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Reapers
and binders: Devices for mechanising aspects
of the corn harvesting process became increasingly common on British farms
during the second half of the nineteenth century.
They were designed to save labour during what was the busiest time of
the farming year. The attraction of employment in towns and cities drew
people away from the countryside and both reduced the availability, and
raised the cost, of spare labour that could be hired for the harvest.
In important respects the design of these machines originated in the United
States and Canada where efforts to open up the prairie lands for corn
growing, with a very small labour force comparatively, were only possible
with extensive and early mechanisation. The earlier machines simply cut
the crop and left it on the ground for gathering by hand into sheaves.
By the last quarter of the nineteenth century, an effective knotting mechanism
had been devised so that the machine could tie the sheaves as well. These
binders, like the one pictured in the 1930s, remained in common use until
ultimately replaced by the combine harvester in the middle years of the
twentieth century.
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