Digital Exhibits

Steam Tractor in Hay Field

A team of men harvest hay or grain from a field using steam-powered machinery. A steam tractor engine and a "Case" brand boiler pulled by two horses stand on the left. A pile of wood used to power the engine and two barrels sit nearby. A long belt attached to the steam tractor engine is running a third machine, possibly a thresher or baler (right). Men stand atop a horse-drawn wagon behind the machine on the right, carefully raking hay, while another empty wagon stands nearby. A recently-cut field of hay or grain is in the background, alongside a grove of oak trees. Small haystacks lie scattered around the field. This photograph was taken around 1910-1914 near Forest Grove, Oregon (possibly in Banks or Hillside), by William Alonso Clapshaw. Flaws in the photograph are due to dust and deterioration of the emulsion layer on the negative.

This is one image from a set of glass plate negatives created by William Alonso Clapshaw. Clapshaw was a clerk and shopkeeper who lived near Forest Grove, Oregon for most of his life. He was born in 1880, probably at the family's home in the Hillside neighborhood of Forest Grove, on what is now Clapshaw Hill Road east of Gales Creek. Around 1910-1914, William took an interest in photography and created a set of glass plate negatives documenting scenes near his family's lands as well as images of himself, his friends and family members. He most likely used a silver gelatin dry plate process. The photographs were donated to the Pacific University Archives in 2023.

Clapshaw, William Alonso, 1880-1985

circa 1910-1914

PUA_MS154_010

Agriculture

Agricultural laborers

Horses

Threshing machines

Forest Grove, Oregon

Gelatin silver negatives

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Pacific University Archives