It Happened Here -- The Man Behind the 

Cast Iron Plow  

On rural roads across New York State a sure sign of spring, more certain than the appearance of Robins or the northward flight of Canada Geese, will be the appearance of tractors of all sizes towing plows of from three to umpteen blades.  Normally, we rural but non-farming residents don't give them much thought except to grumble about how slow they are going and how much of the road they are taking up.  Certainly they don't inspire the wonder and respect that the huge and complicated harvesters and other technological wonders of the farming industry. But for the first half of the nineteenth century farmer/inventors spent a lot of time thinking about ways to improve the plow. (Thomas Jefferson, in his retirement was one of these, and in fact, our inventor would correspond with him.)  Early wooden plows basically cut the soil and produced a furrow to plant in.  What was needed was a plow capable of cutting the soil and turning it over to allow plant residues to compost, to bring nutrients stored in plant roots to the surface where they would nourish young plants, to aerate the soil and to allow rain water to soak in.

In 1730 Joseph Foljambe of Rotherham England designed a  wooden plow with an iron coulter to split the soil and a moldboard sheathed in iron to turn it. Wrought iron plows  began to replace wooden plows. But wrought iron, being soft, regularly needed to be taken to the blacksmith to be sharpened and frequently needed to be welded (re-forged and hammered) when pieces broke. Conservative farm communities harbored fears that iron plows tended to poison the earth as well!
In 1780 Charles Newbold of Chesterfield, New Jersey produced the first cast iron plow in America. Cast iron was much harder than wrought iron, and did not need frequent sharpening but if it broke, it could not be welded and had to be recast. Significant improvements were made in 1803 when Robert Ransdom of Ipswich England produced a cast iron plow cast in three parts with a separate coulter, moldboard and plowshare (cutting edge).

Growing up in White Creek, south of Cambridge New York was young Jethro Wood.  Far removed from the improvements others were making, young Jethro was nevertheless obsessed with designing a better plow.  The story (perhaps apocryphal) was passed down of Jethro melting down a pewter cup and casting it into the form of a plow, then cutting buckles off a set of braces and with some scraps of leather fashioning a harness. The family cat was then pressed into service. The results of his experiment were not recorded but given his rather dubious choice of a draft animal his experiment
was probably not an unqualified success!  As a young man, Jethro Wood was often seen in his free moments with a knife and a block of wood cutting out patterns for prototypes for moldboards that would turn the soil without it sticking fast. Often he would use the soft but firm flesh of new potatoes for his carvings. His Dutch neighbors called him the "whittling Yankee".

Washington Co. Rte 68, Martindale Cors.

In 1799 the family moved to the town of Scipio in Cayuga County and the following year Jethro built a general store and went into business, but the dream of building a better plow was never far from his mind. In Scipio there was a great deal of interest in making a better plow. Three residents, of Scipio--Roswell Toulsby, Horace Pease and John Swan patented minor improvements to the plow.  In 1814 Wood joined them, obtaining his first patent.

Cayuga Co., Long Hill Rd, Poplar Ridge

 By 1819 he was in production, making his own plows and obtaining a second patent that described his moldboard design. The first pieces were cast in a foundry in Montville, on the outskirts of Moravia. Wood's cast iron plows were cast in four pieces. With a replaceable plowshare and moldboard, if part of the plow became dull or damaged it could be repaired in the field. Held together with interlocking pieces, key-ways and wedges, the components could be tapped apart with a hammer, then tapped back together again, unlike more complicated designs which used threaded bolts and nuts that could more easily rust and freeze together in heavy wet soil.  He began production of plows and soon his plows (and his competitors copies of his plows) came to dominate the field.  Wood made a great deal of money, but, over time, much of it was spent in futile court battles to defend his patents. Like Robert Fulton who discovered patent laws in the first quarter of the 19th century were inadequate to protect him from competitors copying his steamboat, Wood faced most of his competition from patent infringing imitators. In 1834 he died impoverished.

Cayuga Co. Rte 38A, Moravia*

In 1833, another former Yankee,  John Deere of Grand Detour, Illinois created the first polished steel plow, having observed that the steel tines of a hay fork tended to shed hay or manure cleanly. His steel, "self scouring" plows were a tremendous success, just when the Great Plains, with its tough prairie grasses were coming under cultivation. Deere became very wealthy,  creating a farm equipment company known world-wide.

Wood's Home, Long Hill Rd., Poplar Ridge

Jethro Wood marker, with a Wood-type plow

* Wood, himself, for many years believed he had made the first cast iron plow, but others had preceded him




Apologies to my regular followers of this Blog who have come to expect a post every 7 to 10 days. My internet connection has been down and I haven't taken the initiative to bestir myself from stove-side to go write at the nearest library or McDonalds to use their wi-fi.

It Happened Here -- Tryon County's Women in War 

Though women in the American Revolution were usually "non-combatants" the Tory and Indian raids of 1778, 1780 and 1781 brought the war to their doorsteps forcing women into roles and committing them to actions far outside their everyday experience.  While countless acts of determination, courage and heroism have gone unrecorded, most of those that are recalled are those passed down by word of mouth, from grandmother to granddaughter, down through the generations,  not written down for 100  years or more and then recorded by Victorian chroniclers perhaps anxious to illustrate the "nobility of the American Frontier Woman" and not above embellishing skimpy facts or perhaps creating "a good story" out of whole cloth.   To professional historians used to dealing with participants' letters and diaries, account books, military unit returns and the works of some early writers that are based on participant interviews and battlefield observations, dealing with such unsubstantiated historical "facts" like these are likely to leave historians feeling a bit "queasy".  Be that as it may, these stories can illustrate some of the roles and actions women played in this period.  Most of the NYSHM's don't refer to these women, either, but  they at least identify the scene of their actions.

On Rte 30A Esperance

In 1778, 1780 and 1781  mixed forces of Tories, Indians and British Regulars raided first the Schoharie and then the Mohawk Valleys.  Militarily they hoped to terrorize the inhabitants of the valleys and tie up large numbers of patriot troops to protect the region; strategically they hoped to disrupt the harvests and destroy wheat production used to feed rebel forces; and personally many Tories hoped to exact revenge for their' expulsion from their homes. Indian forces were similarly motivated by the destruction of their towns across Iroquoia by the Sullivan/ Clinton campaign of 1779.

On Noeltner Rd, Auriesville

     
           

           From early in the Revolution, the mills and 

           wheat fields of the Mohawk and Schoharie 

           Valleys were crucial to provisioning the       

            Patriot's  forces. 

On Denice Rd., off of Ft. Hunter Rd.

The fate of many women in the Mohawk Valley was to deal with loss of a husband or brother or son and of carry on without their loved one's help and economic support. Many families lost members in the third summer of the war as hundreds of Valley menfolk marched off to Oriskany never to return. The burden for women like Elizabeth (Cline) Pettingill is difficult to imagine, running a small farm, alone, with thirteen children!  It became worse in the summer of 1780. As Indian raiders approached, she gathered up her brood and fled, finding refuge under the overgrown banks of the Chuctanunda Creek. As Indian warriors began to track down the family one of the younger children (probably three and a half year old Hendrick, born January 1777)  began to cry and could not be quieted.  Desperate with fear of discovery, Elizabeth stuffed her petticoat in the child's face to muffle its cries.   By the time the danger had passed the child was unconscious but by shaking it vigorously she was able to revive it.  The family emerged to find their house, barn and outbuilding burned to the ground.  Gradually they managed to rebuild, surviving the first winter on wheat that had been scorched but not destroyed in a corner of the barn that now lay in ruins.

On Rte. 334, Fonda

On Rte 30A, at Fairgrounds

Peggy Wemple had more time to adjust to life without a husband, before the Revolution intruded into her life.  Her husband, Barent Wemple, had been a fur trader.  He was fluent in the Seneca dialect and served as a translator in several of the treaty conferences at Johnson Hall in 1769.  In 1771 he was killed in dispute with Indian fur traders.

  Peggy ran a tavern on Cayadutta Street in Caughnawaga* and with her son, Myndert, ran a gristmill on the Cayadutta creek.  She was renowned  for both her beauty and her fierce determination and independence. In 1780, when Tory and Indian raiders rampaged through the town,  she probably met them at the door, barring their way! They forced her inside, barricaded the door and set fire to the building. From an upstairs window she could be heard yelling "Help, Help! Murder, Murder!" Her son was taken captive.  Peggy's brother, John Fonda, sent his slave to investigate but before a rescue could be undertaken the Fonda property was overrun and John and his family was forced to flee. Peggy, apparently, effected her own escape as the tavern and the mill burned to the ground.

Meanwhile, Peggy's father,  Douw Fonda, a local patriot leader and fur trader was apprehended. One of the Indians, "One armed Peter," who knew the elder Fonda from before the war, struck him down and scalped the old man, believing he was certain to be killed, and that being the case, he, Peter might as well reap the financial incentives for taking his scalp!

Following the raid, Myndert was released at Johnstown, and Peggy, determined to go on, began immediately to rebuild.  Money from Douw Fonda's estate and the bequest of three of Fonda's slaves (Africa, Jacob and Catherine) gave her the resources to proceed.  Soon the new mill was up and running and Peggy pushed its production.  By winter of 1780 it had ground and "boulted**" 2700 skepples (2025 bushels) of wheat to be used by the garrisons of Fort Ticonderoga, Fort Hunter, Fort Plank and Fort Stanwix.

*Caughnawaga was named for the nearby Indian town of Caughnawauga, abandoned in 1694. The town's name was changed to Fonda in honor of its founder, Douw Fonda.

**"Boulting" or sifting was the process of sifting out bran and larger particles out of the flour to lighten it and give it better baking qualities. Sieves were made of large wooden hoops covered with a very fine woven cloth, through which the flour was shaken.


Next Week --  Tyron County's Women in War--continues.

Marker of the Week --  He almost got it!                                                                                                                    

On Darrow Rd., Currytown

In 1831 Enoch Ambler devised one of the first mowing machines, to be pulled by horses. It had many of the features that would become standard in many of the mowing machines and reapers over the next 75 years--a long sickle bar that shuttled back and forth, powered by one or more wheels that supported the machine and turned as it was pulled forward by horses. Teeth guided the bar over the ground and channeled the grasses into the sickle.  A skid supported the end of the bar. The sickle-bar was razor sharp like the scythe-man's scythe  until it got dull after a few passes.  But unlike the scythe-er, the mower machine operator couldn't stop, reach into his back pocket and pull out his whet-stone to give his blade a few quick passes to keep it razor sharp. So Enoch Ambler's machine cut at first, then pulled, then jammed.  Ambler wasn't wealthy so it took him a few years to recruit a couple of backers to help him secure a patent.  By then several competitors were using versions of his innovations. Finally he sold his patent and all its rights to a man for $250, and retired from inventing to split shingles for a living.  After a long life he was killed in a shooting accident and was buried in a pauper's grave. The man who bought the patent combined Ambler's machine with a saw toothed scythe blade, which with Ambler-designed guide-teeth scissored off grasses or crops. He combined that with a platform and paddles that swept shocks of grain into bundles.  Cyrus McCormack's reaper made millions, and his company eventually formed the nucleus of International Harvester.