LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
On the other hand ...
While reading the letters to the editor in the Farm Collector February 2003 issue, I was somewhat amazed to find the letter from Mr. Herman Calvert. The letter contains a piece of misinformation that may mislead farm tool collectors. He states, "the unusual thing about Weir plows is that they were made right handed at a time when all other plows were left handed. Right-hand plows didn't come out until the tractor plow."
This statement is not correct. Virtually all plow companies (I have catalogs for several dozen dating back to the 1800s), made plows in both left- and right-hand versions. In 1910, the Oliver plow catalog offers almost all of its models in both right- and left-hand versions. Preference determined which was bought.
In general, it can be said that left-handed plows were preferred east of the Mississippi, and right-handed ones to the west. The same is true of wood or steel beam plows, both were made side by side to the very end of walking plow production. Some people think that a steel beam plow is newer than a wood beam, it's not necessarily so. I just wanted to set the record straight.
Right-hand is "right" too
As a long-time collector of walking plows and other primitive horse-drawn farm equipment, a letter in the (Farm Collector, February 2003) issue was misleading in regards to the right-handed plow not coming out until the tractor plow.
In my research, I find the wood mold-board plows were mostly right handed. In 1797, Charles Newbold's patent in the U.S. was for a right-handed cast plow. In 1819, Woods patented a plow with replaceable cast shear and cast moldboards that were right handed.
In 1837, John Deere made his first steel plow, which was right handed. The Baker's (cast moldboard) plow, which was held together by wooden pins, was also right handed. A number of companies were building plows, some of which also offered left-handed plows.
The cast iron plows and left-handed plows were more popular east of the corn belt due to the soil types - the cast iron plow would not scour in these heavy soils. The prairie grass required a sod breaker such as a rod plow or prairie plow with long moldboards. These were steel plows that would scour easily. The cleared land was plowed with new ground plows that typically had standing cutters to handle the root problem.
Around 1890, some attempts were made to build large gang plows for use with steam traction engines. These were unsuccessful since these engines were not developed for the heavy work of plowing. However, these became a reality around 1900, but sold in limited numbers for about 20 years. Smaller tractors with two- to three-bottom plows or tractors with disk plows were becoming more popular.
- Harold Eddy, RFD #2, Slater, MO 65349