Immediately succeeding this period the automatic cord binder was put into use, and within five years the increase in output of reapers and mowers was very great. In 1885 more than 100,000 self-binding harvesters and 150,000 reapers and mowers were built and sold. In 1890 two manufacturing establishments in Chicago made more than 200,000 machines, half of which were self-binders and the other half reapers and mowers, and these two institutions alone employed in their various branches of manufacturing and selling 10,000 employees. In 1895 the output of the largest of these manufacturing establishments was 60,000 self-binding harvesters, fitted with bundle carriers and trucks, 61,000 mowers, 10,000 corn harvesters, and 5,000 reapers, making 136,000 machines in all. In 1898 the output of this one factory for the year was 74,000 self-binding harvesters, 107,000 mowers, 9,000 corn harvesters, and 10,000 reapers, amounting to 200,000 machines. This output, together with 75,000 horse rakes, also made, averaged a complete machine for every forty seconds in the year, working ten hours a day. The estimated annual production of all factories in this class of agricultural implements is 180,000 self-binding harvesters, 250,000 mowing machines, 18,000 corn harvesters, and 25,000 reapers. [Illustration: FIG. 157.--STEAM HARVESTER AND THRESHER. The wheat is headed, threshed, cleaned and sacked by this machine in one continuous operation.--Cutter, 26 feet wide; Capacity, 75 acres per day.] [Illustration: FIG. 158.--FIFTY HORSE POWER STEAM PLANTING COMBINATION. Traction engine pulling sixteen 10-inch plows, four 6-foot harrows, and a drill.] There were exported in the year 1880 about 800 self-binding harvesters, 2,000 reapers, and 1,000 mowers. In 1890 this was increased to 3,000 self-binding harvesters, 4,000 reapers, and 2,000 mowers. The total value of mowers and reapers exported in 1890 was $2,092,638. The growth subsequent to 1890 is well attested by the exports for 1899, which for mowers and reapers was $9,053,830, or more than four times what it was in 1890. These exported machines harvest the crops of the Argentine Republic, Paraguay, and Uruguay, of South America; carry their labor-saving values to Australia and New Zealand; traverse the wheat fields along the banks of the Red Sea and the Volga, and are used throughout all the continent of Europe. [Illustration: FIG. 159.--A WESTERN HARVEST SCENE (LEFT SECTION OF VIEW).] [Illustration: FIG. 159.--A WESTERN HARVEST SCENE (RIGHT SECTION OF VIEW).]