Sentinels of American Farmland

 

By Suzanne Norquist

What road trip through farm country is complete without sighting a grain silo or two?

Surprisingly, the familiar, tall, round structures have only been around since 1889, and at the time, many farmers were slow to adopt them. Even more surprising, they are already being replaced with newer technology. As we point out the towers on our road trip, we are living a slice of history.

In antiquity, the ability to store food allowed people to survive winters and famine. Rot and insects could ruin grain if improperly stored, but pits lined with a thick layer of chaff provided protection from loss. Careful drainage prevented moisture accumulation.

Some civilizations built storage structures, the precursors to the modern silo. The word silo is derived from a Greek word meaning “pit for holding grain.”

Julius Cesar stored food in pits along the road, which would be covered and marked for use on another trip.

Fred Hatch, an Illinois farmer, is credited with building the first “modern” silo in the United States in 1873. Reports of earlier ones were unverified. Mr. Hatch described the structure to the Prairie Farmer newspaper in 1922.

“The silo was 10 by 16, and 24 feet deep. We didn’t know anything about building silos outdoors, so the first was put inside the barn. We first dug a pit eight feet deep and laid stone walls around it. The part above the ground was built of flooring, with a layer of tar paper and another thickness of flooring boards. This made it almost air tight.”

Farmers throughout the Midwest adopted this practice.

However, the square structure tended to get moisture and rot in the corners. So, in 1889, Franklin King, a professor of agricultural physics at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, devised a cylindrical tower.

These round towers started popping up throughout the Midwest. However, as with all new technologies, some farmers needed to be convinced of their value. Advertisements, expounding on the virtues of silos, filled rural newspapers in the nineteen-teens. Here is one from 1915.

The small print reads,

“My silo saves 90% of my crop. A year of plenty puts me 2 years to the good on feed. I can scare up some ‘Ready Money’ when I need it,—I use-ter couldn’t raise a goldurn cent.”

Wooden silos were quickly replaced with brick or tile since they weathered better.

Next came the familiar cement landmarks that stand watch in most small farming communities. Later, metal silos were added to the mix.

I was surprised to learn that newer “silos” are giant plastic bags that can be stacked across the ground.

Eventually, the giant sentinels we see on road trips will crumble into history. Until then, kids can imagine them as castles from medieval legends . . . after they ask for the bazillionth time, “Are we there yet?”

***

”Mending Sarah’s Heart” in the Thimbles and Threads Collection

Four historical romances celebrating the arts of sewing and quilting.

Mending Sarah’s Heart by Suzanne Norquist

Rockledge, Colorado, 1884

Sarah seeks a quiet life as a seamstress. She doesn’t need anyone, especially her dead husband’s partner. If only the Emporium of Fashion would stop stealing her customers, and the local hoodlums would leave her sons alone. When she rejects her husband’s share of the mine, his partner Jack seeks to serve her through other means. But will his efforts only push her further away?

 

Suzanne Norquist is the author of two novellas, “A Song for Rose” in A Bouquet of Brides Collection and “Mending Sarah’s Heart” in the Thimbles and Threads Collection. Everything fascinates her. She has worked as a chemist, professor, financial analyst, and even earned a doctorate in economics. Research feeds her curiosity, and she shares the adventure with her readers. She lives in New Mexico with her mining engineer husband and has two grown children. When not writing, she explores the mountains, hikes, and attends kickboxing class.

 

Farming and Ranching on the Prairies -- with Giveaway -- by Donna Schlachter

                                                   Hand tools typical to farming and ranching, 1850s

Farming and ranching in the United States has a long and colorful history, beginning with the earliest settlers and reaching its heyday during the Westward Migration of the 1840s through 1880s.

The first settlers tended to claim a parcel of land near a water source such as a river or spring. Then they plowed up the grassy sod and constructed one-room homes called soddies, leaving a hole in the roof for smoke to escape, a door for entrance, and, if they were particularly resourceful, a window. This cleared land then served as the basis for their crops, primarily food for themselves and their stock. Often, the same oxen or horses that hauled their wagon were used to pull the plows, and crops were harvested by hand using tools such as scythes, threshers, and rakes. A family’s livelihood or lack thereof often dictated by the crop yield, the weather at harvest time, and their ability to store the harvest successfully to last through the harsh winter until spring.

Several important milestones occurred which made the farmers’ and ranchers’ lives a little easier and offered greater crop yields, including the invention of farm machinery, fencing materials, and fertilizers.

As far back as 1819, Jethro Wood patented the first iron plow with interchangeable parts for types of soil and plantings. Now the farmer could use the same plow to prepare a field for corn or potatoes, for example. Then, in 1837, John Deere manufactured plows with steel shares that were more durable and kept their edge longer than the iron version.

1840's grain reaper

 

 

                                                                        1840's plow

 

 

In 1831, Cyrus McCormick invented a grain reaper, pulled by a horse. Now a farmer could harvest more acres in a shorter period of time, increasing his food supply and his cash crop sales. His unique design guided the stalks to the blade, cut and then shoved the stalks onto the ground in the wake of the reaper, making cradles and scythes obsolete. In 1854, McCormick introduced the self-rake reaper. This new design gathered the cut grain into neat piles which workers then tied into sheaves before sending to the thresher. Each self-rake reaper equaled the labor of four or five men, which was particularly valuable during the Civil War when so many men left home to enlist. In 1837, the Pitts Brothers patented a practical threshing machine. However, it wasn’t until 1926 that a successful light gasoline tractor was developed.

While we may consider hybridization of corn and other crops a recent advance, in 1816 John Lorain began discussing the benefits of cross-breeding corn to obtain higher yields; in 1866 Gregor Mendel published his experiments in plant hybridization; in 1872 Luther Burbank produced a “Burbank potato”, the first in a long line of new and improved varieties; in 1905 George Harrison Shull began experiments with cross-breeding varieties of corn, perfecting his method by 1909. Donald Jones developed a system in 1917 to grow modern hybrid seed; and in 1926 Henry Wallace used advertising and promotion to popularize his hybrid seed corn.

However, with increased yields and these new varieties, farmers realized they needed to assist the soil with additives and fertilizers. 1850 saw the manufacture of the first mixed fertilizer called Manufactured Guano. In 1908, Haber and Bosch developed the process to make ammonia, leading to increased food production sufficient to feed a billion people a year. In 1914 Edwin Broun Fred supplied cultures of nitrogen-fixing bacteria to growers of legumes. 1921 saw the use of a World War 1 airplane to spread lead arsenate dust in a grove in Ohio; and in 1939 Paul Muller discovered the insecticidal properties of DDT, which was later banned as being harmful to wildlife that ate the poisoned insects.

Barbed-wire samples
 

With farms and ranches increasing in acreage to produce more yield, the need for effective and efficient fencing arose. In 1874 the Glidden barbed-wire patent was granted to contain and protect cattle. The idea of fencing thousands of acres was revolutionary, and given the harsh weather on much of the plains, as well as limited trees for posts, barbed-wire was the perfect solution. On his farm in Illinois, Joseph Glidden first perfected his design in 1816, while a local lumber dealer, Jacob Haish, developed the “s” barb that came a close second for a short time.

Soon the cattlemen’s fervor to protect the best grazing and water sources created friction, forcing small farms and ranches into cutting the wire to regain access to land for their stock. Because of a history of open range ranching, where branded cattle wandered at will and were gathered up in the spring, the switch to fenced ranching resulted in violence and crime for many years. Barbed-wire, often nicknamed “devil’s rope”, now boasts more than two thousand types, and is still used today.

With overproduction and over-grazing, combined with drought and blizzards, the Great Plains faced serious problems in 1886 and 1887. As plow agriculture extended into the semi-arid plains, erosion swept away the topsoil. Just as in the Dust Bowl of the 1930s, yields dropped, forcing farmers and ranchers to use increasingly invasive methods such as over fertilizing, plowing more land and increasing herd sizes, and more mechanization.

As you can see, much of the scientific and mechanical progress made over the past 150 years or so was due to the requirements of farmers and rancher and the demand for more food for a growing population. While the number of farms and ranches in the United States has decreased in the past 50 years or so, the size of the holdings and amount of food produced has increased to meet the demand. A typical family-owned farm currently produces enough food to feed more than 100 people. As we enjoy the Thanksgiving season, let’s remember to be thankful to our farmers and ranchers who keep us well-fed.

Leave a comment about your favorite Thanksgiving dish, and I’ll draw randomly for an ebook copy of A Pink Lady Thanksgiving.

About A Pink Lady Thanksgiving: Kate and Tom McBride, along with their newborn, John Thomas, settle into life in Oregon City, Oregon in November 1879. And while Kate enjoys being a wife, mother, and homemaker, she still remembers her fanciful dreams of last year: become a detective to solve mysteries. Her first case is to find the missing fiancée of a local banker. Tom, however, isn’t sure this is a good idea, particularly not when somebody throws a fiery bomb through the window of their home, burning it to the ground. They learn that their pasts may not be as far behind them as they’d hoped, but when their son is kidnaped, they just join forces to reveal who is trying to stop them—from finding the missing woman, and from starting their new life together.

Resources: 

https://www.facebook.com/Hale-County-Farm-and-Ranch-Museum-244000705709555/
https://www.aghalloffame.com/

       

     About Donna:

Donna lives in Denver with husband Patrick. As a hybrid author, she writes historical suspense under her own name, and contemporary suspense under her alter ego of Leeann Betts, and has been published more than 30 times in novellas, full-length novels, devotional books, and books on the writing craft. She is a member of American Christian Fiction Writers, Writers on the Rock, Sisters In Crime, Pikes Peak Writers, and Christian Authors Network; facilitates a critique group; and teaches writing classes online and in person. Donna also ghostwrites, edits, and judges in writing contests. She loves history and research, and travels extensively for both. Donna is represented by Terrie Wolf of AKA Literary Management.

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Have You Hugged Your House Lately?

Back in the 80s, I got my first job in an office. We had a word processor that was supposed to make our job easier. We had visions of all this “free” time in our future. Even funnier, I was a big believer in the power of computers: I had a degree in computer science after all.

The sales department gradually moved from hand written invoices to computers and software to spit out invoices with the click of a few buttons. Accounts payable eventually went to software that printed our checks for us. Wow! All we had to do was sit back and watch the checks spit out of the printer. Surely our breaks would be longer and more often because of so much automation.

The purchasing department went from calling vendors and placing orders over the phone, to faxing in orders, then to placing orders via email. Before I left the company after 28 years, many vendors had online options where I could place orders, check status, locate tracking numbers, and a host of other things without ever even contacting a salesperson.

Now that I work from home, it’s the same thing. I have a laptop, phone that’s connected to the world, washing machine, dryer, vacuum cleaner, dish washer, oven, stove, microwave, refrigerator, hot and cold running water, electric heat in the winter and electric A/C in the summer. Other than writing a check (or using automatic payments), I don’t have to do anything except pay for the electricity to run all those appliances and electronics.

Jump back to the 17th century and how people lived. Let’s specifically look at the farmer and the housewife. A household in the countryside was largely self-sufficient. The woman of the house had to bake bread, brew ale (since water wasn’t always safe to drink), cure bacon, salt meat, make jellies and jams, pickles, can vegetables. She had to make candles, sew all the family’s clothes and stuff bedding, tend the garden, the chickens and milk the cow and churn the butter.

The farmer planted the corn that fed his cows that fed his family. He saved seed for the next year. That bread, ale, bacon, and cheese his wife made to sustain them came from the animals and crops they grew on their farm. He chopped wood to cook their food and keep the family warm throughout the winter. He hunted for wild game to supplement their diet. By and large, farm families were self-sufficient and could survive for months, years even, without buying or trading for anything outside of what they could produce on their own.

In a word, they made do.

You’d think that with all these fancy gadgets, computers, phones… goodness, these days we can order our groceries from our phone, pay for them, then drive by the store on the way home from work and pick everything up. And if that’s not fast enough, someone else can prepare our burger and fries, and we just drive thru and eat it on the road.

But here’s the rub. On the surface, many of us seem to be just as busy, or busier, than our counterparts two and three centuries ago. But is that really the case? I’m generalizing of course, but even when we think we’re burning the candle at both ends, or thinking we’ll never get ahead, let’s stop and take a deep breath…

Think about living without electricity (and all the electronics that come with it), running water, an insulated home with a/c in the summer, heat in the winter. Think about either having to walk everywhere or hook up the wagon or saddle a horse. Think about having to lug gallons of water to wash clothes. Think about the worry over a sick child or a farming accident with no doctor or hospital within miles. I could go on and on…

Granted, everything isn’t rosy in 2019, and there are families who are struggling to survive, but I don’t think I want to go back in time to the 17th or 18th century.

Although I do love writing and reading about it. :)

I think I'll hug my house today!

What is the one thing you can’t imagine living without? And by one thing, I mean necessary thing. A loaded pizza from your favorite pizza joint isn’t exactly necessary… even though it does sound yummy! Some ideas of what I’m looking for… Electric lights vs. candles/lanterns? Stove vs. fireplace? Washing machine vs. hand washing? Heat-pump vs. fireplace? Automobile vs. walking/wagon?

Check out this Scavenger Hunt!

Have you heard about the Spring Christian Fiction Scavenger Hunt? If not, you're just in time! It ends on the 17th, so hop over to Lisa Bergren's website at Stop #1 and get started. Make sure you enter my giveaway at Stop #21 at pamhillman.com for a chance to win all three books in my Natchez Trace Novel series.

Go to Stop #1 to start your journey on the
Spring Christian Fiction Scavenger Hunt, Stop #1

Famine in Ireland, and a Wee Bit o' Irish Trivia

by Kathleen L. Maher

The potato. A pivotal figure to the history of Ireland. But not quite the way you might think. First of all, it is not a native plant to the Old World, but originated in South America, and only made its way to Europe during the Sixteenth Century. Secondly, it is not that the Irish were born with a natural and insatiable love for the taste of potatoes, forsaking all other culinary fare, as lore or bad jokes would suggest. Potatoes simply fit into a system of subsistence tenant farmers who needed a food crop that would grow abundantly in the harshest conditions and poorest plots. Any good land in Ireland, where barley and oats grew, or where cattle might graze, would have been farmed for cash crops to enable a tenant to pay exorbitant rent to wealthy landowners. Potatoes, as it turned out, would grow in Ireland in such abundance that half an acre could produce enough to feed a family of two adults and four children for a year. Easily stored and preserved over winter, the starchy wonder offered sustenance long after harvest. And so it would seem that the potato was sent as a miraculous provision into this time and place. 

one of the many four-leaf clovers I find

The population of Ireland increased markedly with the cultivation of the tuber, along with dependence upon it as a staple. Intertwined among the social classes, from the very poor who ate potatoes almost exclusively, to the upper classes who filled out their menu of pork or mutton and fresh vegetables with daily portions of potato, the crop became ubiquitous to Irish life. Variety was the spice of the potato life, with different ways of preparing it such as colcannon--boiled/mashed cabbage and potato, boxty--a fried mixture of potato pancake and hash brown, Irish stew--the poorer cuts of meat mixed with potatoes and vegetables, and finally, champ mash--a spud mashed and served with spring onion, butter and/or milk. Milk typically would be skimmed for making butter or curds, and the remaining and less nutritious whey used by the peasant farmers to "make do".

So with a plentiful source of nutrition so easily adapted to their climate and needs, what could possibly go wrong?

Exhibit A) Britain's complex political climate leading up to and including the Victorian Age. Landowners held great influence, even if they were absentee landlords with holdings in Ireland. The poor held little power to influence law or policy. Irish tenant farmers had about as much political voice as the stones they tilled out of their rented fields. 

Exhibit B) English Corn Laws
A system of protecting the financial interests of these wealthy landowners evolved into high tariffs on imported grains into the British Isles. British corn and grain sold at an artificially high price because the more plentiful foreign grain was taxed too heavily to be profitable. The poor simply could not afford to pay for the luxury of eating grain.

Exhibit C) A blight of fungi on the potato crop in Europe
All of Europe began to experience a blight of dry brown rot on potatoes, but nowhere was it more keenly felt than in Ireland, where roughly half the population was utterly dependent upon the food source. From 1845-1852 the blight led to a failed crop which led to famine and death and mass emigration. One million would die of starvation, and two million would emigrate, ravaging Ireland's population to lows that have never fully recovered even to modern day.

Exhibit D) Protestant versus Catholic, and other prejudices alive and well at the time
History does indeed repeat itself. In every society where one group subjugates another, it can only do so if the common belief regarding the subjugated is one of inferiority, or even dehumanization. The Third Reich did this to Jews, Slavic peoples, Russians, and any of non-Aryan genetics. The American settlers regarded the indigenous people as savages. They sold Africans as slaves and decided by law they were only three-fifths of a human. The Egyptians enslaved the Israelites and enacted extermination policies when their number exceeded Egyptian ability to control them. Age-old sins of greed and pride cloud the vision of entire people groups at such sad times in history. And so it was for the Irish Catholic peasants. They were regarded as lazy, ignorant papists, somehow responsible or deserving of the disaster which had befallen them. And so relief efforts were virtually non-existent.

For a brief time, Queen Victoria and the British Prime Minister Sir Robert Peel worked to repeal the Corn Laws in order to alleviate some of the suffering and starvation, but Peel's success in subsidizing grain for Irish consumption had limited effect at best. His successor overturned much of what he accomplished, and what began as a crop failure became a politically engineered famine. 

Some good came out of the ashes of this fiery trial for the Irish people. For one, Ireland has always led the world in famine relief efforts ever since. In addition, Irish culture has spread far and abroad because of the mass emigration during this time. And of note, the exact blight which caused the potato crop ravages is now widely considered to be extinct. 

If you have Irish ancestry, I would love to hear any stories you have of great (great) grandparents who escaped the Potato Famine. Share in the comments below any thoughts or stories or remarks for a random chance to win a $15 Amazon gift card. I will draw the winner with the help of random.org and post one week from today on the sidebar. The luck of the Irish go with ye!

mom and Grandpa Cronin

I'll start by sharing of my great grandfather, John Cronin. He was born in Ireland, I believe in County Cork, in 1849. I'm not certain exactly what year he and his family emigrated to America, but it was during the Great Famine. He grew up in New York City, and enlisted at the age of fifteen in the NY Fighting Irish 69th regiment in the Civil War. He served in the Color Guard, and saw action at the Siege of St. Petersburg, and was present at Appomattox and at the Grand Review in Washington D.C. after the war. He helped organize the St Patrick's Day parade in later years in Manhattan. Family legend has it that it was during his last participation in that parade that he contracted pneumonia and subsequently died. My grandfather, Vincent Cronin, was his seventh son. Vincent's youngest child was my mother, Alicia Cronin (Talvi). I am her youngest. So that is how I have only four generations separating me from that tumultuous time in Irish and American history.

I am roughly half Irish. I married a good Irishman, as my married surname says. And I have to admit, I not only love Irish history, but I actually love potatoes, too. As a kiss from heaven, our only daughter was born on Saint Patrick's Day. Katie Megan Maher, in fifth grade, dressing up to present her biographical report on on Saint Patrick.

Slainte! (Good Health)

 Post Script from last month's post about dogs: Meet the Maher's newest addition, "Bailey", AKC Bailey's Irish Cream. She is a brown and white Landseer Newfoundland. 

Kathleen L. Maher’s first literary crush was Peter Rabbit, and she’s had an infatuation with books and fictional heroes ever since. She has a novella releasing with Barbour in the 2018 Victorian Christmas Brides collection, featuring her hometown of Elmira, NY. Her debut historical “Bachelor Buttons” was released in 2013, and incorporates her Irish heritage and love of the American Civil War. She won the American Christian Fiction Writers' Genesis Contest for unpublished writers, historical category, in 2012.

Kathleen and her husband raised their three children in an old farmhouse in upstate NY, along with a small zoo of rescued dogs, cats, and birds. They run an art business in their spare time and enjoy spoiling their grandchildren on the weekends.

Find Kathleen on facebook: https://www.facebook.com/mahereenie
And on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/author/kathleenlmaher

The Colonial Farmer

Plowing and planting

In my last few posts we considered the lot of the colonial housewife. Well, the farmer’s life wasn’t a piece of cake either. If you know anything about today’s highly mechanized farms, try to imagine what it would have been like to do all that work without any of our modern tools. Today we’re going to take a look at some of the implements the colonial farmer had at hand and how he went about the daily work of tilling the land, planting seed, and harvesting his crops.

The barn was the farmer’s most important “tool” and the first structure he built after raising a modest cabin to shelter his family. In fact, sometimes the barn was built first while the family lived in a lean-to or other temporary structure. Barns housed farm implements and some livestock and provided a place for milking the cows and storing the harvest. They also provided a large open space for hosting extended family or community get-togethers for work and for frolics that lightened the farm families’ hard lives.

Before the industrial age most work had to be done with hand tools and muscle power. That’s why farm families usually had a lot of children. More children meant more hands for the work, but also, of course, more mouths to feed, which necessitated larger fields for crops and thus more work and workers and…well, you get the idea. Every solution has its own problems. But as they say, necessity is the mother of invention. Over time ingenious inventers developed a wide variety of tools to make farm work easier and more efficient so that fewer laborers and less time were needed.

One of the first real innovations was to harness animals to do some of the work. A horse is as strong on average as five men. The average horse weighs around 1,000 lbs. and can carry 250 lbs. A draft horse can draw around 1,600 lbs. and can pull a carriage approximately 25 miles per day on level roads. A horse can only pull up to 1 ½ times its weight, however, while an ox can pull around 2 ½ to 3 times its weight, which makes it preferable for heavier loads. By colonial times the majority of even the poorer farmers had at least one ox or horse. Nevertheless, many jobs still had to be done manually.

Cutting Mattock

When it came to preparing the soil for planting, a number of hand tools were available. A tool similar to a pickaxe called a mattock was used for chopping through and digging in hard soils and grubbing out roots. Cutter mattocks have an ax blade on one side of their heads and an adze on the other, while pick mattocks pair the adze with a pick. Spades and several kinds of hoes also aided the work. A narrow or hilling hoe was mainly used to create the mounds on which plants such as squash grew and for maintaining weed-free hills. Broad or weeding hoes were used for shallow cultivation, and grubbing hoes were used to dig up roots and heavy soil.

Moldboard Plow

The most important tool for preparing the soil for planting, of course, was the plow—or plough in British parlance and as it used to be spelled in America before Daniel Webster reformed our spelling. Forget John Deere’s sharp, tough, steel plow that sped the work of breaking up tough prairie sod into fields. The overwhelming majority of farmers on the colonial frontier wouldn’t have been able to afford one even if it had been invented by then. Which it wasn’t. We’re talking about the venerable old wooden mold-board plow, which was just beginning to be supplemented with an iron plate on the cutting edge. This form of plow could be pushed by the use of handles or pulled by an ox or horse.

Harrow

After plowing, a harrow, a wooden frame with wood or iron teeth, was dragged across the soil to smooth it and make it finer for small seeds to grow. Wheat and most other grains had to be broadcast by hand from a pouch or bucket, and then a harrow might be used again to cover the seeds lightly with dirt. After plowing, a harrow, a wooden frame with wood or iron teeth was dragged across the soil to smooth it and make it finer for small seeds to grow. Wheat and most other grains had to be broadcast by hand from a pouch or bucket, and then a harrow might be used again to cover the seeds lightly with dirt. 

The method was different for planting corn. The farmer plowed furrows across his fields at right angles to each other to create a grid pattern, with the distance between the furrows’ intersection varying according to the variety of corn. For large varieties like gourdseed, furrows were spaced so they crossed from four to eight feet apart, with six feet being most common. Three to 6 kernels were planted 2 to 3 fingers’ breadth deep at each intersection and thinned to 2 to 4 plants per hill after they sprouted. The soil could either be hilled first, then planted or planted first and the hills built up around the base of the plants as they grew. Some colonists planted beans and squash in the hills of corn as the Native Americans did. This was an effective practice since the cornstalks supported the growing bean vines, while the beans fixed nitrogen in the soil for the corn, and the large squash leaves shaded out weeds at their base.

Harvesting wheat with sickles

When sun and rain had done their work and harvest time arrived, grain and hay had to be cut by hand using a crescent-shaped hand sickle with fine cutting teeth, a smooth edged reap hook, or a scythe. This isn’t an easy job, to say the least, but in colonial times an efficient farmer could harvest, bind, and stack crops from a quarter of an acre in one day—which may not seem like much today, but believe me, that’s a stretch when you’re doing it by hand. Scythes were larger and more efficient for this job, but they were also more expensive and took more strength and skill to use. They did minimize bending and saved the poor farmer’s back, however! Grain crops were generally bundled into stocks for storage, but had to be threshed before the grain could be used. Hay was simply left in the field to dry, and then was tossed into wagons with pitch forks and taken to the barn for storage.

Flail

Threshing, or separating grain from the plant’s stalk, was done either by beating the grain heads with a flail (a stick tied to a handle), or by treading—spreading the grain across a circular, packed-earth threshing floor and walking horses across it to dislodge the grain. Once separated from the stalks, the grain was passed through a riddle (a course sieve) on a windy day or through a winnowing or Dutch fanning mill to sift out chaff and dirt. Corn was shelled either by hand—which, trust me, will really tear up your hands!—or by pulling the cob across an iron scraper attached to a tub that collected the grain. I’m sure there was joy on the farm when the automated corn sheller was finally introduced!

Conestoga Wagon

Naturally it was also important for a farmer to have a wagon to transport his crops and other goods and his family as well. Smaller vehicles such as hay wagons were used for most purposes, but in the early eighteenth century a specific type of heavy covered wagon for transporting goods, called a Conestoga, was developed. First mentioned in 1717, it was used extensively well into the nineteenth century, carrying so many pioneers west across the plains that it came to be called a prairie schooner. It could carry up to 12,000 pounds, and its upward-curving floor prevented cargo from tipping and shifting. The seams in the body of the wagon were sealed with tar for protection against leaks while crossing rivers, and a tough white canvas cover protected its contents from the weather.

I grew up on a farm in central Indiana, so I’m very familiar with the hard work farm families do. Even so, the sheer amount of manual labor our ancestors had to do during colonial times is really intimidating. Whether male or female, our ancestors had little time off from their labors! 

Were there any tools mentioned in today’s post that you weren’t familiar with? Are there other farm or garden tools I didn’t mention that were used in colonial or earlier times that you’ve learned about? If so, please share!

~~~

J. M. Hochstetler is the daughter of Mennonite farmers and a lifelong student of history. She is also an author, editor, and publisher. Northkill, Book 1 of the Northkill Amish Series coauthored with Bob Hostetler, won Foreword Magazine’s 2014 INDYFAB Book of the Year Bronze Award for historical fiction. Book 2, The Return, released April 1, 2017. Her American Patriot Series is the only comprehensive historical fiction series on the American Revolution. One Holy Night, a contemporary retelling of the Christmas story, won the Christian Small Publishers 2009 Book of the Year Award.

Alberta Ranch: Summer Haying

Have you ever been on a hay ride? Nowadays they call it a hay ride but instead of using hay, you get to sit or lean against straw bales. Physically, the difference is that straw is the stalk that's left after a grain like wheat, oats or barley has been harvested. It's a yellow or golden color and because it's hollow, it's kind of fluffy until it's pressed down flat which makes it great for animal bedding.

Hay is alfalfa, clover and many grasses that are cut while still green during the summer months and baled or wrapped to seal in the nutrients for the cold winter season. The stalks make up a large portion of hay because they are filled with nutrition unlike the hollow stems of straw. Between the stalks and dried leaves, hay is scratchy, poky and prickly. Think of the bay leaves you add to soups and stews.

Anita Mae Draper nee Muir, Ryland, Ontario

I know because I learned to drive a tractor when I was 12 so that I could pull the hay rack (wagon) while my grandparents pitched hay onto it. My cousins got the job of running back and forth and tamping down the hay in the wagon while I drove to the next hay stack. By the end of the day, they had cuts and scratches from the hay, and if I have to admit it, they had a couple bumps and bruises, too. You see, being a new driver and all, I kept letting out the clutch too fast and having the tractor jump forward which made my cousins tumble into each other and over the side. Oh, the hazards of haying season.



That same summer, Pappa (my Finnish grandfather), taught me how to use the hay cutter and hay rake. Although Pappa could do it himself with a rope that was pulled behind the tractor, he had a bad back and it was better if he didn't have to turn around so much to see what was going on. The hay cutter was a long sickle like moving blade like the kind the maintenance crews use to cut grass and hay beside the roads. On the farm, I would sit on the hay cutter with the 4-5 foot blade heading off to the right. Pappa would start the tractor and off we'd go. My job was to watch for rocks or any other things that would stop the cutting action and either ricochet off or break the blade. Whenever I spotted something, I would push down on a foot pedal while pulling back on a lever which would raise the blade. The harder I pressed and pulled, the higher the blade raised.

As with the other ranch photos in this series, the images of haying in this post are from the Glenbow Museum Archives collection of photographs by rancher Hugh Beynon Biggs showing life on an Alberta ranch in the early 1900's.

In the following photograph you see two men standing on the hay racks where they're pitching the hay around and tamping/pressing it down to make room for more. The two men on the ground are preparing to pitch hay up to the men on the hay rack. My guess is that the man in the foreground is sitting on a cutter with the blade hiding in the grass on his right. The lever to raise the cutter is slightly in front of him within reach of his right hand. (Sticking up behind the other man.)

Haying, Springfield [Biggs] ranch, near Beynon, Alberta. ca. 1900. Courtesy of Glenbow Museum Archives

Once the hay was cut, it had to be raked into piles like the ones in this next image. The man's right foot is on/near a pedal that raises the rake when it's full. There's also a lever that he can pull. I seem to remember using both the lever and the pedal when I was twelve, but if you check out this video of a woman working the hay rake, pay attention to her right foot at the 6-8 second mark. (If the link doesn't work, go to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uZW9YTZwGow)

Man with hay rake, Springfield [Biggs] ranch, near Beynon, Alberta. ca. 1900. Courtesy of Glenbow Museum Archives

This next image called, Load of Hay at Camp, implies that the farm hands camped out during hay season. This makes sense because as soon as hay is ready to be stacked/baled, it should be done as fast as possible. Rain will rob nutrients from the hay and cause mold which will spoil hay and make livestock sick. Spending time traveling back to the ranch to sleep isn't good management if you have food and shelter available to the men.

Load of hay at camp, Beynon area, Alberta. ca. 1895-1896. Courtesy of Glenbow Museum Archives

Perhaps they didn't have shade awnings like they do now, but these ranch hands knew how to use hay and here you see them using it to provide shade for their dining table. Can you see the bucket in the front? I believe that's a stump or can behind it where the men would sit while shaving. There's probably a mirror under the upturned basin. 

Springfield (Biggs) Ranch, near Beynon, Alberta. ca. 1900. Courtesy of Glenbow Museum Archives

With the hay cut and raked, it would be stacked in the field so it was easy to reach in winter. Better to have the hay out in the pasture near the stock than try to haul through snow drifts. 

Haying, Springfield (Biggs) Ranch, near Beynon, Alberta. ca. 1900. Courtesy of Glenbow Museum Archives

The hands would stack the hay in a high arc so that rain and snow could slide down the slopes.

Staking Hay, Beynon, Alberta. ca. 1895. Courtesy of Glenbow Museum Archives

Usually the top couple of feet on a hay stack will be spoiled from the effects of the elements, but then it will be good underneath, so when planning a hay stack, they will put hay that isn't as good on the top as the cover. Nowadays they use tarps.

Haying, Springfield (Biggs) Ranch, near Beynon, Alberta. ca. 1900. Courtesy of Glenbow Museum Archives

How long do they make these stacks? I don't know as this is the longest one I've seen made from loose hay. 

Hay Stack, Springfield (Biggs) Ranch, near Beynon, Alberta. ca. 1900. Courtesy of Glenbow Museum Archives

And of course, not all the hay is left in the pasture. This next image shows a ranch hand directing the pulley system which lifts a hay carrier up to the loft of a barn or stable. In one scene of Romantic Refinements, my novella in Austen in Austin Volume 1, my hero is the man forking hay in the wagon. There's a tense moment when the heroine wonders if the rising hay carrier will fall on him and that's all that I'm going to say about that. 

Haying, Springfield (Biggs) Ranch, near Beynon, Alberta. ca. 1900. Courtesy of Glenbow Museum Archives

And of course, things happen no matter where you are. I have an idea of what may have happened to this broken hay wagon. 

Damaged Hay Wagon, Springfield (Biggs) Ranch, near Beynon, Alberta. ca. 1900. Courtesy of Glenbow Museum Archives

What do you think happened to it? 

Thanks for allowing me to share a journey back to my childhood and farther back to the turn of the century.  For more photos of this Alberta Ranch, check out these other posts:

Feb 5, 2016 - Alberta Ranch Winter Photos

Mar 5, 2016 - Riding Side Saddle

Apr 5, 2016 - Ranch Photos Women and Chores

May 5, 2016 - Alberta Ranch Cowboy Chore Photos 

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Anita Mae Draper's stories are written under the western skies where she lives on the prairie of southeast Saskatchewan with her hubby of 30 plus years and the youngest of their four kids. When she's not writing, Anita enjoys photography, research, and travel, and is especially happy when she can combine the three in one trip. Anita's current release is Romantic Refinements, a novella in Austen in Austin Volume 1, WhiteFire Publishing, January 2016.  Anita is represented by Mary Keeley of Books & Such Literary Management. You can find Anita Mae at  www.anitamaedraper.com

Romantic Refinements by Anita Mae Draper

It's the Texas-style version of Marianne Dashwood in Jane Austen's Sense and Sensibility...

A  misguided academy graduate spends the summer falling in love . . . twice.

One of four novellas based on Jane Austen's heroines found in 

Austen in Austin Volume 1