92 ■ Report on Trials of Plows. 



approved plows than any other man in America, if not in the 

 world, learned the blacksmith's trade of his father. When he was 

 nineteen years old, his father gave him his freedom, and entered 

 into partnership with him in the year 1827. He forged the shares, 

 coulters and other iron work for the old fashioned wooden mould- 

 l)oard lock share plows of half a century ago. They employed 

 an expert wheelwright to make the hard wood or oaken mould- 

 boards and other wood work of these plows. This was in the 

 town of Shrewsbury, Mass., six miles from Worcester. Mr. 

 Nourse had a keen eye, a quick ear, and a dexterous hand. 

 Always on the look-out for improvements, nothing in the action 

 of the plow escaped his observation. The shop was a frequent 

 resort of farmers, whose conversation naturally run much on the 

 form and construction of the implements which were being man- 

 ufactured under their eyes, and which, in the finished state, were 

 all around them. Mr. Nourse carefully treasured up the hints 

 which, from time to time, were dropped. around him, endeavoring 

 constantly to realize them in practice. In this way the real theory 

 of the plow began gradually to dawn upon him, and the constant 

 improvements which he introduced caused a rapidly increasing 

 demand for his work. 



After his father's death he removed his establishment to Wor- 

 cester, establishing himself there in a wider field of business 

 Cast iron mould-boards were now getting into general use, though 

 many farmers still were prejudiced against them, fearing that they 

 would poison the laud and increase the growth of weeds, and that 

 they could not be relied on to stand the wear and tear of 

 plowing. 



A foundry, which was the first and the only one in New Eng- 

 land, had been fitted up at Hartford, Conn., expressly for the 

 casting of these plows. Mr. Nourse was accustomed to go there 

 in a two horse lumber Avagon and buy a load of these castings 

 ,of the Jethro Wood and Hitchcock patterns, though there was 

 much the greater proportion of the latter. These he would Iirins; 

 to Worcester, and having fitted them with beams, handles ;ui(l 

 all other needful appliances, he sold them out in a finished form. 

 After he had been some time established in Worcester, his busi- 

 ness increased so much that he took in Mr. Mason, his brother-in- 

 law, as partner, in the year 1837, and soon after this they admitted 

 Mr. Ruggles, a brother of Judge Ruggles, of Maine, as a third 

 partner, the name of the firm being Eiiggles, Nourse & Mason. 



