What is the best Agricultural Inventions?
An agricultural inventions have changed the face of farming around the world
There are ten major inventions in America that play an important role in agriculture
Agricultural Inventions 1700s
A timeline of important agricultural inventions in the first half of the 19th and 20th centuries
It’s been over ten years since the first issue of Farm Collector landed in the mailboxes of the first subscribers, so it seems fitting to celebrate a Ten Most column on the history of farm machinery and then credit one person for some of the advancements in farming technology could, but most were the product of many curious and clever people who gradually improved the work of their predecessors
Cotton Gin:
In colonial times, cotton cloth was more expensive than linen or wool because of the extreme difficulty of separating seed from the clinging fibers
One man could pick the seeds from only about 1 pound of cotton fiber per day
In 1793, Eli Whitney built a machine consisting of a row of close-set wheels with saw-like teeth around their perimeters
The wheels protruded through narrow slits between metal bars into a hopper filled with cotton bolls
As the wheels revolved, the teeth caught the cotton fibers and pulled them through the slits, which were too narrow for the seeds to pass, thus separating the two
Reaper/Binder:
Small grains had been harvested by hand for centuries, cut with sickles or scythes, hand-raked and tied into sheaves
Grain harvesting machines first appeared in Great Britain in about 1800, and in the U
S
a decade or two later, but most failed
Obed Hussey and Cyrus McCormick developed successful reapers during the 1830s
McCormick’s machine became the more popular one; today he is credited with inventing the reaper
Thresher:
When grain was being cut by hand, the method for separating the kernels from the straw was equally slow and labor intensive
Grain was hauled to a barn where it was spread on a threshing floor and either beaten with hand flails or trampled by animals
That knocked the kernels free of the straw, which was then raked away
Agricultural Inventions 1800s
The remaining mixture was winnowed by tossing it into the air where the wind was relied upon to blow the chaff and lighter debris away from the heavier grain, which fell back onto the threshing floor
Steam Engine:
Until the end of the 18th century, American farmers relied primarily upon their own strong backs and arms and those of family members, hired men or slaves
New farm machines then being developed required more power, so oxen, horses and mules were pressed into service
Stationary steam engines were used early on to run cotton gins and mills
Combined Harvester-Thresher:
By the 1920s the steam traction engine was on its way out, but it paved the way for the gasoline tractors that followed
Although a “traveling thrasher” was patented as early as 1828, the first successful machine was built by Hiram Moore in 1834
Moore’s combine successfully cut and threshed grain, although it had to be winnowed later
After the Civil War, big horse-drawn, ground-driven combines were developed in the wheat-growing regions of the Northwest
In 1871, B
F
Cook put a steam engine on a combine to drive the mechanism, decreasing the number of horses needed to pull the machine
Auto Truck:
Machinery, critters and crops, among other heavy things, all need to be moved around the farm or to market
Two-wheeled carts sufficed for early farmers
Soon 4-wheeled wagons became the norm and were universally used for a couple of centuries
It’s impossible to pin down the first motor truck, but steam-, electric- and gas-powered commercial vehicles made their appearance at about the turn of the 20th century and by 1910 were common in urban areas
The first real attempt to make a vehicle to replace the ubiquitous farm wagon was by International Harvester with its “Auto Wagon” introduced in 1907
Agricultural Inventions 1900s
Since that time farm trucks of all sizes have proliferated and today no self-respecting farmer is without his pickup
Gasoline Tractor:
Steam tractors required a lot of water and fuel (coal, wood or straw), and a trained engineer at the wheel
The internal combustion engine, developed in the 1890s, offered an alternative to steam
John Froehlich is generally credited with inventing the first successful tractor in 1892
The first commercially successful tractor was built in Charles City, Iowa, by Charles Hart and Charles Parr
Early tractors were big, heavy, awkward and none too reliable, but by 1920 the better ones had survived and were becoming hugely popular on American farms for heavy tillage and belt work
General Purpose Tractor:
During the 1920s, row-crop work such as planting and cultivating was still largely done by horses as tractors were too heavy and not versatile enough for those lighter jobs
Several lightweight row crop tractors had been tried, but most were not satisfactory
Several manufacturers offered motor cultivators during the ‘teens, but few farmers were willing to buy a machine that was used only a month or two each year
Rubber Tires:
Steel-lugged wheels limited speed, vibrated, shook bolts loose and quickly dug themselves into soft ground if they spun, not to mention what they did to the driver’s innards
The advantage of pneumatic tires over steel wheels in fuel economy and performance, not to mention driver comfort, sold farmers on their advantages and by 1940, 95 percent of tractors were ordered on rubber
Harvey Firestone’s dream of putting the farm on rubber was on its way to being reality
Hydraulic Implement Lift with Draft Control:
Irishman Harry Ferguson can claim credit for the first hydraulic lift with automatic draft control
By 1933, he had perfected a way of attaching an implement to a tractor by three arms
The tension load on the lower arms and the compression load on the upper arm caused the “virtual hitch” point to be near the tractor’s front axle, thus keeping the front end of the tractor on the ground
In addition, the top link compression load operated a hydraulic valve that caused the implement depth to be automatically regulated according to the draft needed to pull it
