Will County IL Archives Biographies.....Lane, John, Sr 
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File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
Deb Haines ddhaines@gmail.com November 10, 2007, 9:41 am

Author: Genealogical and Biographical Record of Will County

JOHN LANE, Sr. The following account of the origin and history of the first 
steel plow, with which the name of Mr. Lane is indissolubly associated, was 
written by the late Dr. John F. Daggett. At the ninth annual meeting of the 
old settlers of Will County, held in Joliet in September, 1890, the writer was 
appointed one of the committee to gather facts relating to the invention and 
manufacture of the steel plow, the use of which has proved of national 
importance, and is essential to agricultural progress and the convenience of 
farming. The older members of this community can recall the inconvenience and 
vexation caused by the old wooden plow. The history of the plow is interesting 
and important, as by its use the civilized nations of the globe are fed and 
nourished. A history of this implement, tracing its gradual progress from the 
ancient type to the improved form of the present day, is necessarily a history 
of agriculture; so much is this the case that a tolerably correct estimate of 
the progress of the art in any country, whether in ancient or modern times, 
may be formed by ascertaining the structure of the plow in use at any date. 
The principal object of this address is to do a deserved but long neglected 
honor to the memory of John Lane, Sr., who was the inventor and maker of the 
first steel plow that was ever made in this or any other country. The value of 
this invention to the world cannot be overestimated. The name of John Lane, 
Sr., should stand side by side with that of Fulton, Morse and McCormick, as 
one of the great inventors of the country. The first steel plow was made in 
1835 by Mr. Lane (who was an accomplished mechanic as well as practical 
farmer) at his shop on section 20, in the town of Homer (early and commonly 
known as Yankee settlement), in the county of Will, state of Illinois. He was 
assisted in the making of the plow by Levi Hartwell, who was then quite a 
young man. In 1835, after years of hard labor and delay in cleaning his old 
wooden or cast iron plow (using a wooden paddle to remove the sticky soil), 
Mr. Lane was inspired with the idea of making a plow of steel, which he 
thought would keep bright and need no cleaning. At that time there was no 
steel manufactory in the United States where the mould board of a plow could 
be constructed. Mr. Lane secured an old mill saw from the West Lockport 
sawmill. The saw was cut in pieces of the required length, and the edges 
welded together to get the needed width for the mould board. This was then 
hammered or pressed into proper shape, then ground and polished to working 
condition. To get the best shape, Mr. Lane would test the workings of the plow 
in his own fields, and alter the shape as his judgment dictated. The woodwork 
of the plow was made by John Griswold of Lockport, as was the woodwork of 
hundreds of Lane plows thereafter. The plow was sold to Comstock Hanford of 
Lockport, and used until it wore out. The oldest steel plow made by Mr. Lane, 
now in existence, is in the possession of J. D. Frazer, and was made in 1849. 
Mr. Lane continued to manufacture the plow for a year or more before steel was 
manufactured wide enough for a mould board. The mould boards of the first two 
hundred plows were made of old sawmill saws, obtained in Chicago at $1 per 
foot. The first steel plate wide enough to use was obtained from a firm in 
Pittsburg, Pa. From that date he manufactured with Mr. Hartwell, but the 
demand was greater than the supply and in time became worldwide. Factories 
were established and shipments made to distant points. In 1854 one hundred 
plows were shipped via New York and the cape to California, and were the first 
steel plows sent to the Pacific coast. After the death of Mr. Lane, which 
occurred October 5, 1857, when he was sixty-five years of age, Mr. Hartwell 
continued the manufacture of the plow, and John Lane, Jr., who had learned the 
trade in his father's shop, carried on the manufacture in Lockport for many 
years. He became the inventor and patentee of a number of important 
improvements in the manufacture of plate steel for plows. Though often advised 
to do so, John Lane, Sr., absolutely refused to have his invention patented, 
saying that if others could be benefited by his ideas he was glad to be of 
service to them and wished no remuneration for it.

Additional Comments:
Genealogical and Biographical Record of Will County Illinois Containing 
Biographies of Well Known Citizens of the Past and Present, Biographical 
Publishing Company, Chicago, 1900

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