by Shanna Hatfield
Due to spring arriving about a month early this year, wheat harvest has begun in our area. Just the other day, we noticed the number of fields that had already been harvested. Soon, smoke will fill the sky as the farmers burn off the stubble and prepare the fields for another year.
In my
Pendleton Petticoats series is set in Pendleton, Oregon, in the early 1900s, several of the stories include scenes of wheat harvest.
Back in the early years of the twentieth century, Umatilla County (where Pendleton is located)
produced approximately one percent of the nation’s wheat crop. Wheat
harvest brought workers to town, provided income for families, and was
quite an event.
It was also a lot of hot, sweaty, backbreaking work.
Growing up on a farm, I write from experience about the dusty, itchy
chaff that makes the air thick and hard to breathe.
When I looked for visual inspiration, I found several photos taken in the general area.
This photo was taken in
1903 in Sherman County, Oregon. (If you’ve read the Grass Valley series, it is set in Sherman County.)
Although I had a general idea of what each piece of equipment on the machine did, I had no idea how to describe it.
This
was another photo that provided a great visual of exactly how I
pictured wheat harvest at Nash’s Folly, the main ranch in the Pendleton Petticoats series. Taken in 1902 in Walla Walla,
WA, this photo shows not only the machine, but also the rolling, hilly fields prevalent in the area.
This photo, also from the
oldoregonphotos.com
website, shows the team of 32 pulling a hillside harvester in 1900.
Because of the rolling hills, the farmers needed a machine that wouldn’t
tip over on the steep inclines.
And here’s a crew in the early 1900s sitting with bags of
golden kernels
near Arlington, OR. The woman on the end doesn’t look particularly
excited to be there- but if I had to cook for a threshing crew in the
unbearable summer heat dressed in layers of petticoats and long sleeves,
I’d probably look really, really grumpy.
I
also found this awesome photo that shows walls created with 100,000
sacks of wheat near Pendleton. Mission is on the Umatilla Reservation.
After gathering the historic photos and studying them, I still had no
idea how to describe the equipment, so I contacted my dad and asked his
sage advice. I emailed him a couple of the photos. He called me and told
me what all the parts and pieces were as well as giving me the names of
the different jobs of each man on the equipment.
The jigger sewed the sacks shut once they were filled. The tender
made sure the cutter was going where it was supposed to while the
skinner drove the team. I had no idea!
My dad, who comes from a long line of farmers, also spent several
years after he and my mother first wed working in Pendleton in the early
1950s. He had first-hand experience with the terrain, the hillside
harvesters, and even told me why so many of the farmers preferred mules
to horses (because the mules could go all day without a problem and the
horses often got sores or sick.)
As I watch the modern equipment bring in this year's crop, it makes me think of those long ago days when a legion of four-legged and human workers were needed to harvest the wheat.
~*~
Convinced everyone deserves a
happy ending, USA Today best-selling
author Shanna Hatfield is out to make it happen, one story at a time. Her sweet
historical and contemporary romances combine humor and heart-pumping moments with
relatable characters.
When this hopeless romantic isn’t
writing or indulging in rich, decadent chocolate, Shanna hangs out with her
husband, lovingly known as Captain Cavedweller.
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