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Combine Harvester: History & Fun Facts

Combining Three Jobs Into One Machine

A combine harvester earns its name because it combines three separate farm jobs, reaping, threshing, and winnowing, into a single machine that used to require three different pieces of equipment and far more labor. Early mechanical reapers appeared in the 1830s, but true self-propelled combines that could cut and process grain in one pass did not become common on American farms until the 1930s and 1940s.

How the Header and Auger Move the Grain

The wide header at the front uses a spinning reel to pull standing wheat stalks toward a cutting bar, then internal threshers separate the grain kernels from the straw before the clean grain fills a tank on top of the machine. Once the tank is full, the long auger tube swings out to the side and unloads grain directly into a truck or trailer driving alongside, so the combine never has to stop working.

Harvest Season and Modern Field Sizes

A single large combine can harvest well over a thousand acres of wheat, corn, or soybeans in a season, running for long hours during the narrow window when a crop is ready before weather can spoil it. Farmers time harvest closely around moisture levels in the grain, since cutting too early or too late can mean lost yield or higher drying costs after the crop reaches the barn.