Iron Age Ad: The Improved Jayhawk Stacker

By Farm Collector
Published on September 29, 2010
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The dictionary defines the Jayhawk as a mythical bird, a cross between the blue jay and the sparrow hawk. But the Improved Jayhawk, built by the F. Wyatt Mfg. Co. of Salina, Kan., was a farm workhorse well into the 1950s and beyond.

The F. Wyatt Co. got its start in the late 1890s in Salina, building its first hay stacker (capable of lifting 700 lbs. of hay to 23 feet) in about 1903. The Wyatt company was eventually folded into the Hesston Corp., which is today part of AGCO.

The company’s early stackers were horse-powered devices available in both wood and steel models. Commonly used in the Midwest and west before the advent of square bales, stackers created mounds of hay 12 feet tall. Skilled operators knew how to form a rounded top that would shed water.

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