Plow
an agricultural implement used for turning over the soil. In all probability the first instrument employed for this purpose was a wooden crotch pulled by hand. The plow may be regarded as having grown out of some such primitive instrument. There were a few plows in Virginia as early as 1617. Plows were introduced into the Massachusetts colony in 1632. Five years later there were less than forty in the entire colony. The colonial plow was made entirely of wood. It required to be heavily weighted to hold it into the ground. At the best it merely stirred the soil without turning a distinct furrow. Few were able to own plows. The fortunate possessor was a man whose friendship was to be cultivated. In some towns bounties were offered to those who would keep a plough for hire to their neighbors. The early French settlers of Illinois used a large, unwieldy, wooden plow, which they improved later by protecting the point with a piece of iron tied on with strips of rawhide. Similar plows are still in use in Mexico and in a number of the South American states.
In 1793 Thomas Jefferson, who prided himself on being an inventive farmer, invented a moldboard "that would turn a furrow without breaking it." Four years later Charles Newbold of Burlington, New Jersey, succeeded in turning out a cast-iron plow. Altogether he is said to have spent $30,000 in perfecting his plow. He was unable to overcome the prejudices of the farmers, among whom a rumor circulated to the effect that an iron plow "poisoned the soil, ruined the crops and promoted the growth of rocks." So Newbold's plow came to nothing.
In 1819 Jethro Wood of New York patented a plow which may be regarded as the forerunner of the implement now in use. It had a cast-iron share, shin, moldboard, and landside. It was constructed according to pattern, so that the share, for instance, would fit any of his plows. From this date onward improvements followed rapidly. John Deere and James Oliver were pioneers in perfecting steel plows that would scour in sticky soils. The sulky plow, on which the plowman rides, and the gang plow, with two or more plows suspended from the same frame, are now familiar. The steam plow, used in England for the first time in 1832, is now not uncommon. A gang of from two to twenty-four plows is drawn by a traction engine.
A power plow in use in the wheat fields of the Red River Valley has a gang of nine fourteen-inch shares. The traction engine weighs 13,000 pounds. The drive-wheels are twenty-four inches broad. A pilot wheel running in the furrow ahead guides the engine. The power is furnished by gasoline, for which the allowance is two gallons or about twenty-eight cents per acre. The entire outfit is worth $2,700. One man can plow from twelve to twenty acres a day seven inches deep. With a plow of this sort a man is expected to turn over an eighty of wheat stubble between Monday morning and Saturday night, with a half day off to go to town at that.
A favorite French plow is built double--one share and moldboard on the right; the other on the left. The one not in use hangs above the other. By changing the shares at each end of the field the plowman is able to go back in the same furrow without forming lands. A field plowed in this way has neither crown furrows nor dead furrows. In 1836 Daniel Webster, who played at farming in Mansfield, Massachusetts, interested himself in the construction of a plow with a beam twelve feet long which turned a furrow twenty-four inches wide. "When I have hold of the handles of my big plough," said he, "with four pair of cattle to pull it, and hear the roots crack and see the stumps all go under the furrow out of sight, and observe the clear, mellow surface of the plowed land, I feel more enthusiasm over my achievement than comes in my encounters in public life at Washington."
The plow is the emblem of agriculture. It has been adopted as the "coat of arms" of the United States Department of Agriculture. The plow appears on the state seal of Minnesota. Primitive plows ended in a single handle or tail. Hence the term, "plow-tail."