flying belgian

Well-known Member
When did combines replace the threshing
machine in the midwest? I assume it was
when soybeans came to be. Pa bought his
first in mid 40s. Case A-6.
 
My guess would be about WW2. Wasn't that when the Massey Harris Harvest Brigade was? A labor shortage during the war certainly would have hastened the switch.
 
When did soybeans come in? My dad who threshed for people was asked by about 10 farmers if he would thresh beans for them since they wanted to grow this new crop and none had a combine. They sowed the beans and one of them bought a combine
 
How did that brigade work? Did they buy the combine or lease it from government? Or did the government provide combine and you just ran it.
?
 
Neighbor had an Allis Chalmers combine in about 1947. First in the community. Then, about a year or two later, another one showed up. We starrted using a combine, brand new John Deere pull behind, in about 1950 or 51. None of these were for soybeans, all for oats or clover.
 
1944 massey harris harvest brigade, farmers purchased the combines but operated them under contract the first year.

plus you had to pickup the combine where it was dropped off by rail.

if you lived in north dakota, and combine dropped off in southern california, you drove empty grain truck down south and combined your way home.

but if you lived in texas, and picked up your combine in texas, you harvested north as the seasons progressed, then had to haul back home.

also, i read in one article that the canvas drapes on the massey harris 21 combine only lasted a few hundred acres, maybe 300. so If the brigade included 500 combines, each harvesting a minimum of 2,000 acres, then that was alot of canvas drapers to remove and replace and adjust.

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massey harris harvest brigade 1944
 
Pull types were still common in the mid-40's here. Dad bought a new JD 55 in 1950, uncle had a massey about a year earlier. I remember Dad opening up fields with the 55 for folks who still had pull types, to avoid running over the first round of wheat with the tractor and machine. Rode with Dad on the JD 5A (I think that was the model, had a 12' header) when a kid and crawled into the grain tank whenever it reached about 1/3 full. Was nice to be up there out of the dust.
 
I think the AC All-Crop first came out in 35. My uncle bought a new one in 37 when he bought his Oliver 70. He did so much custom work with it that he had to trade the tractor for one on rubber tires with a road gear soon after so they could get around faster.
 
my area in S WI it was in the early 50's. Some younger farmer bought a SP combine and some older customers still used the threshing crew ,especially to get straw blown into barn ,and then they often got a pull type combine. Same time
also saw corn pickers replace corn binders and shredders . And choppers replaced silo fillers and hay loaders and green choppers also were used to chop corn stalks for bedding. Chopping dry hay caused some barn fires and balers became more common.Then by 1960 silo building took off,about half for alfalfa haylage.
 
Also in Southern WI- I'd say post WWII. Prosperity in ag after the war allowed the purchase of a lot of small pull type combines, which eliminated the need for neighborhood cooperation, as well as the need for shocking grain etc. Some continued with threshing machines into the 1960's. The purchase of a small combine was probably welcomed by the farmer's wife, who no longer had to feed the threshing ring.

In the early 60's, my grandfather's brothers were still threshing, but by windrowing the grain with the binder, and then chopping the material with a forage harvester and feeding the chopped oats or wheat through the threshing machine.
 
ma says grandpa brought home a JD pull type around 55/56, and the binder left the farm shortly thereafter. supposedly, his combine was the first in the township in west central Wi and he did a lot of small grain harvest for neighbors with it.
 
We have a non-running Massey Harris 21 A at Farmamerica near Waseca if you are interested in seeing one.
 
My Grandpa bought his first combine, an IH 82, in 1967. That was pretty much the end of the neighborhood threshing. One of the others in that group bought a self propelled combine about the same time. Soy beans didn't show up around here until the '80's.
 
Around here in Illinois, soybeans were introduced as a hay crop. You cut them just like alfalfa in bloom. They have good protein. In the late 40's, they became more recognized for the bean rather than the stem. Today, it is rare to see them baled.
 
Threshing Pretty mich ended about 1945 The year Dad boubhy the first combine. It was a used McCormick 42 inch cut and Dad oulled it with a 1944 2N Ford on PTO. Neighbor bought a 8 foot cut Deere in late 30's.
 
My Dad bought a 48 SC CASE and a F-2 which looks so much like a A-6..in 1951.no one had a combine around here then , And they ran him hard. He could have easily bought a New Oliver S- P around 1960.or a CASE. Dad was well liked by both dealers and they would have bent over backwards to help...But It was a decisive time for my parents.. there were 6 young mouths to feed ,Dad got a easy job in town ,and He had health issues from W W 2. . He and Mom looked at one another. We are getting older, They had a nice 57 Desoto , Lets sell out the Jersey cows. sell the north side of the farm and build a new house ,Lets live a little ,. So they did and We got another brother and a sister too.. LOL
 

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