COTTON 49 



years hence. Writing of this matter in a farm 

 paper early in 1904, we said: "The present labor 

 crisis in the Cotton Belt is certain to bring the mat- 

 ter to the attention of inventors. We have 

 long thought of the cotton picker as an impossi- 

 bility, because the bolls are irregularly placed, 

 ripen irregularly, and must not be mixed with 

 limbs and leaves in picking. But the suggestion 

 now made puts the matter in a new light. Instead 

 of a harvesting machine on a big scale such as we 

 have for grain, a small machine carefully guided 

 and watched over by an operator, would be put to 

 the task of taking the cotton from the open bolls. 

 It does not look as if this should be wholly impos- 

 sible. And as there are millions in it for the man 

 who succeeds at it, it is likely to be done if it can 

 be done." 



THE LOWRY COTTON PICKER DESCRIBED 



Within the last few months the South has seen 

 this "small machine carefully guided and watched 



over by an operator, put to the 



task of taking the cotton from the open bolls." It 

 is the Lowry Picker, and its mode of operation has 

 been fully described as follows; the photographs 

 given herewith making the matter still plainer: 



"The machine is not entirely automatic, as the 

 arms that carry the little wheels which gather in the 

 fleecy staple must be directed by human hands to 

 the open bolls. The arms carry a chain with 

 hooked teeth, adjusted like the chains of a bicycle. 

 When the machine is in operation this chain re- 

 volves rapidly and the curved hooks gather up the 

 staple the instant it touches the open boll, and 



