Sherman County, Oregon, is a farming area and therefore it is not surprising that the award-winning Sherman County Historical Museum in Moro has several displays related to farming.
Shown above is a fanning mill which was used to clean grain for seeding. This dates to about 1900.
Modern farming is based on the plow which could be pulled by draft animals. In 1836, John Deere, a blacksmith in Grand Detour, Illinois, began crafting plow shares of Sheffield steel which allowed the plow to be pulled easier and faster. Shown above is a typical single-bottom plow.
Shown above is the Emerson Kicker (patented in 1907) which separated oats from wheat for clean seeds.
Grain Drill
Harvesting
Once the grain is harvested, it must be harvested with a combine and then be bagged for shipping and sale.
The Sack-Jig puts the sacks on the spouts. Then when one filled he would “jig” or bounced them to fill evenly. The sack then went to the sewer who would sew the sack shut and flip it on to the sack chute.
The equipment shown in front is a horse-power thrasher. It is too large to fully assemble in the museum.
Shown above is the diagram for horse-power thrasher
An old photograph shows it in operation.
Another view of the thresher showing some of the gears.
Shown above is a horse-drawn harvester.
The model shown above depicts a horse-drawn harvester at work.
Another model showing harvesting.
Museums 101
Museums 101 is a series of photo tours of various museum exhibits. More from this series:
Museums 101: An Outdoor Collection of Farm Equipment (Photo Diary)
Museums 101: The Anderson Homestead Barn (Photo Diary)
Museums 101: Homestead Cabin and Barn (Photo Diary)
Museums 101: Farm Equipment at the Presby House Museum (Photo Diary)
Museums 101: A Collection of Farm Equipment (Photo Diary)
Museums 101: Some Farm Equipment at Fort Steele (Photo Diary)
Museums 101: Ranch and Sawmill (Photo Diary)