![]() ![]() The tours have been a great way to study all things Lincoln.ĭavid J. All along my Chasing Abraham Lincoln road trip routes I’ve met many hugely interesting and helpful people, from local librarians to small museum curators to volunteers at courthouses. Shortly after my return home I received an email from Amanda Kirby, an assistant at the Research and Extension Center, thanking me for my visit and providing some additional information and resources for the book I’m researching. While onsite I also checked out the small blacksmith shop and water well.īefore leaving I left my name and website address in the guest book. On the wall hung an old scythe and cradle, hand tools used to mow and reap crops before invention of the reaper. Here there were many models of different McCormick reapers, a full-size original reaper, and tons of information about the history of the farm and the inventor. Grain is fed from a hopper in the upper level and ground at mid level while the main drive shaft and gears take up most of the lower level.Īnother main building had the wood shops in the lower section and a museum in the upper section. There are two sets of mill apparatuses: one solely for corn, the other for wheat and other grains. Inside, the mostly wood gear mechanisms showed how the grain was ground into meal. Outside the grist mill a wooden water wheel creaked eerily as it continued to turn after all these years. ![]() The original ice house was torn down in the 1960s. The McCormick Farm is a well preserved set of eight original buildings, including a grist mill, blacksmith shop, slave quarters, carriage house, manor house, smoke house, schoolroom, and housekeeper’s quarters. McCormick’s reaper eventually led to the modern combine harvester his company eventually merged with others to form International Harvester. Department of Agriculture to enhance the use of science in farming. The era of farm mechanization had begun, and Lincoln the President later relied on his experience to push for and begin the U.S. While angry at being tossed out of what he thought was his case, Lincoln turned it into an educational experience, watching the trial and learning a great deal about how more classically educated eastern lawyers worked a case. Worse, Stanton treated Lincoln poorly, writing him off as a hick western lawyer of little value. Lincoln spent considerable time preparing for the case and writing a technical brief, but when he arrived in Cincinnati he was shocked to learn that an esteemed Ohio lawyer, Edwin Stanton, had been hired and his own services were no longer needed. Manny’s lawyers called in Lincoln because of his jury skills and his local presence in Illinois, but then the case was transferred to the district court in Cincinnati, Ohio. McCormick sued rival John Manny for patent infringement, accusing him of stealing the McCormick reaper design. Cyrus McCormick had invented a reaper that became the gold standard and stimulated others to “borrow” his ideas. ![]() On my second Chasing Abraham Lincoln tour I made an unplanned stop at the McCormick Farm, now part of the Shenandoah Valley Agricultural Research and Extension Center.Īs populations grew the need for improved crop yields increased, and the mechanical reaper made that possible. One of Abraham Lincoln’s most famous cases is one in which he never actually tried. ![]()
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