THRESHING MACHINE
The thrashing machine, or, in modern spelling, threshing machine (or simply thresher), was a machine first invented by Scottish mechanical engineer Andrew Meikle for use in agriculture. It was invented (c.1784) for the separation of grain from stalks and husks. For thousands of years, grain was separated by hand with flails, and was very laborious and time consuming. Mechanization of this process took much of the drudgery out of farm labor.
Early social impacts
The Swing Riots in the UK were partly a result of the threshing machine. Following years of war, high taxes and low wages, farm laborers finally snapped in 1830. These farm labourers had faced unemployment for a number of years due to the widespread introduction of the threshing machine and the policy of enclosing fields. No longer were thousands of men needed to tend the crops, a few would suffice. With fewer jobs, lower wages and no prospects of things improving for these workers the threshing machine was the final straw, the machine was to place them on the brink of starvation. The Swing Rioters smashed threshing machines and threatened farmers who had them.
The riots were dealt with very harshly. Nine of the rioters were hanged and a further 450 were transported to Australia.
Early threshing machines were hand-fed and horse-powered. They were small by today's standards and were about the size of an upright piano. Later machines were steam-powered, driven by a portable engine or traction engine.
Farming process
Threshing is just one process in getting cereals to the grinding mill and customer. The wheat needs to be grown, cut, stooked (bundled), hauled, threshed, and then the grain hauled to an elevator and the chaff baled. For many years each of these steps were an individual process, requiring teams of workers and many machines. In the steep hill wheat country of Palouse in the Northwest of the United States, steep ground meant moving machinery around was problematic and prone to rolling. To reduce the amount of work on the side hills, the idea arose of combining the wheat binder and thresher into one machine—a combined harvester. About 1910, horse pulled combines appeared and became a success. Later, gas and diesel engines appeared with other refinements and specifications.
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