29 



no headway. In 1846 the Xew York Agricultural Society, at its fair 

 held in Auburn, made an award to McCormiek over the Hussey- 

 Auburn machine, and Hussey himself afterwards repudiated the 

 Auburn machine. 



Before this time McCormick's machine was a pronounced success. 

 Hussey's, as has been shown, was a failure. The question, therefore, 

 as to who invented the first practical reaper wouM seem to be conclu- 

 sively settled in favor of McCormick. 



Inasmuch as some have assumed that Hussey's patent of 1847 orl 

 the open back guard was the invention which made reaping machines 

 practical, it is appropriate to show that for several years after taking 

 out that patent he had no conception of a successful cutting apparatus. 



Fig. 6 shows this cutter of 1847. His patent for this improvement^ 

 No. 5,227, dated August 7, 1847, says: 



" In my original invention (patent of 1833) the plates are ground! 

 with a bevel on both sides of the edge. The purpose of this is that 

 by means of the shoulder of the bevel, the sharp edge is prevented 

 from coming into immediate contact with the iron in passing the guard. 

 This bevel is not so necessary for the fork of the blades, as near their 

 points ; hence, in this improvement about one inch of edge at the fork 

 is flush, on the under side, leaving the bevel on the upper side. The 

 design of this is that the grass,, etc., which is forced in between the 

 blades and the lower part of the guard, shall be cut up and worked out 

 by the flush edge coming close to the iron at the fork." 



In this improvement he had two points, which he claimed in the 

 following claims: 



(a) "The opening: above the blades at A, in combination, with, 

 vibrating blades." 



