National Museum of American History
1300 Constitution Ave., NW
Washington, DC
Hand and horse-drawn tools to present-day mechanized equipment illustrate the changes in rural America since the 18th century. Together the scythes, hayforks, plows, harvesting machinery, and steam engines show the progression in agriculture from manpower to horsepower to steam power to the power of the internal combustion engine. In particular, this progression is illustrated by a 1918 Waterloo Boy tractor; a 1924 Huber steam tractor; and a 1943 International Harvester cotton harvester ("Old Red"), with the latter symbolizing the end of the old labor-intensive cotton culture.