GOIN' TO THE CORNER As larger amounts of land were cleared, a machine called the reaper was used for harvesting wheat, oats, barley, and other grains. This reaper cut the grain off just above the ground and it forked it out onto the ground in bunches, with the heads one way and the stems the other way. This reaper was a great improvement over the reaper hook, as it was pulled by horses. A good day's work for a man was to thresh 15 stooks a day. Threshing was first done with a stout hardwood stick an inch and a half in diameter and about four feet long, being attached by a piece of rawhide to another stick much shorter, called the swing. This swing was used by holding the longer stick in the hands and beat¬ ing the grain out of the sheaves with the shorter stick. Janice Ellis Coll . Cutting grain. Hampton Home and son, Douglas Next came the more modern piece of machinery called a binder, a much bigger, more powerful machine that could cut and bind the grain with twine and could knot the twine automatically and kick sheaves onto the ground. This was around 1916. There was the MacCormick and the Deering Binder, used in the 1930s and up until the 1940s. After the horse drawn binder, tractors were used to haul them, and then the big combines hooked up to tractors for harvesting grain in the 1940s and 1950s. These 56