spring 2011 west news
DESCRIPTION
Spring Newsletter for the Western Region of ALHFAM (Association for Living History, Farm and Agricultrual Museums) Focus on MachineryTRANSCRIPT
Farmers traditionally
depended on animal power
to supplement human labor.
Horses, mules and oxen
allowed American farmers
to expand their tilled
acreage, providing
additional income for
commercial exchange.
With an expanding population and export potential, the advantages of fossil fuel power were not limited to factory and transportation sectors. The era following the Civil War provided ample opportunity to experiment with agricultural mechanization. In the nineteenth century
several varieties of
machinery were put to use
in the service of agriculture,
including Cyrus
McCormick’s reaper and its
descendants, and a plethora
of horse-propelled wagons,
seeders, mowers, rakes,
binders and balers. The
steam engine was the first
artificial power source to be
applied to agriculture.
Beginning in the 1850s,
inventors sought to adapt
steam power to farm needs,
with varying degrees of
success. By the 1880s
steam traction engines,
pulled to the field by horses,
were attached to long belts
that powered stationary
threshing machines,
separating grain from straw
and chaff. By the 1890s
these huge, heavy steam
machines could travel under
their own power, and some
were capable of pulling
plows. Their large size,
however, proved to be a
liability; they lacked
maneuverability, they
required sensitive
maintenance and their
Spring Focus ~ Machinery
Western region newsletter S P R I N G 2 0 1 1
S P E C I A L
P O I N T S O F
I N T E R E S T :
Meeting New
Friends at Fort
Nisqually
“Living
History” the
art of a
magazine
cover
Living
History Recipes
Annual Confer-
ence and Meet-
ing: Jackson’s
Mill
Newsletter
Submission
Guidelines
Mechanized
Agriculture: Power
for the Farm
Steve Iverson
When the new millennium began eleven years ago, many of us in the museum field recognized, somewhat suddenly in some cases, that the twentieth century was now history. The last century’s technological innovations for factories, farms, transportation and communication were increasingly appropriate for interpretation at historic sites. The growing prominence of, and dependence on, farm machinery completely changed the history of food production, family life and rural social organization. Understanding the context of twentieth century farm development is a broad topic, but one way to begin is to look at the history of the power sources employed in the fields.
P A G E 2
The Rumely
OilPull, intro-
duced in 1910,
used kerosene for
fuel and oil – run
through a cooling
tower in front –
for cooling. Ru-
mely’s popular
model 16/30, pro-
duced from 1918-
1924, rated 30.1
horsepower on
the drawbar and
46 on the belt in
the 1920 Ne-
braska Tractor
Test.
weight compacted the soil.
Nevertheless, as stationary
machines they continued to
provide important power for
threshing crews even through
the 1920s.
As the twentieth century
dawned, American, Canadian
and European inventors
sought to create reliable,
lighter weight power sources
for farm use. The internal
combustion engine provided
the breakthrough. It was
incorporated into what came
to be called “tractors” –
machines designed to provide
mobile or stationary power –
with various configurations of
wheels and weight
distribution. The experimental
and competitive energies of
manufacturers led to the
opening of dozens of factories
to make machines for
agriculture.
From 1900 to 1920, many
early tractors were
underpowered, lacked
reliability and broke down
frequently. Traveling
salesmen sold inadequate
machines to unsuspecting
farmers, creating a demand
for some form of quality
testing. In 1920 the Nebraska
Tractor Tests began
evaluating the products of
many manufacturers and
publicizing the results,
providing prospective
purchasers with uniform
information by which to make
informed choices. The most
common ratings during the
era were for horsepower on
the drawbar – indicating
pulling power – and on the
belt wheel, which later
included the power take-off.
Those horsepower ratings
were expressed as a pair of
numbers: for example, 10-20
or 30/60. The system had
been used earlier on steam
engines, but the tractor tests
provided a more reliable
indicator of power.
Recognizing the limitations of
steam traction engines,
inventors and farm
equipment makers worked to
advance tractor design. Early
experimenters tried various
fuels: the Rumely OilPull
tractor, produced in LaPorte,
Indiana, from 1910 through
the mid-1920s, ran
successfully on kerosene. Like
many other makers of
tractors, this company had
produced steam traction
engines. Another steam
producer, the J.I. Case
Threshing Machine Company
of Racine, Wisconsin,
introduced its own line of
gasoline-powered machines.
Most steam engine
manufacturers did not
survive the Twenties; others
did so only after merging
with other farm equipment
companies. Examples of the
latter include Avery,
Advance, Aultman-Taylor
and Garr-Scott.
In 1918 Henry Ford entered
the tractor market with his
Fordson tractor, powered
by a Model T motor. Ford’s
mass production achieved
cut costs significantly, and
in the tractor wars that
followed the Fordson soon
outsold all other brands
combined. Many
manufacturers went out of
business, but the survivors
created better models in
response.
Most tractor manufacturers
were headquartered in the
upper Midwest, but the
productivity of California’s
San Joaquin Valley also
stimulated innovative
designs. One example is the
Samson company of
Stockton, whose Samson
Sieve-Grip Tractor
(originally rated 6-12, and
later 12-25) proved quite
popular. The Samson was a
gear-driven, gasoline, three-
wheeled tractor with open
steel wheels. In 1918
General Motors, in an
attempt to compete with
Fordson, purchased Samson
and moved the factory to
Wisconsin. By 1923 they
had given up the project.
W E S T E R N R E G I O N N E W S L E T T E R
W E S T E R N R E G I O N N E W S L E T T E R P A G E 3
By the 1920s tractors with gasoline-
fueled internal combustion engines
had captured most of the market,
though a few kerosene models
maintained a small share. Not until
the 1930s was a reliable diesel-fuel
engine perfected by Caterpillar.
Tractors of the late teens through
thirties were often built around a
four-wheel configuration with wide
front stance, and sat on steel wheels
with lugs for traction. The sales-
leading Fordson was such a design.
Other makers came up with new
concepts that enhanced productivity
and enticed farmers to replace their
draft animals with tractors.
International Harvester’s 1921 Model
15-30, for example, was built on a
sturdy framework that permitted a
power take-off (PTO) to be mounted
on the rear. The PTO provided power
to attached equipment such as
mowers, binders and side rakes. By
1928 John Deere’s Model D included
an independent PTO, which could be
shut off when the operator desired.
Then Allis-Chalmers’ 1932 Model U
was the first tractor mounted on
pneumatic tires, providing both
comfort and traction.
The conventional tractor with its wide front wheels was particularly good for plowing, discing and sowing fields, but somewhat clumsy to maneuver through row crops. International Harvester’s 1924 design for a tricycle tractor, dubbed a general purpose machine, made cultivating easier. High clearance and a narrow nose, aided by the typical independent brakes for each of the drive wheels, gave it maneuverability between rows, knocking down weeds while sparing the crop. Other companies followed with general purpose tricycle models, which became an industry standard through the 1950s.
Three pivotal tractors: International
Harvester (also produced as McCor-
mick-Deering) 15-30 pioneered the
power take-off; the John Deere
model D had an independent shut-
off PTO; the Allis-Chalmers model
U, introduced in 1929, was the first
production tractor offered with
pneumatic rubber tires.
Despite all the improvements, early farm tractors won no beauty prizes. Then in 1935 Oliver Hart-Parr introduced its model 70 Row Crop tractor with a sleek, appealing sheet-steel body. Almost immediately, International Harvester hired industrial designer Raymond Loewy to add style to its machines, and the John Deere Company hired Henry Dreyfuss to upgrade the appearance of models A, B, D, G and H. Both designers were men of international reputation. By providing a clean new look, the old steering column and radiator grill were hidden and the rear end and driver’s seat area became less machine-like.
One other tractor configuration was
especially important in the early
twentieth century. In areas where
soft soils were unable to support
heavy tractors, crawlers – tractors
with treads – offered a solution. Two
California farm equipment
manufacturers pioneered the use of
crawlers. C.L. Best and Benjamin
Holt were rivals in the field from
1908 until their two companies
merged in 1925. Holt’s name for the
gasoline-driven crawlers was
Caterpillar, and it is the name that
stuck. These machines became the
basis for military tanks during World
War I, and when Caterpillar
introduced diesel fuel in 1931, it set a
precedent for the standard farm fuel
of today.
Right: The 1935 styling of
the Oliver Row Crop 70
introduced aesthetics to
tractor design.
Seed Catalogs
P A G E 4 W E S T E R N R E G I O N
It is gratifying to know that
some things never change, or
only change slightly. The
subject in question being the
winter seed catalog which
before the advent of the inter-
net was something that was
waited for with great antici-
pation by our agricultural
minded fore fathers. Although
the seed companies have a
major presence on the World
Wide Web, they still mail out
their catalogs to whoever
wants them, and in some
cases to those that don’t want
them. Whatever the case, the
arrival of the winter seed
catalog still stirs the latent
gardener in this curator.
As handy as the internet is,
there is something about be-
ing able to look through a
catalog that is extremely satis-
fying. Now, of course, you
can’t beat ordering on line and
getting your seeds within a
few days, but drilling down
through several levels on line
to find what you are looking
for just doesn’t feel as good as
flipping pages and being able
to compare varieties on the
printed page.
Hopefully this is what brings
visitors to our museums and
historic sites, the lure of the
physical object. Virtual reality
is interesting, but most of us
are tactile individuals with a
desire to feel and touch and
see the real
thing. A pic-
ture of a
steam trac-
tion engine
is nice, but
can’t com-
pare with
the artifact
itself, espe-
cially if it is
fired up,
dripping
water and exuding steam.
What our sites and museums
do is provide the third dimen-
sion to the light produce im-
ages on the internet. We have
what can never be replicated
electronically, the presence of
the real.
As handy as the
internet is, there is
something about
being able to look
through a catalog
that is still extremely
satisfying.
Western Region on
Facebook!
The Presence of the Real:
Artifacts and Interpretation
P A G E 5 W E S T E R N
Save the Date
“Prescott: Where It All Be-
gan” will be the host city
for the 2011 ALHFAM
Western
Region meeting. The host
site is Sharlot Hall Mu-
seum. The dates: Septem-
ber 8, 9 and 10.
The program is still in the
works, but one thing can be
counted on, you will
experience “The Arizona
History Adventure” on Sat-
urday the 10th. The Ari-
zona History
Adventure is the Museum’s
sixteen year old living his-
tory program that features
both
first person and third per-
son interpretation. For
more information on the
Museum go to:
www.sharlot.org.
More on this as it develops,
but put these dates on your
calendar and make plans to
be in Prescott, Arizona for
this year’s regional meet-
ing.
Announcing: Western Regional Meeting
Join us on facebook! And
help keep us connected
with living history, current
research and more via the
discussion on the page.
http://groups.to/
alhfamwesternregion/
P A G E 6 W E S T E R N R E G I O N N E W S L E T T E R
Stamp Mill at
Bodie State
Historic Park
Stamp Mill at Bodie State Historic Park
Visitors to California’s Bodie State Historic Park east of the Sierra Nevada are familiar with “panning” for gold, or placer mining, but often do not realize most miners in Bodie worked as “hardrock” miners, going underground to blast out quartz rock containing gold and silver. To process the rock, a “stamp mill” was required. Bodie’s peak population was between 8,000 and 10,000 and the town boasted close to 2,000 buildings during the boom years, 1877 to 1881. Bodie’s rapid growth began after a mine collapse revealed a rich ledge of gold ore, attracting the interest of investors in San Francisco and New York. In July 1877, the new Standard Mining Company built a stamp mill for crushing quartz rock and extracting the gold and silver. The Standard seemed destined for success, having bought the mine that started the excitement in Bodie. The company’s innovations would keep it alive into the next century. The Standard’s first innovation was in December 1877, with construction of an aerial cable with iron buckets to transport 45 tons of ore in eight hours from the mine 2500 feet above. The patent on the heavy woven cable was held by a fellow named Andrew Hallide. Most remember him for a more famous project - the San Francisco Cable Car System. At the mill, ore was sorted over grates called “grizzlies.” If you imagine a cattle guard tilted on one of its ends, this gives an idea of a grizzly’s appearance. Ore too large to go through the grizzlies rolled off onto a breaker floor where the ore was reduced further, with a “jaw crusher”, so named for its similarity in function to a human jaw. Then, properly sized-ore was ready for the mortar boxes, which contained the stamps. The Standard’s mortar boxes, solid pieces of cast iron, weighed about 3 tons. At this point, water was introduced, allowing the material to flow between the moving stamps and the die in the bottom of the box. Each box contained five iron stamps, weighing about 1,000 pounds each, going up and down 90 times a minute. The Standard was a 20-stamp mill, so four boxes stood side by side with slanted tables extending from the front opening.
Before the crushed ore left the boxes, it passed through a metal screen to ensure the muddy mixture was 40 mesh -- finer than most screen doors. The slurry continued downward over copper plates coated with mercury or “quicksilver.” Gold and silver, with their affinity for mercury, were held behind. The “amalgam,” was scraped up and taken to a retort furnace and heated to 700 degrees. This vaporized the mercury, which was recovered and cooled for re-use. The gold and silver went to the smelter for melting at 2,000 degrees and pouring into molds. Finally, the bars, a gold and silver mix called “bullion,” were shipped to the U.S. Mint for the final separation of the gold from the silver. As Bodie’s boom ended in 1881, the Standard would stay afloat, just barely. After lack of ore essentially shut down the mill for five years, a new manager, Arthur Macy, a graduate of Columbia School of Mines in New York City, got the company back on track in 1890. Macy did away with Hallide’s aerial cable system, choosing now to transport ore to the mill from a nearby horizontal shaft. He also ordered new treatment equipment, including concentrators, which shook material exiting the amalgamation process in order to separate heavier material from lighter waste. It was known that the amalgamation process only recovered 60-65 percent of the metals. His improvements resulted in lower milling costs and better yields of gold and silver. Macy’s successor, fellow Columbia alumni Thomas Leggett, chose to electrify the mill.
Bodie’s biggest expense was wood to fuel the boilers of the steam engines at the mines and mills. At the Standard, $22,000 worth of wood was required annually. Wood was transported to town at great expense as no trees grew nearby. After consulting with the Westinghouse Company, Leggett chose an alternating current system. His decision was dictated by the distance the power had to travel from the hydroelectric plant nearly 13 miles away at Green Creek in the Sierra Nevada. Leggett’s project was fraught with setbacks. It was hoped the electricity would be running the mill by December 1, 1892. Hopes were so high that the Standard ordered a minimum amount of wood as winter arrived. As months rolled on, one newspaper writer termed the project “Leggett’s Folly.” Finally, on July 15, 1893, Leggett invited a few people in town to witness the electrical start-up, including James S. Cain, who had lived in Bodie since 1879. Cain worked in banking, mining and lumber, a lucrative business in Bodie. The $38,000 electrical installation was a success, but a boiler and steam engine remained for back-up. About two years later, Leggett completed installation of an electric hoist and a lighting system for the Standard Mine. He wasn’t done yet. The new buzz in mining circles was use of cyanide to dissolve gold and silver. It was said this process could recover almost 100 percent of gold and silver from the crushed ore. By late 1894, the Standard had built a cyanide treatment plant.
On October 4, 1898, an accidental fire burned down the mill. New construction began immediately, and in just four months, a second Standard Mill, with galvanized metal siding, sparkled in the sunlight. A new assistant manager, Stanford University graduate Theodore J. Hoover, arrived in June 1903. Hoover was charged with the task of recovering gold and silver from thousands of tons of tailings (crushed material) below the mill. These tailings, called “slimes,” for their excessive clay content, did not respond well to current cyanide processes. After much study and experimentation, Hoover renovated the cyanide plant and brought in a “tube mill” for fine grinding of tailings before treatment. Hoover claimed the tube mill was the only one outside of South Africa at the time. In 1904, Hoover became manger and continued with improvements. By the end of 1905, the company paid dividends to its happy shareholders. Hoover actually had some leisure time and hosted his sister-in-law and famous mining engineer brother, who would later become United States President Herbert Hoover.
After Hoover’s departure, the company continued through the first decade of the 1900s, but mines were clearly playing out. The Standard ceased operations in 1913 and completely dissolved in 1915 after James Cain, witness to the electrical start-up, successfully sued the Standard for taking ore out of his nearby Midnight Mine. Cain acquired the mill and all the mining properties and began operating them on a lease basis. In 1935, the Standard Mill saw the last ore pass through its now 10 stamp mill. Today, park visitors can see the stamp mill on guided tours and marvel at the mining equipment
and techniques that resulted in the Standard producing $18 million in gold and silver – almost half of the district’s recorded total of nearly $34 million. These figures reflect historic gold and silver prices of $20 an ounce for gold and about $1 an ounce for silver. The stamp mill and the 200 buildings in Bodie remaining owe their existence to James S. Cain and his descendents, who hired a series of caretakers to protect the town until it became a California State Park in 1962. Bibliography: Piatt, Michael H. The Mines Are Looking Well, The History of the Bodie Mining District. El Sobrante, CA: North Bay Books 2003. Johnson, Russ and Anne. The Ghost Town of Bodie: As Reported in the Newspapers of the Day. Bishop, CA: Chalfant Press, 1967. Billeb, Emil. Mining Camp Days. Berkeley, CA, Howell North Books, 1968 Hoover, Theodore J. Memoranda: Being a Statement by an Engineer. Hoover Institute, Stanford University, 1939 Leggett, Thomas Haight. Electric Power Transmission Plants and the Use of Electricity in Mining Operations. 12th Annual Report, Office of the State Mineralogist, 1894
P A G E 9
Growing
Living
History: In
Good Times
and Bad
ALHFAM National Meeting and Conference
In today’s tumultuous times, historians and museum professionals continually face the challenge of finding innovative ways to keep the past alive. Visiting new places, ex-periencing new opportu-
nities, and sharing our in-dividual successes and failures are valuable parts of that process.
We’re pleased to welcome the Association for Living History, Farm and Agricul-
tural Mu-seums to West Vir-ginia for its annual meeting
June 4-8, 2011. The Farmstead at WVU
Jackson’s Mill has a very rich history as an 18th and 19th century rural economic hub, the boyhood home of Confederate General Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson, and the first state 4-H camp in the nation. 2011 marks 90 years of operation by the Extension Service of West Virginia University.
W E S T E R N R E G I O N N E W S L E T T E R