Page 15 - DairyOnThePrairie

Dairy on the Prairie 13

A LOOK AT O N E EARLY CREAMERY Top: the Harlan Creamery. Bottom, left

At the Harlan Co-operative Creamery (Fayette Coun- to right: butter tubs, milk cooler, and milk
ty), which opened in 1878, farmers delivered their milk jars. *6
twice daily, dumping their milk into 2-x-4.5-foot han-
dled pans which floated in a wooden vat full of water.
Two "lads" (butter maker assistants) used a blind horse
to power a water pump that cooled the milk, among other
jobs. The butter maker arrived at work at 4 A.M. to skim
the previous night's milk and wash the pans in prepara-
tion for the morning milk. After the morning milk had
arrived, he usually rested from 10 A.M. until 4 P.M. In
the late afternoon, he prepared for the evening deliv-
ery.44

The Harlan Creamery, which went through a succes-
sion of name changes, replaced its "blind horse power"
by 1882. An upright steam engine powered the pump
and the churn. This creamery initially operated on the
whole milk system. Long "shotgun" pails (coolers) were
partially submerged in "pools made of cement filled each
day with fresh water or oftener if the weather required."
A long-handled dipper was used to skim the milk. The
pails needed to be perfectly clean, so a steam hose was
used to scald them. This was an unusual machine, prob-
ably invented by the butter maker. The scalding machine
consisted of

a vat, deeper than a kitchen sink, fitted with a re-
volving rod with several brushes on the end, for
washing cans. They were slipped over the brushes,
and power was applied by means of a foot pedal.
This method was successful and a patent was ap-
plied for, but by that time the cream separator sprang
into use and methods of separating cream from milk
were revolutionized.45

The creamery purchased its first mechanical separator
in the mid-1890s, roughly a decade after separators be-
came commercially available.