Caterpillar sidehill Combined Harvester Recovery

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Quite a Gift!! Looks like it was in a dry location and is pretty well preserved. Thanks for the info and the pics.

Great job and thanks for the share, CR!

The new Patterson Museum is taking shape thanks to your member and volunteers. Can’t wait to check it out.

An added bonus would be having an old hand familiar with one of those old harvesters. One of our locals would work on them and fondly talk of his days as a “sack sewing teen”. JM

Very Nice looking well preserved machine. I was too late to be around those machines but noticed the sack "holders", recall something very similar on the walnut dryer as a kid. I learned to sew sacks but was never proficient. I did notice a "Wheel Brake Band" on the right wheel. Thanks for sharing, glad that it was inside and well preserved. Wooden Deck will be the easy part of restoration. cts

Still a few of those around down here. But are all the newer version in green paint.

CTS I am somewhat surprised they were all gone in your area in your youth. But then again they were known to not like passing any green plant matter very well. And guessing rice was the crop of choice if grain was planted.

JD sold the model 36 new until in 1951, the 36B sidehill model until 53 by special order, because they only had the 55 H hillside model to replace it until 57 when the 95 was released.

Ray - I do not remember having seen sacks of grain from a "harvester". Most all of the grain farms were rice, orchards along the river. Some Dry Land farming on the East side of the river but I was not over on that side to speak of. West side of the Sacramento River in Glenn & Colusa Counties were under irrigation in the very early 1910's. East side did not have the developed irrigation systems and until wells were used much remained as dry farming. AS you stated, most of the "pull rigs" were replaced by "push rigs" in early 50's. If what I have been told was correct, Massey Harris was one of the first push rigs, they were generally used to "open up" (make the first pass) next to the checks to avoid the harvesters-tractors having to run over standing grain on first pass. When I worked for I.G. Zumwalt, one of the yards had two wooden combines under cover, one of them only ran one season (as I was told by the foreman). Another yard was jammed with JD 17's, JD 36's and a few JD55's. That same yard had many 60's and 60 conversions (diesel power). I think most of them met the fate of the scrap yard. (How little did anyone know they would be in such demand today!) - Growing up and working as a youngster in high school, I would have never believed that the steel tracks would ever be retired in favor of rubber tires, especially in the rice. Seldom do I see tracklayers doing the work, most are gone or in the back lots. cts

Nice save !

Wow that combine looks like it's in fantastic shape, glad you were able to save it too. Does it have the header still?

We used to work along side those red trucks. Nice and professional, hauled bulk 21-00-00 and 16-20-00 Lathrop to Richvale, CA.

I always wondered how fast the sack sew crew/person had to work. In the old days, yields could not have been what they are now, but I know the old machines could knock out a lot of acres in one day.

Any plans of making it a runner again? I hope some of the grain experts would chime in. Bruce Petty, where are you?

One secret that made sack sewing easier than you are thinking JM, the sacks were bigger. I still find it hard to believe, but all the older generation than I said a wheat sack started 120 pounds all the way 140. My uncle and dad talked putting a 140 pound sacks 3 high on the truck standing on the ground. They had tricks but still hard to believe. They also loaded 55 gallon drums of fuel on what ever the used as a service truck, off the ground. I never saw it but they did talk of using a block . I always had trouble if the oil barrel was flat and getting it standing up. But they where just a tougher bunch than we will ever be again.

They had a 3 axle White truck back in the day to move the Cat 35. I don't think they took it around the hillsides to get sacks out of the field. But many stories about hauling wheat from the Shandon to Carrisi Plains area of the county on that truck and hauling into Los Angles. On man loading at least 120 sack. And how thankful they were if the ranch provided some help to load.

Some had more trouble leaving sacks behind than others. After WW2 dad and grandpa bought new JD 36b and custom cut grain up at King City back down to Paso Robles. At least one what sacked grain. Since the combine set up for bulk, they made a sack hanging jig (their term) for the bulk truck. The sack sewer was happy to work in the shade of a tree

Hi, Ray54.

You say your grain sacks ranged from 120 to 140 pounds. Here in DowNunda, it was generally reckoned that a sack of wheat was around 180 pounds. I did a bit sack sewing in 1960 and '61 on the first farm I worked on after I left school.

They would have a contract seed grading machine - made by Mayhew, I think - come in and grade the seed wheat/oats/barley, sorting out any under-sized/undeveloped grains, and sometimes 'pickle' it to keep weevils out. The graded seed came out of the seed grader and was put into sacks which held 3 bushels - in wheat, generally reckoned to be 60 # per bushel.

The sacks were then sewn and loaded onto a truck for hauling to a seed shed for storage until next planting season, usually about 6 months.

In the early days, ALL harvested grains were stored and transported in sewn sacks - bags DowNunda - and were delivered to storage areas, usually alongside a railway line in later times, but anywhere that wagon and horse or bullock team could get to prior to rail transport. The MEN who unloaded and stacked the bagged grain were called 'lumpers' and a good lumper could unload and stack 1,000 to 1,200 bags per 10 hour day, maybe more. They were paid by the bag and it was GOOD money back in the day, although they EARNED every penny of it - pounds, shillings and pence, all same England.

The bags were all stacked laying down and the first 6 or 7 layers were 'relatively' pretty easy as they could use the layers of stacked bags as steps to get up on top of the stack. Once the stack got much higher than that, they would use a long, STOUT plank as a walkway to climb up to the top of the stack. Sometimes, the plank would be set with one end on the ground and the other up on the stack. The 'preferred' way, when it was possible, was to set one end of the plank on the wagon or truck being unloaded and the other end on the stack - made for less climbing angle.

Bulk handling started appearing more commonly in the 1950s and sacks/bags were pretty much GONE by the early 1970s.

Much the same with sheaved hay from the old reaper/binders and baled hay. I did get to work with both and I suspect that I might be one of the few people left DowNunda who know how stack sheaves onna truck for transport and inna stack for storage, INCLUDING 'roofing' the stack to keep rain out.

Just my 0.02.