# Small square bales, when did they begin making them?



## Palmettokat (Jul 10, 2017)

I had never notice or maybe thought about it is more correct till I got involved in hay never paid attention the square hay bales in the barns in the old westerns. I did look it up and found horse powered balers were used in the late 1800's but some of those shows were suppose to be way before then.


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## luke strawwalker (Jul 31, 2014)

Hand tied small square bales have been around a LONG time... don't know the particulars but it'd be interesting to find out.

Of course the first mechanical knotters were from the mid-1800's and were originally designed for reapers cutting wheat and small grains and tying it into shocks to dry in the field... It was MUCH later (early 1900's when they were first applied to balers AFAIK...

Before that it was "hand tied" bales, usually wire. I've seen those balers run at threshing shows-- usually a wooden block with grooves in it for the wires to pass through between it and the bale were installed in a slide, which was swung up between strokes when the bale reached the desired length-- the next stroke of the chamber packer (thing that pushed the hay down into the chamber between the bale and plunger) had a "finger" or spring sticking out that pushed the block down into the chamber with the next wad of hay, and the plunger then pushed it past the hay dogs as the baler kept right on charging and plunging the next bale... wires were then threaded through the open sides of the bale press though the grooves in the block, and were pulled together on the opposite side and twisted together, and the bale continued on down til it exited the press, freeing the wood block between it and the next bale. I've got video of the process on my channel on YouTube that I took at the "Winimac Power of the Past" threshing and steam power show in Winimac, Indiana, over a few years of attendance.

Later! OL J R


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## Vol (Jul 5, 2009)

Palmettokat said:


> I had never notice or maybe thought about it is more correct till I got involved in hay never paid attention the square hay bales in the barns in the old westerns. I did look it up and found horse powered balers were used in the late 1800's but some of those shows were suppose to be way before then.


This is a pretty good summary.

Regards, Mike

https://www.farmcollector.com/implements/hay-press-zmhz12fzbea


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## Teslan (Aug 20, 2011)

That was an interesting article. I always marvel at the knotters on any baler.  How someone came up with having a machine tie a knot. And now the knotters really haven't changed on any brand in 45 or more years. Each brand has essentially the same knotters. As for the period western movies Palmettokat mentions they may not be correct. They just probably didn't think a small bale should not be in a movie set in 1860. Much like most people think a hay bale should always be a yellow color.


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## endrow (Dec 15, 2011)

On our farms they put the straw and hay in the mows loose until the mid 1940,s when Ed Nolts Balers went into production . My uncle said they would walk a pair of mules in the straw mow to pack it down as the thrasher blew it in . then when the mow was full they put a big pile of loose straw on the barn floor and blindfold them and push them out . They fed and watered them in the mow they kept them up there till the grain was in . All our barns had devices for the hay it was a grapple that picked loose hay off the wagon and went up to the roof peak and ran on a track to dump it in mow


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## NewBerlinBaler (May 30, 2011)

I think the point Palmettokat is trying to make is that the old westerns we watch on TV are historically incorrect. I also noticed this once I became a hay a farmer. When Hoss Cartwright goes out to the barn, seen behind him is a stack of tight, perfectly formed, small square bales that were obviously made with a piece of farm machinery that didn't exist in the 1870's.


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## Palmettokat (Jul 10, 2017)

Sure have enjoyed and learned from y'all. Vol have notice you sure have a wealth of info. So often you post articles that I find interesting..


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## Ray 54 (Aug 2, 2014)

All the old barn had a track for a hay fork to handle the loose hay. From stories used up to WW2,or after when you could buy new machinery.

But my dad was born in 1912 and by 10 he was helping bale hay by keeping the horse going in a circle providing the power to the baler. All the questions I never thought to ask when I could of got the answer. But taking a educated guess,hay stored for on farm to us was loose in the barn. Hay being sold was baled. Just like today the more miles hay goes from the farm bigger loads are better for the one transporting. So compacted into bales. You had to get hay in every barn in town before the automobile took over the streets,and turned it into the garage.


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## Coondle (Aug 28, 2013)

This question piqued my interest so I went searching and try this as a historical summary:

https://www.farmcollector.com/implements/hay-press-zmhz12fzbea

Here is a link to a hay press from the 1860's, keep watching past 2 minutes:






But this style of hay press made huge bales and it was sometime later that a horizontal press came into being, which with farmer ingenuity was developed into the magpie baler. So named because of the dipping action of the wad board to push the hay from the loading chute into the chamber for the plunger to compress..

At an old-time exhibition held in a town about 2 hours from me there was in the last 2 shows a model magpie baler that is powered through a belt from a steam engine, all about 1/10th size. The twines are fed from the side and bales separated by wooden blocks just as Luke describes in post#2 above.

You Tube helps out with an electric driven model magpie baler:






The original "mobile" ones would have been powered by a steam traction engine, or a stationary steam engine, if by a traction engine the traction engine was most likely used to pull the baler from place to place.

A Massey Harris magpie baler or pecker was my first baling experience when I was still under 5 years of age. My father used a dump rake or sweep rake to drag the hay into heaps, the baler was then towed to the heap and the tractor hooked up via belt pulley (a flat belt) to power the machine, my father then pitch forked the hay into the open top hopper, keeping in time with the pecker.

The machine was ancient then, a Massey Harris and made a wonderful play ground for my fertile imagination. Luckily I never got any of my parts caught in the machinery. which had rudimentary guarding. The machine is on a nearby farm languishing in "Paddy's big blue shed, not far from where it was used over 60 years ago on our farm.

Good old You tube has obliged with this:






Our tractor was eye-wateringly modern as a Fordson E27N compared to the one so magnificently restored here. The flat belt is just as exposed and lurking to grab an unwary passer-by.

The museum in my little hometown has a horizontal hay press of epic proportions, i estimate close on 4 1/2 metres (15 feet) long and apparently powered by a horseworks. Horseworks are the device whereby a horse or other large beast of burden (Oxen, donkeys, mule or camel) walked in a circle with their chest harnessed against a pole attached to a central column. The central column then had a large crown wheel driving a small pinion connected to an axle at ground level that came out from the circle the horse walked in Through cogs and or a belt etc the axle could then drive machinery for threshing, chaff cutting, mixing, lifting or baling etc.

A horseworks:






Look at the 20 second picture and the square sections at the top are for the bar ( if only 1 horse is needed) or two bars if two or more horses are needed. The crow wheel is domed upward and the driven axle is at the lower right with half of a universal joint. Tie this down tight and with two horses each side there can be considerable power harnessed.   Pun intended.  

The museum has several horseworks and a host of antique machinery but no-one with the interest or knowledge to integrate the collection. I have tried with the curator but unfortunately the interest s in documents and fabrics rather than machines. A huge shame because the old guys like me that connect horse powered days to today will soon be gone. The museum has or has the opportunity for almost every advance in grain harvesting, threshing from the sickle to modern combine harvesters including a fully restored harvester from circa 1910. Strippers, threshers, winnowers etc.

A winnower:

www.otms.org.au/blog/what-is-a-winnower

I have a "barn fresh" one of thee still operational by crank handle with the date 1862 and the selling dealer's name and address discernible in the paint work.

The museum also has a multi-story fully operational stone grinding flour mill circa 1870 with the silks and all. Hexagonal wooden shafts driving the grinding stone above the stationary stone. What potential to show city slickers real food trail from paddock to plate. I offered to donate a circa 1947 10 foot harvester, rather unique in that it was factory produced as tractor drawn being the factory modified version of what had been a horse drawn. ground drive machine, a Massey Harris 12 foot No 12 Header (Combine harvester) in almost showroom floor condition, circa 1955 and a 12 foot self propelled harder (combine harvester) circa 1969. All machines fully operational. The harvesters all had the closed Australian stripper or semi-stripper fronts. Indeed the museum has a "Ridley stripper", first demonstrated in 1843.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Ridley_(inventor)

I spoke to the curator about the need to stabilise te stripper but was given short marching orders and later found out that the "contractor" employed to stabilise the stripper had lifted it onto some jack stands and broke its back. what a shame.

It as the marriage three machines, the stripper, the thresher and the winnower that gave rise the term "Combine harvester" since te new machine was in fact the combination int one of 3 previously existing machines. Again farmer ingenuity at work.

Returning to the first observance; yes there is plenty of historical and often factual inaccuracy in movies including Westerns.

I love the appearance of rolled hay in some older movies. A-C made about the first hay roller in about 1949 and modified the WC and WD tractors by introducing a hand clutch to keep a live pto to discharge the little rolls. They had a foot clutch too for the gears but that disengaged the PTO too.

Watch for polled cattle rather than longhorns in westerns and steel star picket posts, plus wire fences. Extruded wire first appeared in the 1860's and what about pneumatic tyres on old tractors, they first appeared in 1927. Mirrors on the passenger side of cars were rare before the late 50's and early 60's. My wife goes off at me if I pick on historical inaccuracies but it does amuse my small mind.


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## Vol (Jul 5, 2009)

Palmettokat said:


> Sure have enjoyed and learned from y'all. Vol have notice you sure have a wealth of info. So often you post articles that I find interesting..


I like to read, and if I can remember where I read something, then sometimes it can be useful.  I too enjoy HT along with the wealth of haying info that I have gleaned through the years so I enjoy keeping this site going. I especially enjoy the people from the different regions and how they tackle their own set of haying challenges.

Thanks Palmetto.

Regards, Mike


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## Wethay (Jul 17, 2015)

I have never heard of a hand clutch for just travel while leaving the pto operating. I have seen two stage foot clutch pedals and true independent ptos, as well as a single clutch that stopped everything. Am I the only one so ignorant?


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## slowzuki (Mar 8, 2011)

Hand clutch not common around here but I knew of them. They did loose hay into the late 1950’s on the ground I hay. Our barn still has the equivalent of 1000 bales of loose hay in it from back then.


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## bool (Mar 14, 2016)

My John Deere 720 has a hand clutch for travel and a foot clutch for PTO.

When I was a kid in the 1960s my father could not afford a pickup baler. We used a ground drive sickle mower (horse drawn converted to tractor pull), a dump rake (again, horse drawn converter to tractor pull), a hay sweep, and a stationary hay press. I still have all of them.

Roger


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## Coondle (Aug 28, 2013)

Wethay said:


> I have never heard of a hand clutch for just travel while leaving the pto operating. I have seen two stage foot clutch pedals and true independent ptos, as well as a single clutch that stopped everything. Am I the only one so ignorant?


Please see the Tractor data write up on the A-C WD, here is the link:

www.tractordata.com/farm-tractors/000/0/1/10-allis-chalmers-wd.html

And here is the Overview extracted:

"The Allis-Chalmers WD featured Two-Clutch Power Control and power-shifted rear wheels. The dual clutch system used a foot-operated dry clutch to disconnect the PTO and driveline from the engine. A hand-operated wet clutch allowed the PTO to operate while the tractor was slowed or stopped."

The transmission had three filler points on the right side of the tractor and within the channel iron frame, one for the hand clutch, one for the gearbox and the third for the final drive, all taking the reasonably recent innovation in tractor oil, the Universal Tractor Transmission Oil (UTTO). Some marketed it as TOU, being Tractor Oil Universal which my father upon marketing recommendation used it in the transmission line and in the engine. Suitable for the A-C we had, a petrol/kerosene model.

Here is a You Tube of one being driven:






At 1 minute 33 seconds the driver engages the hand clutch for forward movement, at 2.32 he uses the foot clutch to stop the tractor and does not touch the hand clutch. He then changes gears but grates them badly in the process.

Live pto was a rarity in the late 40's and A-C built the Rotobaler a belt formed hay roller (no tie facility) which needed a live pto to allow discharge of the roll of hay, just as round balers of today do. Here is a you tube clip of a Roto baler in action, unfortunately with a later model tractor.






A historical clip showing various A-C hay/forage systems including the Roto Baler at 5.25 and even a mid mounted sickle mower at 5.18. We had a mid-mounted Bamford sickle mower fitted to a WD A-C. Bamford was an English hay machinery maker.

manufacturer


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## Palmettokat (Jul 10, 2017)

NewBerlinBaler said:


> I think the point Palmettokat is trying to make is that the old westerns we watch on TV are historically incorrect. I also noticed this once I became a hay a farmer. When Hoss Cartwright goes out to the barn, seen behind him is a stack of tight, perfectly formed, small square bales that were obviously made with a piece of farm machinery that didn't exist in the 1870's.


No idea why the bales of hay surprised me when I really noticed them..I mean most six shooters will fire about 50 rounds in a gun fight. Maybe they had sixty shooters and not six shooters. As to the six shooters think even a child with a toy guns realizes they do not shoot that often but some as simple and really obvious as how hay is handled is just background. Understand with the show The Rifleman the rifle he uses was not invented till a few years after the era of that show was to have taken place.


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## slowzuki (Mar 8, 2011)

Anachronism is very common in plays and movies. It’s a ton of work to make things historically accurate when most people wouldn’t notice.


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## bool (Mar 14, 2016)

I noticed in in "The Dish", a film about a big radio telescope in Parkes, rural Australia, that was involved in receiving footage of the Apollo 11 moon landing. Set in 1969, it featured a backdrop of big square bales.

Roger


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