General Information

Serial #

RS27681

Part Number

1

Total Parts

1

AKA

N/A

Patents

N/A

General Description

metal undercarriage and tires/ wood platforms front and back/ metal hopper and sprayer mechanism, engine casing and parts/ rubber? hose/ fibre rope

Dimensions

Note: These reflect the general size for storage and are not necessarily representative of the object's true dimensions.

Length

317.7 cm

Width

180.0 cm

Height

156.0 cm

Thickness

N/A

Weight

N/A

Diameter

N/A

Volume

N/A

Lexicon

Group

Agriculture

Category

Horticulture

Sub-Category

N/A

Manufacturer

AKA

FRIEND

Country

United States of America

State/Province

New York

City

Gasport

Context

Country

Canada

State/Province

Ontario

Period

1930s +

Canada

An American made orchard pest control device used by the Canadian food manufacturer E.D. Smith at its farms near Winona, ON. The Smith family came to the Niagara Peninsula from the United States in the late 1700s, and like their peers became mixed farmers. Sylvester Smith, Ernest D'Isreali's father began the market garden and orchard business in the 1870s. With the growth of urban centres in the golden horseshoe of Ontario and the development of a rail network the family began shipping their crops to those centres. By the 1880s and E.D.'s time at the helm, competition from the numerous other orchardists in the Niagara region indicated that if the family enterprise were to remain viable there was a need to consider adding value to their farm products. Hence the orchard and fruit crops that might have been shipped to Toronto or Guelph by blower car in the raw form were processed in jams, jellies and eventually pie fillings and sold into that same urban market for a great deal more. Furthermore unlike the high percentage of wastage associated with the shipment and sale of a raw product, with jams and jellies the crop could be processed as it was picked and sold in a form that had a long shelf life. Initially the canning company was called E.D. Smith but with the addition of other family members its name was changed to E.D. Smith and Sons. It was and remains a wholly family owned operation. By the early 1990s the labour costs to pick the company's acres of fruit and orchard crops were felt to be too high so they went to a pick-your-own operation so a large central warehouse was constructed in which was stored baskets and picking ladders etc. In addition objects were collected from the farm and factory, text panels were produced and in 2003 a "display" was opened in half of the ground floor that it was hoped would provide some education for the folks coming to pick their own fruit. Rather than being designed to promote the E.D. Smith company, this material touted the health benefits of the pick your own crops such as strawberries and cherries and provided information on the husbandry of those crops. This new facility, the Niagara Fruit Education Centre was solely underwritten by the E.D. Smith Company. In Fall 2008 the decision was made to end the pick-your-own operation and close the educational component and rather to focus on becoming a clearing house for the distribution of fruit to food banks in the gold horseshoe. The name for this new facility is Farmshare Canada.

Function

A device used to disseminate powdered insecticide in an orchard.

Technical

Friend Manufacturing is the North American company credited with inventing gas engine driven orchard dusting and spraying equipment. They started in business in 1895 and by the 1920s they were offering a line of small gas engines as well as a separate line of gas engine driven orchard spraying and fogging equipment as well as some for harvesting. Although the company's product line included sprayers and foggers fully set up with steel wheeled wagons, this fogger/engine unit was supplied on an angle iron metal base and the orchardist was expected to provide the cart on which to mount the equipment. In this instance the E.D. Smith farm staff manufactured a two-wheeled cart using the axle from an earlier farm wagon welded onto a pipe frame. The unit was built with a tongue so it could be pulled by an orchard tractor. The engine drives a high speed fan mounted in the bottom of the hopper, the spinning of the fan blades drives the insecticide powder up and out the hose nozzle. Although some adjustment to the angle of the hose is possible, the unit was designed to be drawn down between the rows of trees with the powder being blown in a wide arc up onto the underside of the leaves of the trees in the path of the nozzle. The insecticidal powder was intended to be blown onto the trees after they were in leaf but before they had flowered. An examination of the engine=s technology points to a manufacture date in the 1930s, which is corroborated by the provenance. On-line business directories for Gasport suggest that Friend is still located there and continues to manufacture orchard spraying equipment.

Area Notes

Unknown

Details

Markings

Plate on hopper with partially illegible lettering which appears to read 'FRIEND/ MODEL R5XD157/ SERIAL RS27681' and '"FRIEND" MFG. CO./ GASPORT, N.Y., U.S.A.' with lubrication instructions/ Label on motor reads 'WISCONSIN/ air cooled [script]/ TYPE AB SIZE 2 1/2 x 2 3/4/ No. 624277/ RPM ___/ WISCONSIN MOTOR CORPORATION/ MILWAUKEE, WISC., U.S.A.' with operating and lubrication instructions/ label on side reads 'TRADE MARK/ 'FRIEND'/ THE MARK OF A SUPERIOR PRODUCT AND SERVICE/ GASPORT, N.Y., U.S.A.'

Missing

unknown

Finish

Red painted undercarriage, hubs and spokes/ wood platforms weathered with remnants of black paint on back and possibly red paint on front/ grey painted hopper, sprayer pipe and parts/ black painted motor casing, gas tank and parts/ black hose/ tire finish obscured by corrosion

Decoration

N/A