Question about harvesting wheat in the 1930s

I was told my grandfather and his brothers cut their wheat with a sickle bar mower, then fed the wheat into a Mccormick thresher when it got there.

Would they have used a big hay rake to move the cut wheat into rows or stacks? I seem to be missing how the cut wheat would have got to the thresher when it arrived.

Could have.Then used a dump rake to make 'shocks'.They probably lost a lot of grain...Some mowers were equipped with a'buncher'of sorts.But,I'll bet they were useing a binder.

Then used a binder, a horse-drawn implement that picked up and gathered the grain onto a table, then "bound" it into a sheaf with binder's twine, and dumped the sheaf onto the ground. Then horse and wagon and guy with pitchfork go out and put it on a wagon, wagon pulls up to the stationary threshing machine, where guys pitch the sheaves into the machine.

They did it in my area as Mike described except once the sheafs were kicked out of the binder the sheafs were were made into a stack. In the 1940's I followed the threshing machine going to different neighboring farms. They fed you like a king and always needed an extra hand. Our neighbor had the threshing machine and a 15-30 McCormick Deering tractor and did custom threshing. We had a combine that was bought in the late 30's or early 40's. Hal

Here in central IL - the way it used to be done and how some of the amish still do it - they cut the wheat with a binder - generally when the grain is not quite dry enough for the combine - the binder ties the stalks with twine and drops them on the ground. Then, they come along and stand the bundles in groups of 4 or 6 and then then they take 2 bundles place them on the top and spread them out like a fan over the top of those on the ground - this what is called a "shock." A shock designed properly will shead water and allow the grain to dry. Normally, they let them stand for about two weeks, then they load them and take to the threshing machine.

just saw a binder at a con sale, an older gent told me how it worked. Then showed me the knotter. He said that McCormick/Farmall/Ih???? invented the knotter system. Amazingly enough I could see most all the parts that are on todays knotters gobble

I remember my father saying his uncle talked about "stack threshing", before they had a binder.

They would indeed cut the wheat with a sickle mower when it was just short of being completely ripe, rake it, and put it up into stacks. The wheat would go through a "sweat" in the stack and finish ripening.

Then they would load the stacks onto hayracks and haul the wheat to the thresher. They couldn't take the thresher to the stacks or they would have had straw piles out in the field where they didn't want them. That would probably go back to about 1900 or before.

Some of my earliest memories of farming (around 1940) are of riding the grain binder and tripping the bundle carrier with a foot pedal at the right time to make windrows of bundles.

This was about a decade before my time but I still remember binding, shocking and threshing but was mostly only oats in the 40's as everyone had combines by that time. My dad and uncle owned a Case thresher and did custom work. There was another method used here in Kansas. Wheat was cut by a "header", horse powered and the header was actually pushed by the horses. It was like a pull-type combine header and had an elevator on one end which placed the cut heads of the wheat into a header box pulled along side by horses also. They were then taken to the thresher and pitched into it by hand, like they did with the bundles. Never witnessed this operation but have seen many photos of this process being done here in central Kansas.

My Dad/Grandda bought a NEW IHC 121 pull type combine in 1949, Before that they had big Case combines. I will have to dig out pictures and post later. Both Grandda's had threshers. My Dad bought the last IHC binder the IHC dealer in Ogallala, NE had, but it was used for cane.

What delta red says. If they did not have a binder or hire a header. My dad had a mower, I think just about every body did. And a dump rake. I have picked up a lot of cow feed from dump rake piles by hand with a pitch fork. A poor way to do wheat, but we used what we had.
KennyP

(quoted from post at 07:04:49 09/17/12) What delta red says. If they did not have a binder or hire a header.KennyP

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Here in Sask. there were a few dry years in the 30s when the crops were so short that binders would not work. They needed a certain length of straw to actually form a sheaf that would hold together. Too short straw and it would just fall off the canvas.
It was like that here in 61. My Dad cut some of his wheat crop with the sickle bar mower, raked it and baled for feed as that was short too.

If you get a copy of the Ralph Moody book "the Dry Divide" he goes into detail about a wheat harvest he worked in 1919, explaining the way it was done and gives you a foreshadow of changes to come in Agriculture. This was the last book he wrote about his youth and the way people lived in the early 1900's Most folks on this site would probably like any of his autobiographical works from Little Britches or Father and I were ranchers through the last book The Dry Divide. Another author that tells about life in the early 1900 is Ben K Greene who wrote tales of his younger days as a Horse and livestock trader and one book about his veterinary practice in Western Texas.

The first wheat I helped harvest was with a scythe that had a catcher on it. Then we took the wheat bound it with twine hanging on our belt, precut for a shock. That was in the thirties. About 1938 we bought two binders, (one running and one under repair at all times.) We then shocked the wheat into shocks and later after a week or so pitched them up onto a hay wagon and took them to the barn until the the thresher came with his big ole Huber tractor and we had threshing day. great times. Huge meals with all the people around the area helping. Never saw a combine until after WW 2

Ralph Moodys books were very good.They have been in reprint.I sold a lot of them until the computer ruined the book business.

A friend has an original old binder that he uses to harvest corn. They sell the bundles at the farm stand along with bales of hay and pumpkins for autumn lawn decorations. Another friend gets $12.00/ bale for mulch hay that he sells with the pumpkins and corn.

My Grandfather was a thresherman and I worked "on the rig" for a few years in the 1940's.
In our area in Southern Michigan small grain was harvested in the "thresher days" by first cutting it with a grain binder which bundled the stalks of wheat, oats, barley or rye and secured them with a twine. These bundles were then put into a shock that usually consisted of ten or so bundles set on their "butts" (cut ends) in a definate pattern and capped by two bundles spread and placed head to head on top to make a sort of a roof over the ten upright bunbles. The shocks usually " dried and cured" in the field(s) for anywhere from one to three weeks until the "threshing day" came for the individual farm. Then the bundles were forked one by one up onto a flat rack wagon(s) where they were loaded in a definate pattern and hauled to the threshing machine and then forked into it one by one in a continuous stream onto a slatted conveyor(feeder) into the threshing machine which threshed or seperated the bulk into clean grain kernels which were usually caught in sacks and the bulk became a grain free straw which was blown into a pile or into a loft in a barn. All this was a very labor intensive operation and required fifteen to twenty five men or more to make up the threshing crew. The men were the neighboring farmers who "exchanged hands" doing their harvesting operations on their individual farms and crew of two or three men that traveled with and tended the thresher and big gas tractor or steam engine that powered the thresher. Usually about four or more neighboring wives and/or daughters from nearby farms helped the host farm wife to prepare and serve the gigantic meals that fed the workmen and mealtimes were great events marked by huge amounts of "rib-stickin'" food. "Pleasant memories of good times...even with the hot summers and hard, dirty, dusty, work".

My Grandfather was a thresherman and I worked "on the rig" for a few years in the 1940's.
In our area in Southern Michigan small grain was harvested in the "thresher days" by first cutting it with a grain binder which bundled the stalks of wheat, oats, barley or rye and secured them with a twine. These bundles were then put into a shock that usually consisted of ten or so bundles set on their "butts" (cut ends) in a definate pattern and capped by two bundles spread and placed head to head on top to make a sort of a roof over the ten upright bunbles. The shocks usually " dried and cured" in the field(s) for anywhere from one to three weeks until the "threshing day" came for the individual farm. Then the bundles were forked one by one up onto a flat rack wagon(s) where they were loaded in a definate pattern and hauled to the threshing machine and then forked into it one by one in a continuous stream onto a slatted conveyor(feeder) into the threshing machine which threshed or seperated the bulk into clean grain kernels which were usually caught in sacks and the bulk became a grain free straw which was blown into a pile or into a loft in a barn. All this was a very labor intensive operation and required fifteen to twenty five men or more to make up the threshing crew. The men were the neighboring farmers who "exchanged hands" doing their harvesting operations on their individual farms and crew of two or three men that traveled with and tended the thresher and big gas tractor or steam engine that powered the thresher. Usually about four or more neighboring wives and/or daughters from nearby farms helped the host farm wife to prepare and serve the gigantic meals that fed the workmen and mealtimes were great events marked by huge amounts of "rib-stickin'" food......."Pleasant memories of good times...even with the hot summers and hard, dirty, dusty, work".