Holt Combined Harvester-Thresher
date: label: Date made
content: 1886
name: label: maker
content: Holt, Benjamin
notes: label: Description
content: This behemoth was the first machine to functionally combine harvesting, threshing, cleaning and bagging grain. Built in 1886, this machine represents a key shift from the gears of earlier combines to link belts. The belts allowed runaway horses to break the belt instead of stripping the gears, an easier repair. The machine also incorporated mechanisms to keep horses at a steady pace.
label: Description
content: This combine features a reciprocating sickle bar, a gathered reel above the sickle, a continuous moving apron to catch the cut grain and move it along to the threshing cylinder, a sieve to winnow the grain from the straw and chaff, and an elevator to move the wheat to the bags. It also used a ground wheel connected to its link belts, capturing the momentum of the machine to power its mechanisms.
label: Description
content: The massive machine was pulled by teams of 20 or more horses or mules. On this combine's first day of work-June 1, 1887-the man who drove the machine was paid $2.50 for his day's work.
setName: label: See more items in
content: Work and Industry: Agriculture
label: See more items in
content: Agriculture
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: Gift of Mrs. C. Parker Holt, Stockton, California
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: AG.61A12
label: catalog number
content: 61A12
label: accession number
content: 236419
objectType: label: Object Name
content: Combine, Holt, Harvester, Thresher