Short History of Gardening and Agriculture
Steam Powered Farm Equipment
Steam Engines
Thomas Aveling modified a Clayton & Shuttleworth portable steam engine in 1859, creating a self propelled machine that ranks as one of the world's first agricultural tractors. Aveling, and other tinkerers, experimented with the design of the machine over the next several years. By the beginning of the 1870's the shape of the tractor had been developed. The familiar four wheeled design remained dominant for the next several decades. These tractors packed a lot power for tasks like plowing and threshing wheat. The main drawbacks were that they were slow, heavy and hard to maneuver. The heavy machines frequently broke bridges down. They took a skilled operator as if improperly operated they would explode causing death and injury.
Thomas Aveling (September 11, 1824 - March 7, 1882)
The son of Thomas Aveling and Ann Aveling, Thomas was native to Fenland District, Cambridgeshire, Great Britain. His father died when he was young, after which the family migrated to Hoo. There his mother married Rev. John D'Urban. His father apprenticed him to a local farmer, Edward Lake. Aveling married D'Urban's daughter, Sarah. The couple would have six children. Aveling acquired a farm and operated a drainage tile business. In 1859 he modified a Clayton & Shuttleworth portable engine by attaching a long chain between he crankshaft of the engine and the rear axle. This machine became the nucleus of the traction engine that would evolve into the modern farm tractor. Many regard him as the "the father of the traction engine." He invented the steam roller and, along with Richard Thomas Porter founded the Aveling & Porter Company to manufacture steam rollers.
Threshing Machine
The threshing machine performed the work of the flail in threshing wheat. The mechanized thresher separated wheat grain from the straw and chaff in a series of steps. The farmer first fed the bundles of straw into a hopper on the machine. The bundles went into the separator, which was a series of rapidly rotating blades. These blades tore the bundle apart by cutting the twine that held them together and beat the grains from the heads without crushing the grains. The wheat then passed through a series of successively smaller screens that separated the straw and chaff from the wheat grain. The grain fell into a hopper where it was measured and dumped in a sack. The straw and chaff blew onto a nearby straw stack.
Threshing Rings
The mechanical thresher first appeared in 1837 when Hiram A. and John A. Pitts, Winthrop, Maine patented a horse powered threshing machine. This machine remained basically unchanged when steam powered engines first began appearing on farms around the beginning of the Twentieth Century. The threshing machine cost about $4,000 at this time, a substantial sum of money that was out of range of most farmers. Generally, a group of about six to eight farmers pooled their resources and purchased a machine. They would then pay for maintanence costs of the machine as a group. Each farm furnished a team of horses for each 40 acres to be threshed. After the threshing season concluded, the farmers held a meeting to settle accounts and lay plans for the next year.
The Women
While the men worked the threshing machines the women cooked and served the meals. Generally, the women began preparing for the day a week or so ahead of time. Other farm wives in the ring came to help out. On threshing day, the women served three meals, a morning and afternoon lunch and dinner at noon. The lunches consisted of meat and cheese sandwiches, cookies, and lemonade or water. Dinner was usually pan-fried chicken, beef and gravy, mashed potatoes, coleslaw, salads, sliced tomatoes, green beans, corn and other garden vegetables, relishes and pickles, bread or biscuits, along with pies, cakes and puddings. The reader must bear in mind that the quantity of food consumed by a band of hungry men was immense and the women worked without the benefit of air conditioning, refrigeration or modern cooking ranges. They had to carry water into the kitchen from the well in buckets and cook on either wood or coal cook stoves.
The Meals
When the women signaled that the food was ready, the steam engine operator blew the whistle on the steam engine, signaling that work would stop. The men washed their hands at the well or wash basins the women had placed nearby. The women generally brought the food into the fields, or alternately, in a spot near the barn. They women served the food on long tables made from planks. They used china, silverware and glasses. If the farm was large and required more than one day to thresh the grain, this process would repeat until it was done. Typically, the other wives in the ring would help wash the dishes and silverware. At the conclusion of the meal, the steam operator blew the whistle, signaling that work was to begin again.
Once one farm was done, the threshing crew moved to the next farm.
