Connor McKern Steven Erhard

Summary
In the early 1700's, a great change in farming called the Agricultural Revolution began in Britain The revolution resulted from a series of inventions which made farming much more productive than before In the mid-1800's, the Agricultural Revolution spread through much of Europe and North America One of the Agricultural Revolutions effects was the rapid growth of towns and cities in Europe and the United States during the 1800's Because of the inventions, fewer people were needed to produce food, some farm families moved to the towns and cities

Before the Revolution

Most farmers had strips of land which had many disadvantages like drainage was poor farmers had to leave the land alone every four years banks of land separating strips were just wasted farm land

In the 18th century oxen and horses for power, crude wooden plows, all sowing by hand, cultivating by hoe, hay and grain cutting with sickle, and threshing with flail

Inventions of the Revolution

Sickle- A curved, hand-held agricultural tool used for harvesting grain crops Combine Harvesters- They were machines that head, thresh and clean grain while moving across the field Reaper- They replaced sickles and were also used for harvesting grain crops

Cotton Gin- helped to separate the fibrous cotton from the seedpod

Other Inventions of the Revolution

Mechanical reaper- cut down the amount of manpower needed to bring in the harvest, and was able to double the amount of crops that could be harvested on an annual basis Moldboard- The wedge formed by the curved part of a steel plow blade that turns the furrow Plows- A farm tool with one or more heavy blades that break the soil and cut a small ditch for sowing seeds

Open Field System

An Open Field System is an agricultural arrangement by which land was managed by common settlement by a local community The arable land of a township was divided into a multitude of small strips, each of perhaps half an acre or less Each farmers strips were scattered and intermixed with those of others For convenience, open field strips were gathered into groups known as furlongs, themselves grouped into fields The more landholders there were, however, the more difficult it was to arrange Crop rotation, pasturing of animals, and other matters of common interest were decided by the local landholders

Selective Breeding
Before the eighteenth century, raising animals was slow and costly Farmers had used their intuition and observations to breed animals for hundreds of years, but the process was slow and disorganized because the inheritance of desirable traits was poorly understood Breeding of livestock is now a science in industrial societies, with genetic analysis an integral aspect.

The Cotton Gin

Eli Whitney was an accomplished inventor during the agricultural revolution Eli Whitneys most important invention was that of the cotton gin The cotton gin helped to separate the fibrous cotton from the seedpod

Before the cotton gin was invented workers would have to separate the fibers by hand and it would take them a lot longer
One of the more important things was that it eliminated the use of hands

This was a big thing because as the people were opening the cotton pods it would cut their fingers and hands

Combine Harvester
The combine harvester was invented in the United States by Hiram Moore in 1834 They are machines that head, thresh and clean grain while moving across the field They were drawn by mule or horse and used a bull wheel, or a large wheel on which a rope turns like on ski lifts, to provide power

The name comes from the fact that it puts three long processes, reaping, threshing, and winnowing, together
In about the 1980s on-board electronics were introduced to measure threshing efficiency

Reapers
The reaper was invented by Cyrus McCormick in 1847 and started to mass produce them in Chicago factories in 1847 A reaper is a machine for harvesting grain The first reapers cut the standing grain and swept it onto a platform using a revolving reel from which it was raked off into piles by someone walking beside it

An improvement to the reaper was a self-raking reaper with an endless canvas belt that delivered the cut grain to two men who riding on the end of the platform and bundled it

Seed Drills
one of the earliest developments in the agricultural revolution was the seed drill which was invented by Jethro Tull in 1701 It had a horse-drawn wheeled device that consisted of rotating drills and runners that would plant seeds deeper into the ground Before Jethro Tulls seed drill, most planting was by carrying seeds in bags and broadcasting the seed onto ploughed and harrowed ground

His seed drill was later improved with the addition of gears to the rotary mechanism, or the distribution, of the drill provided the foundation for all future sowing technology

Cast-Steel Plow
In 1837, John Deere designed the first cast steel plow The plow was made of bent iron and had a steel segment that could cut through soil without clogging John Deere made the cast-steel plow out of a steel saw blade for the prairie farmers who were having trouble plowing the soil The large plows made for cutting the tough American prairie ground were called "grasshopper plows.

Moldboard
The moldboard was invented by Thomas Jefferson in 1794 A moldboard is a curved metal blade in a plow that turns the earth over The moldboard was originally made for hillside plowing, in that they turned the furrow to the downhill side

Grain Elevator
A grain elevator is a tower containing a bucket elevator, which scoops up, elevates, and then uses gravity to deposit grain in a other storage facility The elevator was invented by Joseph Dart and Robert Dunbar during 1842 1843, in Buffalo, New York Early grain elevators and bins were often constructed of framed wood, and could easily catch fire

After The Revolution

There was better farming Enough food for people who could afford it More improvements in agriculture Mass production of crops

Timeline
1701 Jethro Tull invents the seed drill and a horse-drawn hoe 1730 Joseph Foljambes Rotherham iron plough to have first commercial success in Europe 1770 Potatoes grown to be sold for the first time in England 1784 Invention of iron plough 1790 - Cradle and scythe introduced.

1793 Eli Whitney invents the cotton gin in the U.S.

1794 - Thomas Jefferson's moldboard of least resistance tested. 1797 - Charles Newbold patented first cast-iron plow 1819 - Jethro Wood patented iron plow with interchangeable parts. 1819-25 - U.S. food canning industry established 1830 - About 250-300 labor-hours required to produce 100 bushels of wheat with walking plow, brush harrow, hand broadcast of seed, sickle, and flail.

Timeline continued
1831 Cyrus McCormick invents the first commercially successful horsedrawn reaper for harvesting wheat 1834 - McCormick reaper patented. 1837 - John Deere and Leonard Andrus began manufacturing steel plows. 1837 - Practical threshing machine patented

1842 The first grain elevator is built by Joseph Dart in the U.S
1850 Edward Quincy inven