correspondence. " Threshermen's Review, July 1910, p. 19. « Ibid., May 1906, p. 29. so Farmer's Review, December 9, 1891, p. 783. ei Farm Implement News, April 7, 1892, p. 23. ez "Report of a Special Meeting of the Board of Directors of the Huber Manufacturing Company" (MS, Marion, Ohio, September 18, 1902), p. 4. 83 Farm Implements and Hardware, August 1892, p. 58« Aberdeen Weekly News (Aberdeen, S.D.), September 18, 1902, p. 8. 85 Farmer's Review, September 7, 1892, p. 564. 8« P. S. Rose, "World Wheat Prices," American Thresherman and Farm Poiuer, July 1917, p. 4. Figures cited here show that the average price of wheat rose front the depression quotation of 53f a bushel in 1893, to 63{ in 1900, to 78f in 1905, to 881 i n 1 9 1 °. 95¿ in 1915, and to $1.60 in 1916. s? S. E. Barlow, "Treasurer's Reports to the Board of Directors of the Huber Manufacturing Company" (MS, Marion, Ohio, August 18, 1894), p. 4. 88 Ibid., 1895, p. 4. «β Ibid., 1898, p. 6. eo Farm Implements, October 1897, p. 12. •i Minneapolis Journal, June 18, 1901, p. 7. »2 American Thresherman, August 1899, p. 42. •s Η. E. Canfield, History of Wayne County, Indiana (Indianapolis, 1884), II, 75-76. 64 J. E. Barlow, "Annual Report to the Board of Directors of the Huber Manufacturing Company" (MSS, Marion, Ohio, 1893), p. 3. β' Farm Implements and Hardware, August 1899, p. 9. »« Frank W. Bicknell, Wheat Production and Farm Life in Argentina, United

NOTES

231

States Department of Agriculture Department of Statistics, Bulletin No. 27 (Washington, 1904), p. 66. Bicknell states that in 1904 the English threshing machines in Argentina were threshing 975 bushels of wheat a day; the American machines 1,650 bushels per clay. »1 Eleventh Annual Report of the Department of Agriculture of the Province of Saskatchewan (Regina, April 30, 1916), p. 139. o» Merrill Denison, Massey Harris, 100 Years of Progress in Farm Implements (New York, 1949), p. 29. »»Ibid., p. 30. mo Minneapolis Journal, July 23, 1903, p. 12. ιοί ibid., May 28, 1902, p. 8. ιοί American Thresherman, Octoljer 1898, p. 21. ios Personal Business Records of F. Lee Norton, former treasurer and vicepresident of the Case Company, Racine, Wis. ιοί Threshermen's Review, May 1900, p. 13. ios Minneapolis Journal, May 6, 1902, p. 7. «οβ Annual Balance Sheets of the Gaar Scott Company, 1858-1910. Business Records of the Gaar Scott Company, Richmond, Ind., Journal IV, pp. 1-65. ιοί Threshermen's Review, June 1899, p. 6. »οβ ¡bid., December 2,1889, p. I. •o» C. B. Gunlogson, "Steam Engine Manufacture" (MS, Racine, Wis., 1928), p. 6. 1'hese figures were compiled from studies of the United States census reports in cooperation with census officials of the Department of Commerce, Washington, n o Ibid., p. 7. i n Production figures were taken from the following sources: T h e Case Company, letter from F. A. Wirt, advertising manager of the Company, Nov. 11, 1947; ihe Η über Company, from the Huber Engine Record Books, Nos. 1-3, at Marion. Ohio; the Aultman-Taylor Company, from the Files of the Edison Institute, DeariKtrn, Michigan; the Geiser Company, from the records of Terry Mitchell, advertising manager of the Frick Company, Waynesboro, Pa.; the Minneapolis Company, from Hans Anderson's data taken from the blue print files of the Minneapolis-Moline office at Hopkins, Minn.; Port Huron Company, from the Record Books Numbers 1-40 in the possession of E. S. Sturgis, Port Huron, Michigan; ihe Harrison Company, letter of William Harrison, president of the Harrison Company, November 12, 1947. u s American Thresherman, August 1899, p. 42. u s Personal business records of F. Lee. Norton, op. cit. i n Threshermen's Review, February 1899, p. 21. Russell and Company manufactured four hundred farm steam engines in 1899. T h e Reeves Company of Columbus, Ind., built six hundred traction engines in 1904. u s Case Eagle (Racine, Wis.), July 1923, p. 3. n o Fred Smith, "The Story of Steam Engines," MS (Library of the Edison Institute, Dearborn, Mich., 1938), p. 10. il'· Bußalo-Pitts Company Catalogue (Buffalo, N.Y., 1911), p. 7. u s Farm Implement News, May 7, 1883, p. 6. no American Thresherman and Farm Power, June 1919, p. 78. izo Archer P. Whallon, "There Were Giants in Those Days," Farm Quarterly, March 1947, p. 26. Iii Interview with Hans J. Anderson, engineer of the Minneapolis-Moline Company, Minneapolis, August 21, 1947. 1-2 T h e Nicholas and Shepard Business Records, Engine Testing Books, Numbers 9 and 10. Offices of the Oliver Company, Battle Creek, Mich. 123 T h e Huber Business Records, Engine Record Books, Numbers 17, 18, 19. Huber Company office building, Marion, Ohio.

232

STEAM POWER ON T H E AMERICAN FARM

124 Minneapolis Threshing Machine Company Catalogues, 1890 to 1914 inclusive, Hopkins, Minn. T h i s collection in possession of Hans J. Anderson, Minneapolis, Minn. 125 Young, op. cit., p. 18. a* Panic Proof, I (Gaar Scott Company, Richmond, Ind., 1910). 1. ι:* The Reeves Company Catalogue (Columbus, Ind., 1912), p. 12. 128 farm Implement News, September 27, 1945, p. JO. 12» Case Road Locomotive (Case Company, Racine, Wis., 1905), p. 4. 130 The Evidence of 500 Traction Engine Operators (Could Balance Valve Company, Kellogg, Iowa, 1912), pp. 2-22. 131 Port H u r o n Thresher Company Records, Sales Department, File numliers 1-40. T h i s collection is in possession of E. S. Sturgis, Port H u r o n , Mich.

CHAPTER VI ι Interview with Victor O. Wik, Des Moines, Iowa, a former steam traction engineer, o n March 28, 1948. 2 J. E. Davies, "A Report of the National Association of T h r e s h e r Manufacturers," Farm Machinery Trade Associations (Department of Commerce, Bureau of Corporations, Washington, 1915), pp. 296-98. » E. O. Laughlin, " T h e Threshing Machine Man," Farm Implements, January 1897, p. 40. * Dakota Farmer, August 1889, p. 114. s Interview with A r t h u r G. Kellam, Racine, Wis., December 29, 1948. « Aberdeen Daily News (Aberdeen, S.D.), August 31, 1905, p. 8. ι Ibid., August 24, 1905, p. 5; September 20, 1905, p. 3. » School for Threshermen (Huber Company, Marion, Ohio, 1903), p. 3. β William Hurst and Lillian Church, Power and Machinery in Agriculture, United States Department of Agriculture, Miscellaneous Bulletin No. 157 (Washington, April 1933), p. 12. 10 American Thresherman, August 1910, p. 98. 11 American Thresherman and Farm Power, November 1915, p. 37. 12 American Thresherman, December 1907, p. 40. 13 Threshermen's Review, May 1898, p. 23. * « E. W. Hamilton, "Custom W o r k " (MS. A paper read before the Machinery Dep a r t m e n t of the Farm Equipment Institute, Chicago, December 3, 1936), p. 2. is Interview with Edwin Haselhorst, Norbeck, S.D., July 12, 1948. ie Mary Dodge Woodward, The Checkered Years (Caldwell, Idaho, 1937), p. 168. if William Allen White, " T h e Business of a W h e a t Farm," Scribner's Magazine, XXII (November 1897), 543. i s Everett Dick, The Sod House Frontier (New York, 1937), p. 291. ie Ohio Farmer, September 25. 1880, p. 195. 20 Minneapolis Journal, July 24, 1901, p. 7. 21 Aberdeen Daily News, September 17, 1903, p. 2. 22 Minneapolis Journal, August 8, 1909, p. 1. 23 Iiïid., J u n e 27, 1901, p. 4. 24 Aberdeen Daily News, July 7, 1905, p. 7. 5 Nebraska Farmer, July 9, 1891, p. 474. 2« Aberdeen Daily News, July 7, 1905, p. 7. Ibid., August 9, 1905, p. 8. 28 Topeka Daily Capital (Topeka, Kan.), July 29, 1903, p. 5. 20 Minneapolis Journal, July 26, 1914, p. 11. so Harold E. Briggs, "Early Bonanza Farming in the Red Rivef Valley of t h e N o r t h , " Agricultural Histoiy, VI (1932), 34.

NOTES

233

si Minneapolis Journal, July 26, 1914, p. 11. s-· Ibid., August 1, 1909, p. 1. s·1 Ibid., July 5, 1908, p. 1. s* Ibid., July 29, 1903, p. 9. 3· Ibid., October 25, 1914, p. 5. s* Aberdeen Daily News, July 30, 1894, p. 2. si Ralph Chaplin, Wobbly (Chicago. 1948), p. 88. 3β Minneapolis Journal, October 12, 1905, p. 17. 3» Ibid., July 26, 1914, p. 11. 40 American Thresherman, February 1900, p. 14. Ibid., November 4, 1901, p. 3. «2 Farm Implements, September 26, 1898, p. 8. «3 Case Eagle (Case Company, Racine, Wis.), June 1941, p. 3. ** Minneapolis Journal, September 11, 1905, p. 9. 45 Robert Yates, When I Was a Harvester (New York, 1908), p. 87. er Business Correspondence. Park Rispalje, "Steam Thresher Keeps Old Romance," Sioux City Journal, August 28, 1949, p. 1. »3 Mrs. Fred Franke, "Threshing Rings," Dakota Farmer, October 1948, p. 19. Some of the anxiety experienced by the fanners' wives is expressed in a letter written by a Dakota housewife and printed in the Dakota Farmer, August 1889, p. 1 I: " T h e r e is probably no time of greater concern d u r i n g the year than at threshing. Hail, d r o u t h , rust, smut, or mildew may claim a share of the farmer's crop. T h r e s h i n g time is a busy and hard season both inside the house and outside. Not less than fifteen hungry men must be fed. It is difficult to estimate just how much food will be needed. If too much cooking is done, there will l>e waste, if not enough, hard words will be said. T h e wife works, plans, and calculates, often with little help f r o m her husband. How much easier the work would be if there were a barrel or two of water at the door, plenty of wood or coal for the kitchen, with a lot of groceries in the pantry. Of course the husband is woiTied too. Perhaps he has engaged

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a thresherman who has a machine which has stood out of doors all winter. As a result, it breaks here and there, belts wear out, boxings burn out and repairs must be ordered from the factory. The men must be laid off, the meat and pies in the pantry spoil, rains come to destroy the gTain in the fields and the yields at threshing time are reduced. This means more debts, hardships and discouragement. If the crops are good, however, obligations are met, honor redeemed, happiness assured, and the home is spared another year. This may be only one view of threshing time, but it is a real one. Threshing means more than noise, bustle, and dirt; it is the day when the fanner's balance sheet is made out. It is the day when the question of profit or loss for the year is determined." ** Ibid., September 15, 1900, p. 1. es Ibid., September 1, 1907, p. 22. »· Threshermen's Review, February 1911, p. 28. Aberdeen Daily News, September 16, 1903, p. 2. •β Minneapolis Journal, November 4, 1901, p. 3. o® Ibid., July 26. 1914, p. 11. too Letter received from Thomas D. Campbell, Hardin, Mont., August 12, 1948. In 1949, the Campbell Corporation farmed sixty-five thousand acres of land near Hardin, a project which has made Campbell an authority on bonanza wheat farming, ιοί Conner, op. cit., pp. 138-39. >02 Interview with Walter Jones, Racine, Wis., November 25, 1947. »os Don D. Lescohier, "Work Accidents and the Farm Hand," Industrial Accidents, Employers Liability, and Workmen's Compensation in Minnesota (Bureau of Labor. Industry, and Commerce of Minn., Minneapolis), 1911, p. 3. WPA Index File of the Minneapolis Journal, 1890-1917. Public Library. Minneapolis, »o® American Thresherman, September 1927, p. 21too Ibid., December 1907, p. 10. This magazine reported the accident of a carelesa man who had the habit of climbing through the main drive belt. He had been warned but still kept up the practice. One day he slipped, fell on the belt, and was killed before anyone could move to save him. »o* Junction City Tribune (Junction City, Kan.), July 30, 1891, p. 1. ios Minneapolis Journal, September 14, 1899, p. 5. »0» Threshermen's Review and Power Farming, September 1915, p. 12. no Minneapolis Journal, June 1, 1901, p. 1. m Ibid., September 3, 1901, p. 10; November 25, 1901, p. 8. 111 J. I. Case Threshing Machine Company Prospectus Book Number 65 (Racine, Wis., 1900), p. 8. The shipping weights of threshing machinery were listed as follows: Case steam engine of twenty-five horsepower in 1900 weighed 15,860 pounds; a forty by fifty-eight inch separator weighed 8,795 pounds, a twelve-barrel water tank, weighed 1,300 pounds, making a total weight of 25,955 pounds, or nearly twelve tons for the outfit. This figure does not include the weight of the water, coal, and extra tools carried. An Advance twenty-six horsepower engine weighed sixteen tons. American Thresherman, November 1906, p. 63. Another thresherman writing to the same magazine on May 9, 1910, stated: "I am sending a picture of my engine which fell through a bridge near Howells, Nebraska. It took six men to pull me out from under the engine. I jumped, but the engine struck me and knocked me into the mud. I came out of it pretty lucky with only a few broken ribs and a badly bruised arm. The bridge was not old, but had been built out of old lumber." 114 Minneapolis Threshing Machine Company Catalogue (Minneapolis, Minn., 1926), p. 38.

236

STEAM POWER ON THE AMERICAN FARM

u s Threshermen's Review and Power Farming, November 1913, p. 32. n e American Thresherman, August 1906, p. 95. m Threshermen's Review and Power Farming, March 1914, p. 15. lie Ibid., April 1915, p. 9. il» American Thresherman, November 1906, p. 63. 120 Ibid., pp. 63-64. 1*1 Farm Implements, August 30, 1911, p. 54. 122 Harley Stone, T a r k i o , Mo., to the Case Company, Racine, October 10, 1909. Case Correspondence. 123 American Thresherman and Farm Power, November 1916, p. 34. 12« Stephen Roper, Hand-Book of the Locomotive (Philadelphia, 1907), p. 278. 125 Interview with H a n s J . Anderson, Minneapolis. J u l y 17, 1947. ΐ2β " T w e n t y - T h i r d Biennial R e p o r t of the D e p a r t m e n t of Labor and Industry;" Sixth Annual Report of the Industrial Commission of Minnesota (Minneapolis, 1931-37), p. 174. T h e force of a boiler explosion is generated by the rapid vaporization of water. W h e n water is converted into steam, the volume of the water is increased 1,600 times. If a boiler is filled with cold water a n d the pressure increased until a break in the boiler occurs, no explosion will result, but the boiler plate will separate to release the water. O n t h e other hand, if the same pressure is created within a boiler filled with hot water and steam, an explosion powerful enough to destroy the engine will result. T h e difference in these two réactions lies in the fact that when water is heated u n d e r pressure, its boiling point rises f a r above the n o r m a l boiling point of 212 degrees Fahrenheit. W h e n a boiler full of water heated to 300 degrees breaks a n d the pressure on the water is suddenly removed, t h e hot water immediately vaporizes into steam. T h i s almost instantaneous expansion creates the explosion in m u c h the same m a n n e r as the sudden expansion of air gives power to the detonation of a charge of dynamite, ι " Threshermen's Review, September 1899, p p . 6-7. 12»American Thresherman, J a n u a r y 1908, p. 70. 129 Stillwater Messenger (Stillwater, Minn.), September 12, 1885, p. 4. iso Weekly Tribune (Junction City, Kan.), August 3, 1893, p. 3. 131 Minneapolis Journal, September 5, 1904, p. 1. T h i s account described a boiler explosion of a threshing engine which killed five men, throwing arms a n d legs twenty rods. T h e Pacific Rural Press, August 19, 1876, p. 125, reported a threshing accident near Rio Vista, California. W h e n a crew of twenty men were at work, the boiler exploded, hurling the smokebox between the stacks and over the separator to a distance of 180 paces. In its course it struck one man, killing him instantly. A Chinaman was firing the engine with straw. H e was thrown seventy-five yards and seemed to be "scalded f r o m head to foot—literally parboiled. H e was blinded and his limbs broken below the knees. . . ." T h e Ohio Farmer, July 17, 1880, p. 45, gave an account of an explosion of a f a r m engine d u r i n g threshing which left the "dead and injured scattered a b o u t the place and the air filled with the groans of the wounded. . . ." 132 Topeka Daily Capital, July 10, 1914, p. 3. 133 Threshermen's Review, November 1908, p. 43. 134 Ibid., p. 3. 135 American Thresherman, April 1910, p. 24. " β Topeka Daily Capital, July 10, 1914, p. 4. 137 "Twentieth Biennial Report of the D e p a r t m e n t of Labor and Industry," Fifth Annual Report of the Industrial Commission of Minnesota (Minneapolis, 1929-30), p. 224. « s Farm Implements, October 1897, p. 8. " β Grand Forks Herald (Grand Forks, N.D.), October 8, 1897, p. 3. n o Threshermen's Review, July 1898, p. 24.

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" i Ibid., July 1898, p. 24. " 2 Roper, op. cit., p. 278. ι « Ibid., p. 272. "« Threshermen's Review, January 1898, p. 9. i«» American Thresherman, April 1910, p. 48. This article reported an explosion in Kansas caused by an engineer who tightened the safety valve down so far that it would not release under five hundred pounds of steam pressure, i«· Threshermen's Review, July 1898, p. 25. American Thresherman and Farm Power, June 1919, p. 78. " β Case Company Catalogue (Racine, 1917), p. 19. For details relative to boiler laws and boiler inspection in the various states see United States Senate Document No. 680,60th Congress, Second Session, January 25, 1909. Serial number 5408. n e Advance Rumely Company Catalogue (La Porte. Ind., 1916), p. 81. Reeves Company Catalogue (Columbus, Ind., 1912), p. 25. " i Threshermen's Review, March 1901, p. 37. The railroad locomotives had the same problem when using alkali water. The New York Central locomotives could run four years without a change of flues, while the trains in the western states were required to remove the flues every six to twelve months in order to remove the boiler scale. i " Reese and Slagel, Lewistown, Pa., to George Frick, Waynesboro, Pa., May 27, 1865. Frick Papers. «» Journal of the Franklin Institute, LXXIV, 3rd series (Philadelphia, 1877), 14. χ»« Taylor J. Crow, "Keeping the Boiler Clean," American Thresherman, March 1910, p. 14. » " Interview with E. C. Rosen, St. Paul, Minn., January 28, 1948. «β American Thresherman, September 1910, p. 29. i 5T Traction Engine Catechism (St: Joseph, Mich., 1906), p. 152. «» Letter from Edwin Haselhorst, Norbeck, S J)., February 5, 1948. Interview with John Heckenroth, St. Paul, Minn., January 4. 1948. »«o Threshermen's Review, September 1910, p. 48. " i Topeka Daily Capital (Topeka, Kan.), July 10, 1914, p. 4. " 2 Threshermen's Review and Power Farming, September 1915, p. 18. »«» Aberdeen Daily News, October 5, 1905, p. 2. *·« Pacific Rural Press, July 30, 1887, p. 84. i«« Aberdeen Weekly News, September 25, 1902, p. 2. See also Mary Dodge Woodward, The Checkered Years (Caldwell, Idaho, 1937), p. 138. *** Aberdeen Daily News, September 30, 1905, p. 3. im Ibid., October 5, 1905, p. 2. ιββ Threshermen's Review and Power Farming, January 1915, p. 58. During the period 1914 to 1917 there were upwards of six hundred fires caused by explosions created by accumulation of smut in the threshing machines in the northwestern part of the United States, ιββ Pacific Rural Press, July 30,1887, p. 85. ito Letter from Thomas D. Campbell, Hardin, Mont., August 12, 1948. According to the Threshermen's Review, June 1899, p. 16, the boilers would most frequently rust out around the smokebox, then around the water pipes. The gears were the first to wear out, followed by the drive wheels, the crossheads, reversing mechanism, and valves and pistons, " i Threshermen's Review, May 1898, p. 23. Hamilton, op. cit., p. 4. » ' W . C. Smith, "The Old Thresherman Talks of Quitting," The American Thresherman and Farm Power, October 1920, p. 8. "«Farm Weekly, September II, 1950, p. 12. " β C. Henry Warren, The Land is Yours (London, 1944), p. 165.

238

STEAM POWER ON THE AMERICAN FARM

i ' · Interview with Albert O. Stewart. Norbeck, S.D., July 6, 1947. i " Threshermen's Review, November 1898, p. 7. " » I n t e r v i e w with G. B. Gunlogson, Racine, Wis., November 28, 1947. i'» E. W. Hamilton, "Custom Work," p. 5. American Power Farmer, March 1944, p. 11, included a letter of J. E. Brewster of Hudson, Ohio, who recalled the spirit of the engineers: "From the time I was a small boy, I was determined that I would own a threshing rig some day. I walked many a mile to watch every rig I heard of. When I was 15 years old I started running steam engines on merry-go-rounds and on steamboats. This continued until I was 20.1 couldn't stand it any longer, so I bought an old threshing rig. . . . T h e first year I had this outfit we had chicken to eat at every place we threshed. One of my men said that every time the chickens saw the old Monitor coming u p the road, they just ran and laid their heads on the chopping block." is« American Thresherman, December 1907, p. 42. isi Ibid., May 1907, p. 49. íes Threshermen's Review, J u n e 1907, p. 45. 183 Threshermen's Review and Power Farming, November 1913, p. 1. 184 Power, November 1903, p. 636. 183 American Thresherman, December 1905, p. 62. ι M American Thresherman, December 1899, p. 8. is» Threshermen's Review, November 1908, p. 24. 188 Ibid., April 1905, p. 18. íes Interview with GeoTge Winter, Pipestone, Minn., May 6, 1948. i*o George Winter, Pipestone, to the Case Company, Racine, J u n e 9, 1940. Case Correspondence. i»i Argus Leader (Sioux Falls, S.D.), August 30, 1942, p. 4. ι** American Thresherman, May 1926, p. 62. 1»» St. Paul Pioneer Press, J u n e 18, 1944, p. 3. ι»« T h e following are some of the threshing records: A Kansas thresherman in 1910 threshed 4,322 bushels of wheat in one day; a South Dakota outfit in 1905 threshed 3,070 bushels of o a u in half a day; a rig near Minden, Nebraska, threshed 2,463 bushels of wheat in eleven hours; a North Dakota farmer threshed 5,642 bushels of wheat in fifteen hours in 1906. See the Threshermen's Review, September 1910, p. 48; Ibid., October 1914, p. 16; the American Thresherman, December 1906, p. 74; the Aberdeen Daily News, September 8, 1905, p. 4. American Thresherman, June 1906, p. 43. iee Ibid., April 1899, p. 22. 197 Threshermen's Review and Power Farming, November 1913, p. 25. iee American Thresherman, May 1898, p. 9. i»» Ibid., June 1907, p. 66. seo Hamilton, "Custom Work," p. 18. 201 Threshermen's Review, August 1899, p. 23. 202 American Thresherman, J u n e 1907, p. 45. 203 w . E. Raymond, "Power on the Farm," Northwestern Agriculturist, March 1, 1903, p. 136. 20« Wallaces' Farmer, February 1906, p. 246. 205 American Thresherman, J u n e 1909, p. 49. 2oe Threshermen's Review, November 1912, p. 16. 20? Emil Rauchenstein and C. A. Bonner, Successful Threshing Ring Management, University of Illinois Agricultural Experiment Station, Bulletin N u m b e r 267 (Urbana, May 1925), p. 391. These writers s u t e that cooperative threshing may be a partnership with two farmers abiding by a written agreement. However, the more common form was the corporation in which many farmers pooled their

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239

financial resources. The chief advantages were limited liability, easily transferable shares, and greater permanence. m American Thresher man, February 1915, p. 58. so· Letter from Henry G. Bossman, Sheldon, la., February 12. 1949. no Sioux City Journal, August 28, 1949, p. 1. su Edward A. Rumely, "The Passing of the Man with the Hoe," World's Work, XX (March 1910). 13245. i n Plowing with Traction Engines (Reeves and Company, Columbus, Ind., 1909), p. 27. si* Berton Braley, "Steam Comes to the Plow" (Poem written for E. W. Hamilton, Winnipeg, 1905). 21« Rumely, op. cit., p. 1S246. *i» Figures taken from the personal records of E. G. Rosen, St. Paul, Minn., 1906-10. s i · Hamilton, "Custom Work," p. 4. sit American Thresher man, April 1908, p. 69. si· Letter from Edwin Haselhont, Norbeck, S.D., November 12, 1948. n· Dakota Farmer, June 1908, p. 27. sso Farm Implements, July SI, 1909, p. 28. ssi Plowing with Traction Engines (Reeves and Company, Columbus, Ind., 1912), p. 27. «SS Ibid., p. 5. sss Lynn W. Ellis, Traction Plowing, United States Department of Agriculture, Bureau of Plant Industry, Bulletin No. 170 (Washington, 1910), p. 57. The report of Ellis was based upon letters received from five-hundred steam plowing operators in the United States and Canada. The major traction plowing areas "are to be found in the Pacific Coast states, the Northwestern states including the Dakotas and Minnesota, and the Southwestern states induding Kansas, Colorado, Oklahoma, and Texas. In the Northwestern states and in Canada much prairie sod remains to be broken. Grades seldom axe objections 1 and the natural difficulties are wet weather, soft ground, hidden rocks, pot holes and buffalo wallows. In some sections brush is a handicap. Coal underlying parts of the region is used for fuel, or straw, either baled or loose. All plowing engines are equipped with wide drive wheels to prevent loss of power through slippage. The traction gearing is wider than on threshing engines. Bunkers for several hours' coal supply and tanks for from one to three hours' water supply are provided. In plowing, it is usually nccessary to take on supplies about once an hour. To withstand the strain these engines are of great weight, ranging from seven to twenty tons. They are rated from twenty to fifty horsepower, most of them being between twenty-five and thirty-five horsepower. . . . To secure water in some cases, permanent wells are sunk at convenient intervals and a small gasoline engine used for pumping." Letter from Edwin Haselhorst, Norbeck, S.D., September 13, 1947. ss» Personal records of E. G. Rosen. St. Paul, Minn. ss· A. Frank Mantle. "The Traction Plow in Western Canada," Threshermen's Review, October 1909, p. 7. 2ST Ellis, op. cit., p. 83. sss ibid., p. 84. ss»W. N. Springer, "Handling the Plowing Outfit," Threshermen's Review, October 1909, p. 21. «so Ellis, op. cit., p. 25. tsi Ibid., p. 16. sssBurness Grieg, "Traction Plowing," Canadian Thresherman and Farmer, September 1906, p. 4.

240

STEAM POWER ON T H E AMERICAN FARM

233 Ellis, op. cit., p. 26. 234 Personal records of E. G. Rosen, Si. Paul, Minn., pp. 2-16. -•35 Ibid., p. 24. -•"•o Emma Olson Wik. "Sweden to America; A Story of Pioneering on the American Frontier" (MS, Silver Creek, Nel)., 1945), p. 15. -·" Threshermen's Review, November 1908, pp. 24-25. a: