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Olsen, series editor. AMERICAN Agricultural Implements A Review of Invention and Development IN THE AGRICULTURAL IMPLEMENT INDUSTRY OF THE UNITED STATES IN TWO PARTS PART ONE: General History of Invention and Improvement PART TWO: Pioneer Manufacturing Centers R. L. ARDREY CHICAGO: PUB1,ISHED BY THK AUTHOR COI'VKIGHTKl) 1894, IIY R. I,. AKDREV. T. INTRODUCTORY. <• THE year of the World's Columbian Exposition is a most advantageous time for issuing, in book form, a review of the development of the agri- cultural implement industry in America. To our improved methods in agriculture, more than to any other factor, excepting railroads, we owe the marvellous development of our resources during the past century, and a full share of the credit should be given to the inventors, beginning with Whitney just lOO years ago, who gave their lives, often in martyrdom, to the development of inventions, whose object was to make labor more effective in man's struggle with Mother Earth. If we had none of our modern implements of planting, cultivation, har- vesting and separation, Europe would look in vain to our shores for bread and clothing for her congested population, and the millions of our own cities would be to-day an ignorant peasantry. Empires in the past arose and fell and their places were utterly forgotten, save to the scribe or philosopher, for the masses — men, women and chil- dren — were so enslaved to the soil that they were helpless, after their mas- ters had slain each other in war or gone the way of dissipation. But in this nineteenth century man has been shaking off the shackles of manual toil, and has secured advantages of education and intercourse with his fellownien that lay a firm foundation for the future and insure against a relapse, in America, at least, into another slough of ignorance and helpless- ness. It is fitting that, in our celebration of the achievement of Columbus in the discovery of America, we should also remember the inventors who by power of mind over matter have freed their fellowmen. To these, whom the historian of the future will call truly great, this brief review of their Mork is dedicated. The author acknowledges with gratitude the kindness of C. W. Marsh, editor of the Farm Implement News, in authorizing the revision and use of his able historical articles published a few years ago. Mr. Marsh is well qualified to speak with authority in matters pertaining to the agricultural implement industry, as he was the inventor of the harvester, a machine which represents to-day more capital invested in its manufacture and use than any other single machine in the world, excepting the steam engine; and since retiring from its manufacture has been actively engaged for nearly ten years in editorial work that has kept him closely informed regarding the progress of every branch of the industry. It is to be regretted that Mr. Marsh could not have taken up this work, but editorial duties have pressed him too closely, and it has devolved upon the writer, who has undertaken it in the hope that four years' connection with Mr. Marsh's paper, nearly three years of that time as editorial assistant, has in some measure fitted him for the task. A PART I. CHAPTER I. The Development of the American Plow. THE first agricultural implement used by prehistoric man, as shown by remains found in peat bogs of England, France and other countries, was a hooked stick, or sometimes a stag's horn, adapted to the work of digging and stirring the soil in planting seed. This rude tool — it can scarcely be called an invention — developed in course of time into something more like a plow, the forked stick with a long branch to which animals were attached, and perhaps an artificial brace added to strengthen the other branch used as the share or "bottom." This style has been found illus- trated on an ancient monument in Asia Minor. Its antiquity is demonstrated by the fact that the plow, as represented on Egyptian monuments more than 3000 years B. C, shows a slight improvement over it. The Romans are also known to have used wooden plows of a very primitive type, with an im- provement in the days of the Tarquins of a handle, which allowed the plow- man to more easily hold the point in the ground. Chinese historians say that the Emperor Shen Neng, who ascended the throne of China 2737 B.C., "first fashioned timber into plows and taught the people the art of hus- bandry." The records of the past fail to show us when and where metal points or shares were first used. Several prophetic allusions are made in the Old Testament to the time when warriors would "beat their swords into plow shares," and it is known that ancient Egyptians and Assyrians had plows that were pointed or edged with copper and iron, but the time when metal was first used cannot be even guessed. In a later period, probably in the time of Cincinnatus and Cato, the Romans used a plow that was quite diflferent from the older patterns com- mon in various countries. J. Stanton Gould, in his report to the New York Agricultural Society in 1856, says that this plow "will be found to exactly agree with the description of the implement given by Virgil in the Georgics. The sole of the plow has two rectangular pieces of wood fixed to it on each side, forming an acute angle with it, in which the teeth (dentalia) are in- serted. This exactly answers the description of Virgil: 'Duplici aptantur dentalia dorsoi' (the teeth are fitted to the double back). These project b AMERICAN AGRICUIvTURAL IMPLEMENTS. obliquely upward, and perform the office of a mouldboard. The share was of metal." The plows of ancient times seem, however, to have been built only for the purpose of breaking and stirring the soil, the bottom having been invari- ably a simple wedge, with no power to turn a furrow. It is true that plows may have been made with one side straight like a modem landside, and with the other side extending out to push the loosened soil over and thus leave some- thing like a furrow, but " no one had as yet grasped the idea of combining two wedges in the same implement, nor had they any idea of the curves by which this could be effected." The practical combination of share and mouldboard remained to be discovered. Gould refers to a wheeled plow used in France for centuries, no one knows just how long, which seems to be the first feeble attempt to realize the idea of a mouldboard. Its model has been handed down unchanged for centuries. It had the principle of the twisted wedge, " raising up the earth first and then twisting it to the right. It is furnished with two wheels to keep it steady in the furrow, and a coulter of the modem form. It is a rude affair when compared with our modem implements, but it shows real genius in its author." It is well to note here that this is not the first use of either the wheel or coulter on a plow. Plows having the beams supported by two wheels, some of them approaching in form the two-wheeled sulky so popular a few years ago, were made by the Greeks 2000 years ago. The coulter was certainly known in the time of William the Conqueror, in the eleventh century, in England, if not earlier, for we read that at that time plows with their beams supported on wheels were very common, one of them being described as follows: "It was drawn by four oxen and fastened to them by ropes made of twisted willows, and sometimes by the skins of whales. It consists of a simple wooden wedge, covered with straps of iron, one side being placed parallel to the line of the plow's direction, the other sweeping over to the left hand, cleaning it from its own path and leaving an unobstructed furrow for the next slice. A coulter, not unlike those now in use, is inserted in the beam, and a wheel is placed in front to regulate the depth." Thus far, however, it would seem that no real inventor had appeared to contribute to the development of the plow, and even as late as fifty years ago in this country the usual method of plow-making was for the farmer to purchase the wood part of his plow from a "plow-wright (or often from the jack-of-all-trades wagon maker) and have it "ironed" by the local black- smith, although sometimes the wagon maker bought the irons and "stocked" them. The first English patent granted on a plow was to Joseph Foljambe, of Yorkshire, in 1720, he having invented a number of improvements on a crude style of plow, which had been brought from Holland. The bottom of Foljambe' s plow was of wood, with a sheet-iron covering on the wearing parts and a point of iron plate. The coulter was, of cour.se, mdde of iron. The point was conical in form and the furrow was raised by it and then turned over by the mouldboard. The handles and beam were better pro- portioned than any that had been in use previously, and the firiit clevis AMERICAN AGRICULTURAL IMPLEMENTS. THE CASCHKOM, HEBRIDES ISLANDS. ANCIENT SAXON PLOW. JAMES SMALL'S EAST LOTHIAN PLOW. FRA.MB OF THE EAST LOTHIAN PLOW S AMERICAN AGRICULTURAI, IMPLEMENTS. that is known to have been used on a plow was fitted to the beam. But this plow, although it was superior to anything then known, did not come into general use until James Small established his factory at Black Alder Mount, Scotland, in 1763, and began to manufacture and sell plows on what was then a large scale. In time he made many improvements, and the plow finally assumed the .style of the East Lothian, which gave general form and feature to all the common British plows since. The beam and handles were of wrought iron, the body frame and mould- board were cast, and the share was of wrought iron. Robert Ransome, of Ipswich, England, obtained a patent in 178-') for making the share of cast-iron, and in 1«03 for case-hardening or chilling the share, and Thomas Brown, of Alnwick, England, was engaged at the open- ing of this century in building plows of improved form and construction still more approaching the modern implement. The seed sown by Ransome in 1785 took root, and produced a manufacturing establishment, which to this day is one of the largest in England, having followed the industry through all the changes of a century. Howard, beginning about 1840, estab- lished a factory which has also continued to the present day, having con- tributed, from time to time, improvements and changes in patterns as de- manded by the progress of invention or the change in "fashion." In America, progress in the development of the plow was slow during colonial times, owing to the narrow policy of England in discouraging or prohibiting altogether the establishment of factories. The manner of mak- ing a plow a century ago was remarkably crude, judged by modern stan- dards. In the language of Gould: " A winding tree was cut down, and a mouldboard hewed from it, with the grain of the timber running as nearly along its shape as it could well be obtained. On to this mouldboard, to pre- vents its wearing out too rapidly, were nailed the blade of an old hoe, or thin straps of iron or wornout horseshoes. The landside was of wood, its base and sides shod with thin plates of iron. The share was of iron, with a hardened steel point. The coulter was tolerably well made of iron, steel edged, and locked into the share nearly as it does in the improved lock coulter of the present day (1856). The beam was usually a .straight stick; the handles, like the mouldboard, split from the crooked trunk of a tree, or as often cut from its branches, the crooked roots of the white ash being the favorite timber for plow handles in the northern states. The beam was set at any pitch fancy might dictate, with the handles fastened on almost at right angles with it, thus leaving the plowman little control over his imple- ment, which did its work in a very slow and most imperfect manner." It must be remembered, however, that in colonial times the land under culti- vation was very largely "new ground," or land recently cleared of timber, with a porous soil which was easily penetrated and stirred up. It had neither the stickiness nor tendency to bake of clay land which has long been under cultivation, nor the impenetrable network of leathery- grass roots which made the breaking of virgin prairie soil so difficult. And besides, farming was conducted on a far smaller scale then, for the cities being small and few in number, the market for farm products was limited, and the aver- age farmer contented himself with growing enough for his family, with a AMERICAX AGRICUI.TlTRAr, IMPIJiMlvNTS. 9 small surplus for purchasing the very few articles of commerce indulged in at that early day. Thomas Jefferson, the renowned statesman, was the first to bring theo- retical knowledge to the design and the construction of the mouldboard. Writing in 1788, he referred to the curves which should characterize a mouldboard, and said: "The offices of the mouldboard are to receive the sod after the share has cut under it, to raise it gradually and to recover it. The fore end of it should, therefore, be horizontal, to enter the sod, and the hind end perpendicular, to throw it over; the intermediate surface changing grad- ually from the horizontal to perpendicular. It should be as wide as the fur- row, and of a length suited to the con.struction of the plow." While Jeffer- son succeeded very well in using the experimental plows which he made, the time -was not yet ripe for the general adoption of his ideas, and his work was lost for a generation, until it was taken up and improved upon by Wood and later inventors. The first letters patent granted in America, on a plow, was in 1797, to Chas. Newbold, a farmer of Burlington, N. J. His specification was as fol- lows: "The subscriber, Chas. Newbold, of Burlington county. New Jersey, has invented an improvement in the art of plow making, as follows, viz. : The plow to be (excepting the handles and beam) of solid cast iron, con- sisting of a bar, sheath and mouldplate. The sheath serves a double pur- pose of coulter and sheath, and the mouldplate ser\'es for share and mould- board, that is, to cut and turn the furrow. The forms to be varied, retain- ing the same general principles, to meet the various uses, as well as inclina- tions of those who use them." Although Newbold's plow worked well, far better than tho.se in general use at that time, the farmers rejected it, on the plea that the cast iron "poisoned the land," and stimulated the growth of weeds, :;nd after spending 130,000 in trying to get it introduced, the inventor gave up the task in despair. During the twenty years following Newbold's invention, a number of patents on plows were issued, but nothing valuable was contributed to the art of plow building, and the rude "bull" plow with its wooden mouldboard still ruled the realm. Jethro Wood's invention, patented September 1, 1S19, ushered in a new era in the history of the plow, the era of manufacturing, as distinguished from the era of building in small quantities by blaoksmiths or "plow Wrights." In Wood's plow, cast iron was substituted for the woodt-n mould- board, landside and standard, and a ca.st iron point or share for the old •wrought, steel tipped share. But the most important part of Wood's invention ■wastheinieirAang^eabiliiy of parts. This it was that established the era of manufacturing, by making it possible for the farmer to replace a womout or broken casting with a new one from the factory. Wood also sought to form his mouldboard on scientific principles, so that the pressure o( the turning furrow would be evenly distributed on its surface, and thus avoid wearing it in spots. After many ups and downs. Wood succeeded in reducing every point of his invention to practice, and its merits soon won for it wide recognition, followed by a general demand from the farmers for the new plow; and then began the struggle which linally drove the noble inventor to his grave. A demand once created for the invention, others be- in AMERICAN AGRICULTURAL IMPLEMENTS. CORSICAN PLOW. NORTH RUBSIA.V PLOW "KOSOCLIA" SICILIAN PLOW. PLOW FROM SOUTH RUSSIA. PLOW OF CENTRAL RUSSIA. PLOW FROM CREMONA, ITALY. PLOW, DRAWN BY OXEN, FROM SARDINIA. ITALI.\N PLOW FROM LOMB.\RDV PLAINS. FRENCH PLOW. I.MPROVED FLEMISH PLOW. AMERICAN AGRICLXTURAI. IMPLEMENTS. 11 t;an to manufacture it — in wanton disregard of the inventor's rights, ac- quired by his work of a lifetime, and the expenditure of a fortune in his experiments — and in his efforts to enforce his rights in the courts his little remaining property was spent, and his children, after his death in 1834, were equally unsuccessful in securing reparation, although congress had, in 1833, extended the life of his patent fourteen years. In the words of Wm. H. Seward, secretary of state under Lincoln: "No citizen of the United States has conferred greater economical benefits on his country than Jethro Wood — none of her benefactors have been more inadequately rewarded." Manufacturers throughout the country having copied Wood's invention with alacrity, it was not long until cast iron plows were in general use, and for a generation or longer but little was done to improve his model, further than to make changes in detail, adapting it to the needs of different parts of the country. Joel Nourse was one of the noted plowmen of the generation succeeding Wood. He first started at Shrewsbury, Mass., but afterwards removed to Worcester, and in 1842, perfected the famous Eagle series, plows with a longei:.^teuldboard than Wood's, and with a greater turn, breaking the fur- row more thoroughly. The sales in the forties of Nourse's firm, (Ruggles, Nourse, Mason & Co.), were said to have reached 25,000 and 30,000 plows per year. THE INVENTION OF THE CHILLED PLOW. There remains to be noticed an important step in the perfection of the plows in use throughout the eastern states. Efforts to harden the wearing parts, and thus make them more durable, began almost with the first use of cast plows, but the chilling process was so little undS£Stood, that for more than half a cenfufy no one could master it. Credit for making thejchilled plow a practi^l success is due. tojames Oliver^ .who began experiments soon after establishing his plow~sfibp or factory at South Bend, Ind., in 1853. It is a fact worthy of note, that when cast or "grey iron" plows first came into use, made after the patterns of Wood, Nour.se and others, no complaints were heard in regard to scouring. But as the country grew older, and the soil, by repeated working, became dense and sticky, it was found that cast iron scoured with difficulty, or not at all. Hence the great demand that was heard among the next generation for a new kind of plow that would respond to the changed requirements. This demand was filled by the invention of the chilled plow, as was also the demand for a mouldboard that would with- stand more efficiently the wearing of gravelly or sandy soil. It was this general and unremitting demand that led Mr. Oliver to persevere in his efforts to produce a perfect chilled plow, in the face of as great obstacles as ever embarrassed an inventor. For years it seemed as though the problem would not be solved, so long did it require to produce a chilled mouldboard that would meet the varying requirements of the farmers, but success dawned at last, and with it a new epoch in agri- culture. Thomas Jefferson had formulated the design of an ideal mouldboard, and Jethro Wood had done much to realize this ideal, but of the cast plows in use when Mr. Oliver began his experiments, there were few that had AMERICAX AGRICULTURAI. IMPtEUHXTS. WOODEN MOni.nBOARD HORIZONTAI, SHARE PLOW, OF A CENTURY AGO JETHRO WOOD'S PLOW, PATENTED SEPT. 1, 1819. CHAS. NEWBOLD'S PLOW, PATENTED 1797. FIRST AMERICAN CASTIRON PLOW. ZADOK HARRIS' PLOW, 1819. SIB JOSMUA GIBBS STEEL PLOW, 1838. NOUBSE'S EAGLE PLOW, BUILT IN TBE "FORTIES" OLIVER'S CHILLED EDGE SHAKE, PATENTED JULY 29, 1879. OLIVER'S PATENT NOV. 18, 1873. AMERICAN AGRICULTURAL IMPLEMENTS. 13 mouldboards even approximating the best form by which lightness of draft, even distribution of the pressure of the soil over the wearing surface, and a properly laid furrow might be secured. Two fundamental defects had hitherto stood in the way of a successful chilled moulSb'oard. One was the frequency of soft spots or blow holes in the casting, making it .short lived, and the other was the extreme brittleness of chilled metal, and the risk of breakage in a mouldboard of convenient weight and thickness. A remedy for the first was finally discovered in using hot water under certain conditions in the chills, and a way was soon after- wards found for removing the brittleness. By a peculiar annealing process it was made possible to toughen the metal without softening it, and so to give it the strength that would enable it to endure the hard usage of general purpose work on a million farms. With this discovery the last , barrier in the way of a successful chilled plow was removed. In their general construction the cast and chilled plows of the east have been so different that it will be proper to follow them a little farther before taking up steel plows. The two classes may thus be kept distinct. Ap- parently the first patent covering a practical device for adjusting the beam laterally in a plow was issued to E. Ball, of Canton, Ohio, more famous as a reaper inventor, the patent bearing date of March 23, 1852. It showed a standard with a double head, with the beam held to it by two bolts in such a way that it could be adju.sted both laterally and vertically. The beam was cut off at the rear of the standard. R. A. Graham's patent, Oct. 4, 1853, showed a lug on the landside handle to which the heel of the beam was attached, a peculiarly arranged set screw giving the beam a lateral adjustment. This patent also claimed a screw-bolt in the bottom of the handles, arranged as an adjustable brace for the mouldboard. Still another method of shifting a beam laterally was shown in the patent of A. W. Stoker, Sept. 11, 186C, in which the handle brace was a rod extending through the heel of the beam, a portion of the rod being threaded to permit of holding the beam in position with nuts. The slotted handle brace now in general use on plows that are adapted to either two or three horses, was patented by James Oliver, Feb. 21, 1871. In this patent Mr. Oliver covered also a share with a fin cast upon it extending'upward from the landside edge of the point so as to cut the soil or sod. June 18, 1872, the same inventor patented his peculiar standard by which the beam is brought more directly over the line of draft, the shin extending to the side past the landside edge of the beam. This patent also covered the peculiar Oliver wheel for a wood beam plow, one arm of the standard being slotted to permit a vertical adjustment, and the other arm flattened on its end and fitted under the beam, where it is held by a hook in a way to permit alignment of the wheel when the beam is shifted. In his patent of Nov. 18, 1873, Mr. Oliver shows a share with a coulter or shin cast as a part of it, to be seated against the front edge of the mouldboard, and also the sloping landside, a feature that has ever since distinguished his plows in the trade. A later patent, issued July 29, 1879, and several suc- ceeding it, covered for Mr. Oliver the process of chilling the nose and cut- ting edge of a share. 14 AMERICAN AGRICULTURAX IMPLEMENTS. The Patent Office records show many efforts to produce a cast share with a slip or reversible nose, the names of M. M. Bowers and James Oliver ap- pearing oftener than others, and their inventions having a more practical appearance. Mr. Bowers' first patent appears in 187-3, and his last in 1880. An important patent was also issued to Mr. Oliver May 8, 1877, for a jointer or coulter holder. It covered a holder rigidly secured to the standard of the plow, and ha^^ng a slotted plate fitting the under side of the beam, to which it was held, as well as a slotted ami extending downward, to which the jointer or hanging coulter blade is attached. STEEL WALKING PLOWS. When hard}' emigrants from the Old World landed upon our eastern shores to establish settlements, they found that in the land of their dreams, ' 'flowing with milk and honey, ' ' the advantages of free farms were largely off- set by the disadvantages of pioneer life,of clearing away the forest, and pre- paring the soil for the growth of their crops. They had new proof of the fact that the treasures of the soil can onlj' be unlocked b}' patient and persistent application. The experience of settlers east of the Alleghenies had its coun- terpart in the pioneer work of those who settled in the vast prairie region of the Jlississippi valley, extending a thousand miles westward from Ohio. Where the ax and the ' ' grub hoe ' ' had been needed to subdue the eastern land, the prairie breaking plow, with a share as sharp as the woodman's ax, was required to penetrate the turf of a thousand years' growth and un- cover the inexhaustible soil that lay shielded beneath the hard, matted roots of the prairie grasses and weeds. Never in historj' had such a prob- lem confronted the land-seeking emigrant; but, with ready ingenuity, he forged with blacksmith's tools a new kind of plow to meet the new require- ments. The old principles of a beam, handles, a mouldboard, standard and share were all right, but the mouldboard must be made with a long, easy curve, and the share with an edge of the finest steel. In late years, prob- ably early in the "forties," a few curving rods were attached to the share in place of a mouldboard. The plow was made of exceptional strength, for it was the rule to use three to six yokes of oxen in breaking. With the problem of breaking overcome, it might have been expected that the soil would become tractable and obedient to the touch of its mas- ter, but yet another obstacle was to be surmounted. The old wooden plows, and those of cast iron that were coming in from the east, or of "boiler plate" that were made" by local blacksmiths, would not scour in the light vegetable mould after it had been stirred up by cultivation during several seasons. Various remedies were tried, but without avail, until it was dis- covered that a high grade of steel would clean itself and do satisfactory work. Who it was that made this discovery it would be difficult to deter- mine, but the first steel plow of which there is any record was made in 183,3 in Chicago in the woods near where the Illinois Central station at Twelfth street now stands. The maker of this plow was John Lane, whose son, the inventor of soft center plow steel, was a witness of the incident, and yet lives in Chicago to tell the interesting story. A rude forge of logs had been built by Mr. Lane, who was a blacksmith, and to a tree that stood by it a bellows was hung. AMERICAN AGRICUI,TURAI. 1MPI,KMENTS. 15 NATIVE PI,OW.PHIl,IPI'IXKISLAN-DS. PERSIAN PLOW. ANO THER STYLE, 1>H II.I Pl'I N K ISLAX DS. MEXICAN PLOW. HEBREW PLOW, BIBLE TIMES. JiVANESE PLOW JAPANESE PLOW. JAPANESE HAND PLOW. MEXICAN PLOW. 16 AMEiaCAN AGRICUI,tURAL IMPLEMENTS. An old saw, probably a worn out "crosscut," had been cut and deprived of its teeth, and three lengths of it were used to make a mouldboard of the requisite width, another piece forming the share and an "anchor wing" of iron, the three-cornered shin piece shown in illustration. For several years it was impossible to obtain anything but saws from which to make a plow, and old ones were gathered up and used until the supply was exhausted, and new ones had to be purchased. In 1836 or 1837 plow makers like Lane were able to obtain from Pittsburg saw blanks or plates, seven or eight inches wide, in which the teeth had not been cut, two widths being sufiBcient for a mouldboard. Two or three years later, as nearly as the younger Lane can remember, a special width of steel coula be had from Pittsburgh, rolled twelve inches wide, and this gave quite a boom to the infant industry. It was a plow with a mouldboard made of old saws that John Deere^ then a blacksmith, built in 1837, after he had come west and settled in Grand Detour, 111. The success of the first two which he made led him to build a considerable number, for which he found a ready sale. This again inspired him to higher efforts, and he ordered from abroad the steel which could not be obtained in this country in the quantity or quality he desired, and went still further in his improvements. "The first slab of plow steel ever rolled in the United States was rolled by Wm. Woods at the steel works of Jones &• Quigg and shipped to John Deere in Moline, 111.," says James M. Swank, in his "History of Iron and Steel In All Ages." Mr. Deere removed to Moline from Grand Detour in 1847 and founded the business which is now carried on, perpetuating his name. His partner at Grand Detour, Major .\ndrus, continued at that place until later years. Wm. Parlin, another pioneer in the days when the Illinois prairies were settled and broken, worked in much the same way, beginning in 1842, and laid the foundation for what is claimed to be the oldest permanent steel plow factory in the west. Many other names could be mentioned of men, who, with the blacksmith's hammer and sledge, brought forth in limited num- bers what was then the most important of all agricultural implements. But few patents have been issued affecting the form or general appear- ance of the steel plow, which has always been made on simpler lines than the chilled plow. The manufacture of steel for plows used on the prairies of the west was revolutionized in 1868, by the invention of "soft center" steel for mould- boards, shares and landsides. For a time during the infant years of the industry plows were made from a high grade of saw steel, but before long cheaper material was substituted, with the result that plows made of it would not scour in all kinds of soil. Caae-hardened German steel was then tried, but it was not generally satisfactory, chiefly Secause of the difficulty in tempering it uniformly. In 1862 an invention was patented that in some measure paved the way for the introduction of "soft center" steel, but it did not come into general favor, although it is still used successfully by two well-known plow manufacturers. It was covered by the patent of Wm. Morrison, and consisted in the use of a cast steel plate for the face of a mouldboard, share or landside, welded upon and strengthened by a backing AMERICAN AGRICULTURAI, IMPLEMENTS. 17 ANOTHER STYLE PRAIRIE EREAKINO PLOW. FRAIRIK BREAKING PLOW OF SO YEARS AGO. THE FIRST STEEL PLOW, 1833. JOHN LANE'S PATENT, 1868, "SOFT CEN- TER" STEEL. GILPIN MOORE, JDNE 29, 1875. GILPIN MOORE'S PATENT, JTNE 29, 1875. W. L. CASADAV'S PATENT, MAY 2, 1S?6. W. I.. CASADAV'S PATENT, SEPT. 6, 1881, 18 AMERICAN AGRICULTURAI^ IMPLEMENTS. plate of soft iron. The great defect in it, which prevented its general in- troduction, was its tendency to warp in tempering, which could onl}- be overcome by a tedious and unsatisfactory method of holding it in clamps. The iron and steel would not expand and contract together. John Lane, above referred to, some time prior to applying for his pat- ent, which was issued Sept. V>, 1868, conceived the idea of making a plate of three layers, two outer plates of steel, with a central one of soft iron or steel. When made in this way a mouldboard or other shape would not warp enough to injure the scouring or turning qualities of the plow, as the one layer of steel balanced the other in heating and tempering, and the soft plate in the middle made the combination stronger than any form of steel that had ever been used. The importance of this invention can hardly be estimated. On many kinds of prairie soil plowing was done with great difficulty, and in some sections it could not be done at all with the old style plows, except under favorable conditions. The new kind of steel was like oil upon troubled waters, and proved itself worth millions annually to the farmers of the west. Its inventor was content with a royalty of about 3 cents on a plow, yet this amounted to a sum that would have made Jethro Wood one of the wealthiest men of his day. It was of the steel plows that turn the prairies of the west that Mr. Marsh wrote in his beautiful "plow sentiment" in lii85 as follows: "The young farmer, if possessed of any spirit, as he guides a well set, keen cut- ting American plow through the ground behind a spanking team, his well made implement answering promptly to his touch, shaving the roots, and covering all with the rushing furrow as it ripples from the polished mould- board, feels an exhilarating interest in his work, akin to that of the sailor who plows the waves with a light, trim vessel under a spanking breeze. There is the same sort of mastery over the elements and a like freedom of action in governing them. In my observation of foreign farming it seemed to me that the marked superiority of American farmers, in spirit and intelli- gence, was largely due to the finish and capacity of the agricultural imple- ments in use in this country. "American inventors and manufacturers have done much by providing such superior tools, to educate and elevate our operating classes; while on the other hand, such intelligence demands from manufacturers a continu- ance of their best efforts, and the combined result is manifest in the fact that as a working people we are infinitely in advance of all others. We labor with zest and a masterful spirit because our tools are in accord and give us perfect command over the work in hand. What a contrast between our plows and the thing so called in Russia, for instance, and what a con- trast also between the respective operators. Like plow, like man. On the one side are brightness, keenness and adaptability; on the other coarseness, clumsiness and stolidity. "Americans whittle because they carry finely finished and keen cutting knives, and it is a pleasure to use them. The same pleasure exists in the use of our machinery, generally. Not so on the other side; their imple- ments excite no impulse to operate them nor pleasure in their operation. AMERICAN AGRICULTURAL IMPLEMENTS. 19 If your knife was but a piece of hoop iron edged, you would have no im- pulse to whittle. A European peasant's plow beside one of ours affords a like comparison. It does seem as if the general diffusion of intelligence throughout the world, by paper, steam and electricity, would ere long awaken the foreign tiller of the soil, and penetrate even his stolid soul with an ambition for better things than what have come down to him scarcely improved for a thousand years and he ought to begin the new life with an American plow." SULKY AND GANG PLOWS. Although sulky_ridi.ng, plows are now .eminently practical implements and are in general use throughout the west, a brief period of thirty years would cover their development. Twenty years of this time were taken up by the invention and manufacture of various styles of the old two-wheel sulky, the three-wheel plows, now so popular, having been made practical for general introduction within the past ten years. So many patents were granted during the reign of the old sulky that they present the aspect of a pathless wilderness, one that the author has no^ intention of exploring. It may be in order, however, to notice briefly a fetv of the pioneer patents on wheel plows or those on sulkies which became popular. The first patent that appears in this class was granted to H. Brown, March 9, 1844, and covers an arrangement of plow bases in a gang. The next, issued to E. Goldthwait, Nov. 26, 1851, shows a plow with two wheels sup- porting the forward end of the beam, the plow being constructed substan- tially like a wood beam walking plow. A patent was issued to C. R. Brinckerhoff, Oct. 11, 1853, on a plow which was almost the same in general form, though differing in details of construction and adjustment. Several patents were granted on gangs prior to that of M. Turley, Dec. 9, 1856, which shows a sulky with one base. During the years following patents -were issued at frequent intervals to inventors in various parts of the country, •covering the arrangement and adjustment of sulky and gang plows. One of the first sulky plows to be made practical for introduction into •general use was the Davenport, based on patents issued to F. S. Davenport, Feb. 9, 18 64, for a gang plow. Robert Newton, of Jerseyville, 111., in 1864 ■converted one of Davenport's gangs into a three-horse plow, with one six- teen-inch base, a three-horse evener and rolling coulter, and used it success- fully, making many improvements which were found necessary, such as to change the position of the tongue, putting it between the land horses. Mr. Newton met with many discouragements, but persevered and was able to sell twenty-six sulky plows in 1865 in the state of Illinois. From this small beginning he saw the trade grow until in one year 36,000 plows of this type were sold by one house, he having captured in the meantime ninety- one out of 107 field-trial awards. By 1868 there were several practical sulkies in the field, and an important trial was held at Des Moines in that year. Many other trials were held in the years following, and at St. Louis in 1873, there were sixteen sulky plows entered in competition, more than had ever before been brought together. January 19, 1875, a patent was granted to Gilpin Moore, on a sulky that became widely known as manufactured at Moline by Deere & Company. 20 AMERICAN AGRICULTURAL IMPLEMENTS. May 2, 1876, a patent was granted to W. L. Casaday, reissued Nov. 13, 1877, on the famous Casaday sulky, made by the Oliver Chilled Plow Works, which was the first to do away with the landside and use a wheel set at an angle against the furrow to support the plow. Other important patents were granted to Casaday in the years following on adjustments for this plow. In 1884 the first of the three-wheel plows was introduced in the trade by the Moline Plow Company, based on patents that had been issued to G. W. Hunt. The ultimate success of this type of plow inspired invent- ors everywhere to activity in the new field, and many improvements and variations have been recorded in the Patent Office in the intervening years. To enter into a description of all of them would be impossible, and it is too early in their development for the evolution of the trade to show what principles are destined to triumph and become the standard. For the past forty years inventors have worked on the problem of steam plowing. The favorite plan in England has been to draw a gang of plows back and forth across the field by a cable driven by an engine atone side, or often by two engines, one on each side of the plot. Many of these outfits went into use, and at least one or two were imported into this country and used for a time. The plan proved a clumsy one, however, and has been almost entirely abandoned abroad. In this country the popular plan has been to draw a gang of plows behind a traction engine. In some cases a modified form of threshing engine has been used, of sixteen or twenty-horse power or larger. Excel- lent results have been obtained, and many outfits of this type are now in use. During the past ten years the needs of wheat ranches in California and elsewhere have developed a special form of engine for plowing, harvesting and similar work. As built by Jacob Price at the J. I. Case Works in Ra- cine, and by the Benicia Agricultural Works, Daniel Best and others in Cali- fornia, this engine has assumed a tricycle form, the weight of the boiler and engine resting on two very high, wide tread wheels, with a third wheel in front of castor type for easy steering. A high pressure, force draft boiler is used, and small, high-speed engines, developing forty to eighty-horse power, according to the size of the outfit. Such engines are in general use on large farms in the west, drawing twelve, fifteen and sometimes eighteen, twelve-inch plows, and turning over twenty-five to fifty acres per day. CHAPTER II. Harrows. ALTHOUGH the harrow is of far less antiquity than the plow, it is a more difficult matter to trace its origin and development. The first harrow used by man was undoubtedly nothing more than the branch of a tree, and it is equally probable that the next stage of development was a crude wooden frame with wooden teeth, or possibly a forked timber with a piece extend- ing across the rear from one prong to the other. A peculiar form of A frame harrow, shown in our illustration, was used by the ancient Romans, who also had a kind of smoothing harrow. Pliny says: "After seed is put in the ground harrows with long teeth are drawn over it." In the Bible it is said of King David, about 1033 B. C, in describing his treatment of the men of Rabbah, that "he cut them with saws and toothed harrows of iron and with axes." Other references are made in the Bible to harrows as a means of torture, but no mention is found of their use in agri- culture. We may infer, however, that they were generally used for that purpose, and that their adaptability as a means of torture in those days of cruelty and bloodthirstiness was only incidental. The Japanese have used from time immemorial disk harrows, like that shown in our illustration, which, it will be observed, has smoothing blades or teeth running behind the disks. A roller with teeth is also of unknown antiquity in Japan, and both it and the disk harrow are in common use to-day in that country. , . Harrows maybe properly divided into three general classes; spike tooth, "/ disk and'St)ring tooth. The first two, as we have just seen, are of remote antiquity, the spike tooth being probably the older, as wooden teeth would be naturally used before disks were invented. The spring tooth is an inven- tion of the past generation. The spike tooth harrow of the early settlers in the west was so simple in construction that the frame was usually home- made or made to order at the village wagon-maker's, the teetli being forged of iron by the village blacksmith. Aside from changes in frame and manner of hitching, the only improvement of which this harrow was susceptible was giving the point of the teeth a backward pitch to thus make them more effective in smoothing the surface and crushing clods. With the cheapen- ing of iron and steel, however, came the practicability of making the frame of iron and the teeth of steel. Then a lever to change in an instant the pitch of the teeth was invented by an Iowa man early in the "seventies" and the spike tooth harrow as made by plow manufacturers and others and largely sold throughout the west, waj perfected. The first patent in the United States for a revolving disk for pulverizing the soil was granted Aug. 7, 1847, to G. Page, and showed a single disk used 22 AMERICAN AGRICULTURAL IMPLEMENTS. as a side part of a peculiar form of plow. For the arrangement of disks in a gang, a patent was issued June 27, 1854, to H. M. Johnson, this invention seeming to lay the foundation for the modern disk harrow, although in a previous patent in 1846, disks were shown as an attachment to a seeder, following behind to pulverize the ground and cover the seed, with a rake attachment bringing up the rear. S. G. Randall patented in 1859 a combination of a broadcast seeder and two gangs of disks set at an angle. With this invention as a basis on which to build, our inventors and manu- facturers went on from step to step, making improvements and changes, all of which have resulted in the various forms of disk harrows now on the market. The manufacture of such harrows began in the "seventies" in New York, and about 1880 prominent manufacturers in the west became interested in the trade, which has developed largely in their hands. The spring tooth, as generally used in harrows of this class, was in- vented by David L. Garver, of Hart, Mich., and patented in J8£9.- For eight years the inventor made unsuccessful efforts to introduce his harrow, only making a few. At this time D. C. Reed, of Kalamazoo, became in- terested in the harrow, and endeavored to establish the manufacture of it. Finding Garver's invention incomplete, he improved it by the ad- dition of an adjustable clip for holding the teeth in any position desired, which he patented in 1877. This improvement made the new implement a successful one, and the demand for it became general among the farmers, especially in the eastern and central states. Many inventors sought fame in the new field, and patents on new devices and variations of old ones multiplied, all being subordinate during its life to the Garver patent on the spring tooth. D. C. & H. C. Reed & Co., of Kalamazoo, were the first to begin manufacturing in the west, followed a year later by Chase, Taylor & Co., and by others. In the east G. B. Olin & Co. at Canandaigua, N. Y., acquired an interest in the Garver patent and were pioneers in manufactur- ing. As new manufacturers came into the field patent litigation increased, and by the fall of 1890 matters had fallen into so much of a tangle that it was deemed best by leading houses to consolidate their interests in patents, which numbered several hundred, into a. corporation to be known as the National Harrow Co. This was accomplished, and the company was made trustee or owner of all the patents, the different manufacturers, originally fourteen or fifteen in number, taking licenses to manufacture. In time others were taken into the fold, and at present the licensees number about twenty-five. Within the past year a consolidation of manufacturing inter- ests has been effected, several large houses turning over their business to a new company, known as the Standard Harrow Co. Of late years several new types of harrows have been brought before the trade, notably an invention of La Dow, a spading harrow, manufact- ured at Brockport, N. Y., by D. S. Morgan & Co., the old reaper house, and the Clark "cutaway" harrow, made at Higganum, Conn. AMERICAN AGRICULTURAL I^;PLEME^'TS. 23 PRIMITlVi; UKUSH HARROW FIRST IMPROVESIENT, CROSS CAR HARROW. ROMAN SPIKE TOOTU HARROW JAPANESE DISK HARROW. JAPANESE TOOTHED ROLLER. CARVER SPRING TOOTH HARROW, CHAPTER III. Grain Drills. UNDOUBTEDLY the first method of putting seed in the ground by prim- itive man was to make holes with his stag's horn or crooked stick and drop in the seed, covering it afterwards. Broadcast seeding probably origi- nated in the valley of the Nile, where, after the water had subsided, a farmer could sow his seed and drive sheep over the ground or go over it with a brush harrow or plow. The first trace of a seeding machine that is found in history is an Assyrian drill used many centuries before Christ, a repro- duction of it being found on the Aberdeen "black stone," of the time of Esarhaddon, 080 B.C. "It was a rude implement, having a mouldboard made from a round stick of toughened wood, with a tongue and handles attached. In the rear of the plow point was attached a bowl-shaped hopper, supported upon a hollow standard, through which seed passed to the furrow, and was covered by the turned furrow falling back upon it." The Chinese have a kind of wheelbarrow seeder with hollow teeth which draws furrows and drops the seed, and it is claimed that this implement has been used for ages. It is said that iu Italy about the year ICOO a. d., a seeder running on two wheels and supporting a seed-box on its axle, was used. It was "mounted on two wheels, the axle passing through the seed-box, on the bottom of which was a series of holes opening into an equal number of metal tubes or funnels, through which the seed was conducted to the ground. The fronts of the tubes, at their lower ends, were shaped somewhat like plowshares, and were designed to make small furrows into which the seed dropped." Several efforts were made during the sixteenth century by English in- ventors to perfect a seeding machine, and their machines may have worked well in the hands of the inventors, but were soon lo.st sight of and forgot- ten. One machine by an unknown inventor on the continent was manu- factured and patented about 1664, and in 1669 John Evelyn presented one to the Philosophical Society of London, and it is even claimed an agent was appointed in London for its sale. The machine was attached to the "stilts" of a plow, behind, and consisted of a seed-box having a cylinder fur- nished with wheels to distribute the seed, which was dropped regularly in the furrow. The greatest contribution to the early development of grain drills was made by Jethro Tull in the eighteenth century. In 1731, in a work which he published, entitled, "Horse-hoeing Husbandry," he argued that grain and seed should not be sown broadcast, but should be planted in rows or drills so as to admit of hoeing by horse power with proper implements. His first drill was constructed so as to sow wheat or turnips, three rows at a time. 24 AMERICAN AGRICULTURAL IMPLEMENTS. 25 ENGLISH WUEELBAKROW SEEDCH, 132U. =^ FOSTER, JESSUP & BROWN'S FORCE FEED, KOV. 4. 1851. COOKE'S GRAIN DRILL. EARLV ENGLISH INTENTION. C. P. BROWN'S PATENT, OCT. 9, 1;6(.', FORCE FEED. FATRIC &. BICKFORD, NOV. 26, 1867. FORCE FEED J. P. FULGHUM OCT 30, 1377. FORCE FRED 26 AMERICAN AGRICUI, and to regulate the depth of planting as described." This second patent of Mr. Brown's was re-issued Nov. 10, 1857, and again Dec. 11, 1860. As re-issued it covered: Placing seats of driver and dropper so that one balanced the other; making driver's seat adjustable so he could put more or less of his weight on the-seeding apparatus and thus regulate the depth; hanging the seeding apparatus on hinged joints so itcould be raised out of the ground and carried on the wheels and tongue; a stop for preventing rear part of frame from descending too low when the for- ward part was raised and carried; and finally, an improvement in drop- ping device, by which, with one lever, the seed passages could be opened and closed at regular intervals to pass measured quantities. The first patent on a marker was granted to E. McCormick, Oct. 16, 1855, for a device projecting from the end of the axle. F. Goodwin, of Astoria, N. Y., March 3, 1857, showed in his patent the first marker that could be changed from one side to the other, but did not make any claim on it, and Kuschke and Merkel, of St. Louis, in their patent of May '26, 1857, made no claim for their markers, one on each side of the jjlanter, ar- ranged so as to be folded over the planter when not in use. The marker as used to-day was shown in the invention of jarvis Case, of La Fayette, Ind., whose patent, under date of Dec. 1, 1857, showed a marker having a double- edged shoe, and hinged so that it could be turned over to mark on either side, or be raised clear of the ground in turning. Many other inventors contributed their ideas and work to the evolu- tion of the modern planter, which represents the simplest and best devices of all combined into one, though of course there are points of difference in nearly all the planters of standard makers. J. W. Vandiver in 1863 patented adjustable covering shares, a feature of the old Vandiver planter made at Quincy, since improved by J. C. Barlow, his associate and the head of the Barlow Corn Planter Co. Gait & Tracy, of Sterling, 111., were large manu- facturers of planters of the "open heel " drop pattern in the early days, be- ginning in 1867, and they contributed many improvements. An early patent of Geo. W. Brown shows the principle of the rotary drop, in which the dropping plate is rotated by intermittent steps, moving forward with either a right or left motion of the dropping lever. The Deere & Mansur Co., of Moline, 111., are accredited with pioneer work in adapting this rotary drop to a check-rower. The Moline Plow Co. introduced a. few years ago the principle of gearing the dropping mechanism to the wheel of the planter so as to drop one kernel at ^ time into the valve. The advantage of this de- vice, which has been generally adopted by manufacturers, is that the corn can, if desired, be planted in hills with a check- row attachment, or the check-rower can be taken off and the corn drilled in. The Fuller & John- son Mfg. Co. of Madison, Wis., have introduced what they term a "force; AMURICAX AGRICULTURAL IMl'LKMKNTS. 33 D. S. ROCKWELL'S PATENT, 1839. GEO. W BROWN'S riBsl I'LANTDK, 1853. M. ROBBINS. PAir.NT, IShT, G. D. HAWOUTH'S PATENT, 1870. 34 AMERICAN AGRICUI^TURAI, IMPLEMENTS. feed,"