BURNING STRAW

saw mills, and in the wheat fields of the Pan Handle Country, we
burned coal in the steamers. However, in the Dakotas and Canada is
where I got to run the straw burners, which I loved to run best of
all, providing you had a well-equipped engine to run.

I ran a 25 H.P. Reeves simple engine for a thresherman in North
Dakota. When coal was too high, he would decide to burn straw and
that was music to my ears. We would take out the coal rocker grates
and install a dead plate, which would cover 1/4 of the grate area
in front of the fire box door. We would then install the straw
grate in front of the dead plate. Next, would come four large fire
brick in the fire box, which would extend from below the flues at
an angle to within 8′ of the crown sheet. Then we took off the
fire door and installed a funnel trap door for straw and also
installed a screen over the smoke stack. This particular engine had
a trap door on the left side of the fire box for the purpose of
cleaning straw clinkers off the flue sheet. It also had a large
water tank on four wheels with a large straw rack on top of it,
making it practical for moving long distances. This water tank was
coupled to the engine with a platform on a tongue. A fireman could
stand on it while moving, and we were ready to work when we arrived
at our threshing destination.

We would uncouple from the separator and run around in a
360-degree circle to line up. Then we would uncouple the water tank
so as to leave four feet of ground space for the fireman to stand
on and fire. A hose would reach from the water tank to injector to
feed boiler. We also had a hose and nozzel on the injector for the
purpose of wetting down the ground around the engine to prevent
fire. Then, came the straw monkey, as we called him. He had a mule
and tripod for pulling straw from the straw pile to the engine
where the fireman could get it. Next, came the fireman. He fired
the straw and took care of the water in the boiler.

Engine lineup at a recent Tuscara was Valley Pioneer
Association, Inc.

All I had to do was move, set, and oil the engine. I sat in a
shock of wheat and watched the hobos and the I. W. W. pitch in the
golden grain. The fireman I had couldn’t be beat. He was a
little guy of Russian decent and he could keep that steam gauge
hand at 150 lbs. You would think it was frozen there, as he
didn’t work hard, but it was steady. He got out at 4:00 in the
morning, had steam and was ready to go at 7:00. He would eat
breakfast and dinner on the job.

Sundays he would wash the boiler and clean the grates. Burning
straw would form clinkers like glass over the grates. He would have
to take them out and it took a chisel and hammer to clean them. The
fireman preferred burning flax straw, as it fired better than wheat
straw.

Again, I say if you had a well-equipped engine for burning straw
and a good fireman, they were very nice to run. You can bet when I
went further North, I looked for a straw burner to run. They were
my favorite!