September 4, 1889

The morning and for part of the day was nice. But in the after noon it rained several small showers.  We went over and helped Jo Call thrash.  Got done about 3(?)oclock.  After eating dinner the machine moves over to our job.  We thrashed our oats.  Had 300.bu..  Mr. Purdy(?) was not here.  His machine went up to Mr. Cork(?)


Side notes:
1.  It is not plain whether the Haywards owned their own machinery or if it was borrowed.  But, it is clear that not every family in the area could afford the expensive farm machines like Threshers.  What an impressive communal effort it must have been!  I can also imagine that dinner did not only involve the Hayward boys but also anyone that was helping with the effort.
2.  I thought this may be relevant...

Snorting Monsters

Toward the end of the 19th century, machines pulled by horses began to replace hand power in the grain harvest. By then Iowa farmers were not growing much wheat but they needed oats to feed the horses.

For thousands of years, farmers all over the world had cut, shocked, flailed and winnowed grains the same way. Machines changed all that very quickly. Horse-drawn reapers cut the grain, and binders tied the stalks into bundles.

When the grain was dry, the threshing team arrived. Because the operation with machines required many workers, men from up to a dozen farms worked together for several weeks, moving from farm to farm when the grain was ripe until all the grain was harvested. Some members of the crew loaded the bundles onto a wagon and hauled them to a threshing machine. The machine usually looked like a railroad locomotive. It had a firebox that burned coal to produce steam, and the steam drove wheels and gears that operated a conveyor belt. Black smoke poured out of the chimney and a piercing steams whistle signaled farmers when it was time to start and stop work.

Teams of horses pulled the wagons loaded with bundles close to the big conveyor belt. Farmers on the threshing team climbed to the top of the pile and began pitching bundles onto the moving belt. A rotating knife cute the twine holding the bundles together. Then the stalks of oats were pitched into a series of beaters that knocked the heads from the grain (flailing). The breeze from the operation blew the stalks and chaff into a straw pile while the clean grain dropped into a waiting wagon (winnowing). When the wagon was full, the crew drove it to the barn where it was stored in a grain bin.

Farm women also worked long hours during threshing time. Whenever a crew came to a farm, it was the job of the women there to fix a huge noon meal for the men. Sometimes women from neighboring farms came in to help. The meal usually had beef, chicken or pork (sometimes all three), mashed potatoes and gravy, vegetable from the garden: pickles, bread, butter, jams and jellies, and large slices of pie and cake for dessert. Often the women set up long tables in the shade in the yard where it was cooler than the hot kitchen. The women knew that the men could not help comparing the cooking from one farm to the next, and the women worked hard to make the beast meals they could. The men on the threshing crew went back to work in the afternoon well fed. http://www.iptv.org/iowapathways/mypath.cfm?ounid=ob_000067