Farming Methods & Farming Machinery

After we had our own corn binder we cut all the corn left over from silo filling with it. Then came the job of setting up the shocks. In doing this we used a wooden horse. It took 2 men to set up corn shocks like this and it too was hard work, when the shock was finished you tied a string around it to hold it in place.

Husking CornWhen husking hand cut shocks you cut the 'bucks' and then sat on the stalks you had husked with your knees. When the entire shock was finished you tied the stalks into large bundles which you in turn set up again.

The procedure was much the same with binder cut shocks. However you first had to cut the strings on all the bundles before you could start husking.

In the fall of 1939 we snapped the corn in the field before we filled silo. Then we went out into the field with the hay rack and picked up the ears and hauled them on the back driveway of the barn. At the end of September my grandmother and I husked the corn and I hauled it to the corncrib with a washtub on our wheelbarrow.

Shredding CornThe corn shredder was a machine that snapped and husked the corn and shredded the fodder.

It is of special interest to me that Mr. August Rosenthal together with his brothers invented the Rosenthal corn husker on his father's farm near Reeds-burg, Wisconsin. Several years later they moved to Milwaukee and organized the Rosenthal corn Husker Co. They were in business until 1957. The Rosenthal corn husker was unique because it had combination husking and snapping rolls.

It was during the middle 30's that the International Harvester Co. stole the patent on the Rosenthal corn husker and made their McCormick-Deering shredder like it. They also had a safety clutch connected to the platform so that when the operator's weight was off the platform the rolls stopped. Another feature on the McCormick-Deering was a blower that could be extended by turning a crank. On the Rosenthal you bolted on sections of pipe. I have already mentioned the Appleton shredder, the New Idea shredder also used separate snapping and husking rolls. This shredder was made by New Idea, Inc. of Cold-water, Ohio. The U. S. Goodhue made by the U. S. Pump & Wine Engine Co. of Batavia, Illinois also used this principle. These were the firms that were still doing business in 1939 when I was collecting literature on corn shredders. To this list we must also add the Dues Husker-Shredder made by the Dues Machine Co. of Munster, Ohio.

In looking through a book entitled 'An Album of American Belt-Powered Machines', I find that there were many makes of corn shredders in the early days. My 1910-1911 Advance Thresher Co. catalog describes their 10 and 12 roll shredders. And in 1915 the J.I. Case Threshing Machine Co. was making shredders.

A corn shredder was a dangerous machine to work around and when I was a boy there were a number of men around LaValle and Wonewoc, Wisconsin who had lost their arms in corn shredder accidents. What would happen would be this: some corn stalks would get caught between the rolls and the man who was doing the feeding would reach into the rolls to pick it off and the rolls would pull his hand into the machine. As early as 1914 the Port Huron Engine & Thresher Co. had a husker-shredder on the market which had a self-feeder but I don't know whether it ever got on the market or not.