History of American Agriculture 1776 - 1990

• Farm Machinery and Technology.
• Transportation
• Life on the Farm
• Farmers and the Land
• Crops and Livestock

Famous Agriculturists

• Luther Burbank - The Idaho Potato
• George Washington Carver
• Jethro Tull

Cotton Gin
The cotton gin is a machine that separates seeds, hulls and other unwanted materials from cotton after it has been picked. Eli Whitney patented the cotton gin on March 14, 1794.

• Stripper harvesters strip the entire plant of both open and unopened bolls, along with many leaves and stems. The cotton gin is then used to remove unwanted material.
• Picker machines, often called spindle-type harvesters, remove the cotton from open bolls and leave the bur on the plant. The spindles, which rotate on their axes at high speeds, are attached to a drum that also turns, causing the spindles to penetrate the plants. The cotton fibers are wrapped around the moistened spindles and then removed by a special device called a doffer; the cotton is then delivered to a large basket carried above the machine.

In the 18th century, British agriculturalist Charles Townshend aided the European agricultural revolution by popularizing a four- year crop rotation with rotations of wheat, barley, turnips, and clover. In the United States, George Washington Carver brought his science of crop rotation to the farmers and saved the farming resources of the south.

The Grain Elevator
In 1842, the first grain elevator was built by Joseph Dart.

Hay Cultivation
Until the middle of the 19th century, hay was cut by hand with sickles and scythes. In the 1860s early cutting devices were developed that resembled those on reapers and binders; from these came the modern array of fully mechanical mowers, crushers, windrowers, field choppers, balers, and machines for pelletizing or wafering in the field.

The stationary baler or hay press was invented in the 1850's and did not become popular until the 1870's. The "pick up" baler or square baler was replaced by the round baler around the 1940's.

In 1936, a man named Innes, of Davenport, Iowa, invented an automatic baler for hay. It tied bales with binder twine using Appleby-type knotters from a John Deere grain binder. A Pennsylvania Dutchman named Ed Nolt built his own baler, salvaging the twine knotters from the Innes baler. Both balers did not work that well. According to The History of Twine, "Nolt's innovative patents pointed the way by 1939 to the mass production of the one-man automatic hay baler. His balers and their imitators revolutionized hay and straw harvest and created a twine demand beyond the wildest dreams of any twine manufacturer."

Further Reading: The Agricultural Revolution
"The Age of Invention, A Chronicle of Mechanical Conquest" was first published in 1921 by Holland Thompson. This chapter discusses the evolution of inventions related to agriculture.

Horseshoes - Riding Saddles
The history of horseshoes, horseshoe nails, and riding saddles.

Milking Machine
In 1879, Anna Baldwin patented a milking machine that replaced hand milking - her milking machine was a vacuum device that connected to a hand pump. This is one of the earliest American patents, however, it was not a successful invention. Successful milking machines appeared around 1870. 
Early Cow Milking Machines by Richard Van Vleck
The earliest devices for mechanical milking were tubes inserted in the teats to force open the sphincter muscle, thus allowing the milk to flow. Wooden tubes were used for this purpose, as well as feather quills. Skillfully made tubes of pure silver, gutta percha, ivory, and bone were marketed in the mid-19th century.
Cow Milker Patents
During the last half of the 19th century, over 100 milking devices were patented in the United States.

Plow
John Deere invented the self-polishing cast steel plow - an improvement over the iron plow.

Reaper
In 1831, Cyrus H. McCormick developed the first commercially successful reaper, a horse-drawn machine that harvested wheat.

Related Innovations
The Automobile
Steam Engines

©Mary Bellis
image from agrinet