ONE HOT JOB

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Making hay took a lot of time; early on, hay was cut with scythes, allowed to dry and gathered by hand into small stacks.

Later, horse-drawn mowers came out, often with only a 3-foot cut, but still much faster than making hay by hand. In time, dump rakes were developed to bunch hay into windrows, where it could be forked up into a hayrack. Still, the process demanded hard work. Then came hay loaders, which were developed in the 1870s and used into the 1950s.

Last summer, we acquired a hay loader that had been stored for 50 years in a barn. Orange paint remaining on the unit's galvanized sides spelled out 'New Idea.'

None of the wood was rotten, so we cleaned it up, greasing and oiling as needed, and naturally, decided to test it.

Neighbor Myron Joneson brought up his horses, hooked them to our makeshift rack, and we loaded hay. It was long grass hay from the pasture, real similar to what would have been loaded 75 years ago.

With a hay loader, hay is brought up behind the rack, elevated up as shown in the photographs and dumped at the rack's rear. Men on the rack then move the hay forward, piling it loosely, to make room for additional hay coming up the loader.

An hour of loading hay this way makes one appreciate modern technology.

Usually, two men, including the driver, would load a rack; the horses, on their own, would straddle a windrow while the driver helped on the rack.

Loading hay with horses is quite peaceful; the click of the loader and the squeak of the harness leather is all you hear - save for the labored breathing of crew members in less-than-prime condition.

Another neighbor, Mike Schmidt, got wind of our project, brought some old slings by and suggested we try them out, too.

So, we loaded up a sling and took it to Mike's, where he had an existing hay carrier, track and hay rope in his barn.

No hay had been loaded into this barn since 1952, so Mike wanted us to be sure the carrier worked safely. He didn't mention it was 30-odd feet up - well beyond our extension ladders' reach.

Not to be denied, we took a hoisting rig normally used in our well business and raised the mast inside the barn.

Armed with penetrating oil and a small hammer, I climbed the mast to the hay carrier, and Mike climbed up an extension ladder to hand tools to me as needed.

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