We are inviting you to be a part of Pennsylvania's Agricultural History .

"Six Thousand Years of Small Grains" was the featured theme at the Pasto Agricultural Museum during Penn State's Ag Progress Days, Aug. 14 - 16, 2001. Visitors saw historic grain production items used for soil preparation, sowing, harvesting/handling, threshing, power, cleaning, and grain handling.

The collection began with a 6,000-year-old clay sickle and concludes with a horse-drawn binder and photographs of horse-drawn combines, according to Darwin Braund, museum curator. The latter items are representative of those that closed the human- and animal-power era in most of the United States by the 1940s.

"For centuries the harvesting and threshing of small grains required more labor than growing them," says Braund. "Thus, much attention was paid to improving the harvest. It was the most important event on earth every year."

In the earliest days, the heads of grain were hand-picked from each stalk and then threshed by rubbing them between the hands, explains Braund. A flint stone with a sharp edge was the earliest mechanized cutter. Clay sickles were made in areas with no stones. Sickles made of bronze - an alloy of copper and tin - followed the clay models. They in turn were replaced when the Iron Age made sharper blades possible. New designs of the tools improved efficiency in their use.

"A large time line on the museum wall will cover the 6,000 years and describe the concurrent developments in harvesting and threshing small grains," says Braund. "Visitors will see a self-raking reaper [1830s] and grain binder [1930s] operating in the museum, as well as a horse-tread-powered threshing machine [1870s]."

Darwin Braund can be contacted at 814-863-1383 or dgb12@psu.edu.

The Pasto Agricultural Museum collection has more than 750 antique implements used for farming and rural life. Visitors can tour the museum by appointment. Groups of 10 or more can schedule tours from April 15 through October 15 by calling 814-863-1383, sending an e-mail to pastoagmuseum@psu.edu, or registering through http://www.pasto.cas.psu.edu.

 

This early [1870s] model consists of the forward-threshing section and the "winnower" back section, joined together by clamps. It demonstrates technological advancement by combining both the threshing and winnowing (grain separation) operations in one machine. Made by Schaeffer, Merkel & Co. in Fleetwood, PA (Berks County.) The thresher has "THE KING" stenciled in original lettering. The number "213" is stenciled on the other side. This means it was 213th one made by the manufacturer - no machines have been found with the same number. A total of 377 individual pencil marks on the side is someone's accounting of grain threshed; one mark equals either one bushel or ten bushels. Purchased and donated as a matched set (very unusual to find a matched pair like these). Completely cleaned and restored by Joe Shafranich (Penn State Farm Operations) and Darwin Braund, volunteer curator, in December 1999 and January 2000, and added to the Pasto Agricultural Museum in early 2000.

 

 

A one-horse tread power; made in the 1870s by Schaeffer, Merkel & Co. in Fleetwood, PA (Berks County.) Original lettering and stenciling on both sides: "THE BUCKWALTER CHAMPION", Schaeffer, Merkel & Co. Manufacturers, Fleetwood, PA." Bought at auction May 15, 1999, together with thresher as a matched set, then cleaned and restored.