CHAPTER XVI.

THE REAPER. EARLY ENGLISH MACHINES--MACHINE OF PATRICK BELL--THE HUSSEY REAPER--MCCORMICK’S REAPER AND ITS GREAT SUCCESS--RIVALRY BETWEEN THE TWO AMERICAN REAPERS--SELF RAKERS--AUTOMATIC BINDERS--COMBINED STEAM REAPER AND THRESHING MACHINE--GREAT WHEAT FIELDS OF THE WEST--STATISTICS. In the harvest scenes upon the tombs of ancient Thebes the thirsty reaper is depicted, with curved sickle in hand, alternately bending his back to the grain and refreshing himself at the skin bottle. For more than thirty centuries did man thus continue to earn his bread by the sweat of his brow. Even to the present time the scythe, with its cradle of wooden fingers, is occasionally met with, and it is to the older generation a familiar suggestion of the sweat, toil, bustle and excitement of the old harvest time. But all this has been changed by the advent of the reaper, and ere long the grain cradle will hang on the walls of the museum as an ethnological specimen only. The first reaper of which we find historical evidence is that described by Pliny in the first century of the Christian Era (A. D. 70). He says: “The mode of getting in the harvest varies considerably. In the vast domains of the province of Gaul a large hollow frame, armed with comb-like teeth, and supported on two wheels, is driven through the standing grain, the beasts being yoked behind it (in contrarium juncto), the result being that the ears are torn off and fall within the frame.” This crude machine has in late years been many times re-invented, and it finds a special application to-day for the gathering of clover seeds, and is called a “header.” The first attempt of modern times to devise a reaper was the English machine of Pitt, in 1786, which followed the principle of the old Gallic implement, in that it stripped the heads from the standing grain. The Pitt machine, however, had a revolving cylinder on which were rows of comb teeth, which tore off the heads of grain and discharged them into a receptacle. In 1799 Boyce, of England, invented the vertical shaft, with horizontally rotating cutters. In 1800 Mears devised a machine employing shears. In 1806 Gladstone devised a front-draft, side-cut machine, in which a curved segment-bar with fingers gathered the grain and held it while a horizontally revolving knife cut the same. In 1811 Cumming introduced the reel, and in 1814 Dobbs described a wheelbarrow arrangement of reaper in which he used the divider. In 1822 the important improvement of the reciprocating knife bar was made by Ogle, which became a characteristic feature of all subsequent successful reapers. It was drawn by horses in front. The cutter bar projected at the side. It had a reel to gather the grain to the cutter, and the grain platform was tilted to drop the gavel. In 1826 Rev. Patrick Bell, of Scotland, devised a reaper that had a movable vibrating cutter working like a series of shears, a reel, and a traveling apron, which carried off the grain to one side. This machine was pushed from behind, and, with a swath of five feet, cut an acre in an hour. It was, however, for some reason laid aside till 1851, when it was reorganized and put in service at the World’s Fair in London in competition with the American machines. All the earlier experiments in the development of the reaper were made in England. Grain raising was in its infancy in the United States, and near the end of the Eighteenth Century the Royal Agricultural Society of England had stimulated its own inventors by offering a prize for the production of a successful reaper, and continued thus to offer it for many years. There is no evidence, however, that the preceding machines attained any practical results, and it remained for the fertility of American genius to invent a practical reaper which satisfactorily performed its work, and continued to do so. Quite a number of patents for reapers were granted to American inventors in the early part of the century, among which may be mentioned that to Manning, of Plainfield, N. J., May 3, 1831, which embodied finger bars to hold the grain and a reciprocating cutter bar with spear-shaped blades. [Illustration: FIG. 149.--PATENT OFFICE DRAWING, HUSSEY’S REAPER, DECEMBER 31, 1833.] Cyrus H. McCormick, of Virginia, and Obed Hussey, of Maryland, were the men who brought the reaper to a condition of practical utility. The commercial development of their machines was practically contemporaneous, and their respective claims for superiority had about an equal number of supporters among the farmers of that day. Hussey, originally of Cincinnati, but afterwards of Maryland, was the first to obtain a patent, which was granted December 31, 1833. An illustration of the patent drawing is given in Fig. 149. It embodied a reciprocating saw tooth cutter _f_ sliding within double guard fingers _e_. It had a front draft, side-cut, and a platform. The cutter was driven by a pitman from a crank shaft operated through gear wheels from the main drive wheels. His specification provided for the locking or unlocking of the drive wheels; also for the hinging of the platform, and states that the operator who takes off the grain may ride on the machine. [Illustration: FIG. 150.--PATENT OFFICE DRAWING, McCORMICK’S REAPER, JUNE 21, 1834.] On June 21, 1834, Cyrus H. McCormick, of Virginia, obtained a patent on his reaper. In Fig. 150 appears an illustration of his patent drawing. This had two features which were not found in the Hussey patent, viz., a reel on a horizontal axis above the cutter, and a divider L, at the outer end of the cutter, which divider projected in front of the cutter, and separated in advance the grain which was to be cut from that which was to be left standing. McCormick’s machine had two cutters or knives, reciprocated by cranks in opposite directions to each other. This feature he afterward abandoned, adopting the single knife, described by him as an alternative. This machine was to be pushed ahead of the team, which was hitched to the bar C of the tongue B in the rear, but provision was made for a front draft by a pair of shafts in front, shown in dotted lines. The curved dotted line beside the shafts indicated a bowed guard to press the standing grain away from the horse. The divider L had a cloth screen extending to the rear of the platform. Neither Hussey nor McCormick appears at that time to have been cognizant of the prior state of the art, and as the patent law of 1836 had not yet been enacted, there was little or no examination as to novelty, and no interference proceedings as to priority of invention, and consequently their respective claims were drawn to much that was old, and probably much that would have been in conflict with each other under the present practice of the Patent Office. In the _Scientific American_, of December 16 and 23, 1854, in a most interesting series of articles on the reaper, the Hussey machine is fully described. The first public trial was on July 2, 1833, before the Hamilton County Agricultural Society, near Carthage, O., and its success was attested by nine witnesses. Great stress was laid by Mr. Hussey on the double finger bar, _i. e._, a finger bar having one member above and the other below the knife. The _Scientific American_ said the machine was a success from the first; that “in 1834 the machine was introduced into Illinois and New York, and in 1837 into Pennsylvania, and in 1838 Mr. Hussey moved from Ohio to Baltimore, Md., and continued to manufacture his reapers there up to the present time.” In 1836 Hussey was invited by the Maryland Agricultural Society for the Eastern Shore to exhibit his machine before them. On July 1 he did so, and made practical demonstration of its working to the society at Oxford, Talbot County, and again on July 12 at Easton. On the following Saturday it was shown at Trappe, and it was afterwards used on the farm of Mr. Tench Tilghman, where 180 acres of wheat, oats and barley were cut with it. The report of the Board of Trustees of the society was an unqualified commendation of the practicability, efficiency and value of the machine, and a handsome pair of silver cups was awarded to the inventor. The report was signed by the following well-known residents of the Eastern Shore: Robert H. Goldsborough, Samuel Stevens, Samuel T. Kennard, Robert Banning, Samuel Hambleton, Sr., Nichol Goldsborough, Ed. N. Hambleton, James L. Chamberlain, Martin Goldsborough, Horatio L. Edmonson, and Tench Tilghman. Hussey made and sold his machine for years. In the _American Farmer_, of October, 1847, an agricultural journal printed at Baltimore, the advertisement of his machine appears with full price lists of the different sizes of machines, and also of an improvement in the manner of disposing of the grain, which was the invention of Mr. Tench Tilghman, and was adopted by Hussey on his reaper. [Illustration: FIG. 151.--THE McCORMICK REAPER OF 1847.] While Hussey was at work at his reaper, McCormick also was busily engaged with his, and he took his second patent January 31, 1845, No. 3,895. This related to the cutter bar, the divider, and reel post. McCormick’s next patent was dated October 23, 1847, No. 5,335, and in this the raker’s seat was to be mounted on the platform as shown in Fig.