Notes
Threshers were the men who helped harvest grain crops. The threshing machine was invented about 1784, so it is most likely that this harvest was done by machine, although there was still a lot of manual labor involved in the process, particularly bundling the straw. Frequently, threshers were all of the neighbors in a community who moved from farm to farm and helped to harvest each other's grain. In some places, one individual or family in the community would purchase the threshing machine, and make a schedule for the farmers in the community, harvesting each farmer's grain crops in turn. In any event, having threshers on your farm meant that there was a lot of work to be done, and no time to stop and visit.