Inventors . ng,changing, improving, during the short periodsof each harvest. In a letter to the Commis-sioner of Patents, on file in the Patent Office,Mr. McCormick said: From the experiment of1831 until the harvest of 1840 I did not sell areaper, although during that time I had manyexhibitions of it, for experience proved to methat it was best for the public as well as for my-self that no sales were made, as defects presentedthemselves that would render the reaper unprof-itable in other hands. Many improvements werefound necessary, requiring a great deal of thoughtand study. I was sometimes f
Inventors . ng,changing, improving, during the short periodsof each harvest. In a letter to the Commis-sioner of Patents, on file in the Patent Office,Mr. McCormick said: From the experiment of1831 until the harvest of 1840 I did not sell areaper, although during that time I had manyexhibitions of it, for experience proved to methat it was best for the public as well as for my-self that no sales were made, as defects presentedthemselves that would render the reaper unprof-itable in other hands. Many improvements werefound necessary, requiring a great deal of thoughtand study. I was sometimes flattered, at othertimes discouraged, and at all times deemed it best CYRUS HALL McCORMICK 215 not to attempt the sale of machines until satisfiedthat the reaper would succeed. About 1835 the McCormicks engaged in a part-nership for the smelting of iron ore. The reaper,as a business pursuit, was yet in the distance, andthe new iron industry offered large profits. Thepanic of 1837 swept away these hopes. Cyrus. Interior of the Blacksmith Shop where the First Reaper was Built. sacrificed all he had, even the farm given him byhis father, to settle his debts, and his scrupulousintegrity in this matter turned disaster into bless-ing, for it compelled him to take up the reaper withrenewed energy. With the aid of his father andof his brothers, William and Leander, he beganthe manufacture of the machine in the primitiveworkshop at Walnut Grove, turning out less thanfifty machines a year, all of them made under 216 INVESTORS great disadvantages. The sickles were madeforty miles away, and as there were no railroadsin those days, the blades, six feet long, had to becarried on horseback. Neither was it easy, whenonce the machines were made, to get them tomarket. The first consignment sent to the West-ern prairies, in 1844, was taken in wagons fromWalnut Grove to Scottsville, then down thecanal to Richmond, Va.; thence by water toNew Orleans, and then up the Mississippi andOhio Rivers to Cin
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