MA CHINES T IN A QRICVL1URE. 25 



when Samuel Lane, of Hallowcll, Maine, patented a 

 machine for cutting, gathering, and thrashing grain 

 at one operation. One other machine, that of Wil- 

 liam Manning, of Plainfield, New Jersey, registered in 

 1831, and having several points of resemblance to 

 some now in use, was patented previous to that of 

 Obed Hussey's, of Cincinnati, Ohio, in 1833. With 

 the Hussey machine grain could be cut as fast as 

 eight men could bind it. In June, 1834, Cyrus H. 

 McCormick, of Virginia, received his first patent for 

 cutting grain of all kinds by machinery. From that 

 time to the present nearly every year has produced 

 one or more modifications of harvesting machinery, 

 among which may be mentioned that of Moore & Has- 

 kell, of Michigan, in 1836, which cuts, thrashes, and 

 winnows the grain at one and the same time. 



As early as 1860 four horse harvesting machines 

 would cut twenty acres of grain in a day, leaving it 

 spread upon the ground to be gathered and bound by 

 hand. Now machines are used that will cut eighty 

 acres in a day of ten hours, the team traveling at the 

 rate of three miles an hour. One machine, controlled 

 by one man, cutting as much as could be done by 320 

 men with sickles. The cutter of this machine is 24 

 feet long. But the machines in common use in some 

 of the great grain fields of the West, having cutters 

 from 12 to 16 feet in length, at the same rate of travel, 

 cut 40 to 60 acres a day, one man now doing the work 

 that required 160 to 200 about 60 years ago. These 

 machines are known as headers, and cut the grain in 

 such manner as to take little more than the heads, 

 which are discharged into a large box, known as the 



