WEBVTT - Rerun: How Medieval Warfare Led to the Lawnmower 0:00:04.440 --> 0:00:12.799 Welcome to tech Stuff, a production from iHeartRadio. Hey there, 0:00:12.840 --> 0:00:15.920 and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host, Jonathan Strickland. 0:00:15.920 --> 0:00:18.479 I'm an executive producer with iHeart Podcasts and how the 0:00:18.520 --> 0:00:20.759 tech are you of? So it's Memorial Day here in 0:00:20.800 --> 0:00:24.000 the United States, and that means we're off and I'm 0:00:24.040 --> 0:00:26.759 currently out of town as you listen to this, but 0:00:26.840 --> 0:00:29.440 I wanted to bring you an episode anyway. So this 0:00:29.480 --> 0:00:31.240 is an episode that actually aired just a couple of 0:00:31.360 --> 0:00:35.840 years ago. Fifteenth, twenty twenty one is when it originally published. 0:00:36.159 --> 0:00:40.640 It's titled How Medieval Warfare Led to the Lawnmower? And yeah, 0:00:40.760 --> 0:00:43.600 this is one of those examples of me going back 0:00:44.080 --> 0:00:46.400 in order to tell a story and just keep going 0:00:46.479 --> 0:00:49.319 back over and over again to kind of find out, well, 0:00:49.360 --> 0:00:53.680 what's the genesis for this technology, and arguably, in the 0:00:53.720 --> 0:00:57.400 case of the lawnmower, it's medieval warfare. I hope you enjoy, 0:00:57.720 --> 0:00:59.400 and I hope for those of you in the United 0:00:59.400 --> 0:01:02.520 States rating that you have a happy and safe holiday. 0:01:02.720 --> 0:01:08.679 I'll chat with you again at the end. While I've 0:01:08.720 --> 0:01:13.160 been recording shows from my home for nearly a year now, 0:01:14.040 --> 0:01:18.280 I still occasionally get reminded about how things can be 0:01:18.840 --> 0:01:22.200 different from when I was working in the office. For 0:01:22.240 --> 0:01:25.160 the most part, things are kind of like this. This 0:01:25.240 --> 0:01:28.959 is the normal now. However, at the office, there is 0:01:29.040 --> 0:01:31.560 no chance that my dog will be barking in the 0:01:31.600 --> 0:01:33.880 background while I record, and so far, I think I've 0:01:33.920 --> 0:01:37.839 mostly avoided having him show up on episodes of Tech Stuff, 0:01:38.200 --> 0:01:41.360 but only because I've edited around it. Keep telling him 0:01:41.360 --> 0:01:43.080 if he wants to be on a show, he should 0:01:43.080 --> 0:01:45.920 get his own podcast, but I'm also scared that if 0:01:45.920 --> 0:01:48.120 he does that, he'll get way more popular than me. 0:01:48.760 --> 0:01:52.360 You're also not likely to hear other extraneous noises at 0:01:52.360 --> 0:01:56.240 the office because there our studios or recording studios are 0:01:56.240 --> 0:01:58.240 all in rooms that don't have a window to the 0:01:58.240 --> 0:02:02.360 outside world built into them. Though you can still occasionally 0:02:02.400 --> 0:02:04.640 pick up sounds of folks who are chatting in the 0:02:04.680 --> 0:02:08.600 office outside the studios, because well, at least in the office, 0:02:08.639 --> 0:02:10.720 we used to be a pretty chatty lot. So if 0:02:10.720 --> 0:02:15.000 you listen to any of the stuff shows, if you 0:02:15.120 --> 0:02:18.680 listen very carefully, you might occasionally hear the sounds of 0:02:18.840 --> 0:02:23.760 people talking outside that studio room. That's because there are 0:02:23.880 --> 0:02:26.600 desks and stuff just on the other side of those doors. 0:02:27.360 --> 0:02:30.960 But one noise that has been a particular issue for 0:02:31.080 --> 0:02:34.480 me while working at home has been the sound of 0:02:34.600 --> 0:02:38.560 the landscape crew that's working on the courtyard outside the 0:02:38.600 --> 0:02:41.760 townhouse I live in. They always seem to show up 0:02:42.040 --> 0:02:45.840 just as I'm getting ready to record. And then I thought, Hey, 0:02:46.200 --> 0:02:49.000 how about I talk about the history of lawnmowers and 0:02:49.040 --> 0:02:51.800 how they work. That could be a great topic and 0:02:51.960 --> 0:02:57.360 turn that frustration I feel into an episode. So let's 0:02:57.400 --> 0:03:01.720 begin with some etymology, which I am now being told 0:03:01.800 --> 0:03:05.360 is not the study of bugs, but rather the origin 0:03:05.400 --> 0:03:08.280 of words. So we think of a lawn, you know, 0:03:08.600 --> 0:03:12.440 as a grassy area like a yard, typically covered by 0:03:12.520 --> 0:03:16.080 turf grass in fact, and that is somewhat kept in 0:03:16.120 --> 0:03:20.520 an orderly fashion, partly by cutting the grass fairly low. 0:03:20.919 --> 0:03:24.800 But where does the word lawn come from? Well, the 0:03:24.840 --> 0:03:28.959 word derives from a Middle English word of lone, meaning 0:03:29.000 --> 0:03:32.639 an unwooded field or an open space in the woods, 0:03:32.720 --> 0:03:38.240 like a glade. Thanks Merriam Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, now y'all 0:03:38.320 --> 0:03:42.800 might know. Now, back in my college days, I studied 0:03:42.840 --> 0:03:47.360 medieval literature, including Old and Middle English texts, and so 0:03:47.440 --> 0:03:51.520 immediately I thought of our old pal Jeffrey Chaucer known 0:03:51.560 --> 0:03:55.839 for composing the Canterbury Tales, though then he thoughtlessly went 0:03:55.880 --> 0:03:59.280 off and died before he finished writing them. But he 0:03:59.320 --> 0:04:03.160 also wrote a poem called Parliament of Fowls that mentions 0:04:03.160 --> 0:04:07.480 a londe, which hey, that poem also references Valentine's Day 0:04:07.560 --> 0:04:10.720 later on, and since we just had Valentine's Day, this 0:04:10.800 --> 0:04:14.440 episode is now timely. So the whole poem is far 0:04:14.480 --> 0:04:16.400 too long for me to read. It's like seven hundred 0:04:16.440 --> 0:04:18.760 lines long. But I will give you the little bit 0:04:18.760 --> 0:04:21.920 of it that's about the lounde. And the passage goes 0:04:21.960 --> 0:04:25.120 like this, and then a londa upon the Hilla of 0:04:25.160 --> 0:04:30.120 Flores was set. This nobler goddess Natier of branches were 0:04:30.200 --> 0:04:34.280 here Hollis and herbores. He wrought after her craft, and 0:04:34.360 --> 0:04:38.039 here measure. Now, this passage goes on a bit longer, 0:04:38.080 --> 0:04:40.880 but honestly, I would just be indulging my own love 0:04:40.920 --> 0:04:43.960 of medieval English lit, so I'm going to cut it off. There. 0:04:44.279 --> 0:04:47.960 What that passage means in modern English is and in 0:04:48.000 --> 0:04:50.560 an opening in the woods, on a hill covered with 0:04:50.640 --> 0:04:54.560 flowers sat the goddess Nature. Her home was made of 0:04:54.600 --> 0:04:57.800 branches and arranged according to her art. So it's a 0:04:57.800 --> 0:05:02.479 pretty little passage. And here Londa refers to something you 0:05:02.560 --> 0:05:06.799 might encounter if you were walking through the countryside, through 0:05:07.240 --> 0:05:12.599 the wooded forests of old England or old France, and 0:05:12.640 --> 0:05:15.520 then at one point you encounter an opening in the 0:05:15.560 --> 0:05:19.360 forest where there aren't any trees. So how did it 0:05:19.440 --> 0:05:24.039 come to mean the word lawn that we use today? Well, 0:05:24.160 --> 0:05:28.360 to understand that, we have to talk about war. Yes, 0:05:28.600 --> 0:05:32.440 just as many a homeowner has suspected lawn care and 0:05:32.520 --> 0:05:37.440 warfare go hand in hand. Okay, So you got your 0:05:37.520 --> 0:05:40.640 big medieval big wig types. You know, you got your 0:05:40.720 --> 0:05:44.440 kings and your lords and your earls and whatnot. And 0:05:45.360 --> 0:05:49.360 occasionally these types would lead large groups of warriors to 0:05:49.400 --> 0:05:54.360 conquer other medieval big wig types, something like a, Hey, 0:05:54.520 --> 0:05:57.280 those guys over there got it pretty good, so why 0:05:57.320 --> 0:06:00.200 don't we go over there and take their stuff and 0:06:00.240 --> 0:06:04.119 make it our stuff? And so the world turns upon 0:06:04.240 --> 0:06:08.440 such thoughts. But it's not enough to conquer the people 0:06:08.440 --> 0:06:10.279 who live on the other side of the hills or 0:06:10.880 --> 0:06:13.599 river or ocean or whatever. You got to hold on 0:06:13.960 --> 0:06:17.040 to the land that you've claimed, right, and that means 0:06:17.160 --> 0:06:21.160 creating fortifications, preferably in places where you can get a 0:06:21.200 --> 0:06:23.960 pretty good look at your surroundings to make sure no 0:06:24.200 --> 0:06:28.000 other medieval big wigs get the same bright idea you got. 0:06:28.279 --> 0:06:31.800 And then they come to take your stuff, and it 0:06:31.920 --> 0:06:34.240 used to be someone else's stuff, because you know, there's 0:06:34.279 --> 0:06:37.080 always a bigger fish, as it were. So you build 0:06:37.160 --> 0:06:39.800 up your forts or your castles as it were, to 0:06:39.839 --> 0:06:44.200 protect your assets. Your castles are your defense system where 0:06:44.240 --> 0:06:47.080 you can pull back if necessary if enemies come to call. 0:06:47.480 --> 0:06:49.480 But you can't really be on the lookout for the 0:06:49.480 --> 0:06:52.599 next bully if you can't see the armies for the trees, right, 0:06:53.160 --> 0:06:55.960 and so it gets to chopping. You chop, chop, chop 0:06:56.000 --> 0:06:58.920 all those trees down around your fortifications so that you 0:06:58.960 --> 0:07:01.760 can see folks from a long way off if they're approaching, 0:07:02.000 --> 0:07:04.960 and you can prepare if there's an imminent attack. It 0:07:05.000 --> 0:07:07.440 also helps if you know, you don't leave trees around 0:07:07.440 --> 0:07:09.400 for people to cut down and turn into stuff like 0:07:09.600 --> 0:07:12.960 battering ramps. So there's that element as well. So rather 0:07:13.000 --> 0:07:16.760 than wooded fields, you have grassy ones. And this is 0:07:16.840 --> 0:07:19.480 the origin of the lawn though back in those days 0:07:19.520 --> 0:07:23.440 the lawns weren't exactly you know, pristine, So to maintain 0:07:23.600 --> 0:07:27.280 the lawns. You'd either have livestock go out to the 0:07:27.280 --> 0:07:31.160 fields to graze, thus cutting back the grass by eating it, 0:07:31.560 --> 0:07:34.360 as well as fertilizing the land on occasion, you know, 0:07:34.720 --> 0:07:38.440 when nature called, or you could have laborers go out 0:07:38.480 --> 0:07:41.760 to the fields with hand tools like scythes and sickles 0:07:42.000 --> 0:07:45.920 to cut back the grass manually so that it wasn't 0:07:45.960 --> 0:07:49.800 too high. A sickle is a handheld tool that has 0:07:49.840 --> 0:07:53.240 a handle, typically made out of wood, and on the 0:07:53.280 --> 0:07:57.520 business end, you've got a curved blade sticking out from 0:07:57.680 --> 0:08:01.600 the handle, making kind of like a almost like a half moon, 0:08:01.680 --> 0:08:04.240 you know, it's sort of crescent shaped, and the blade 0:08:04.280 --> 0:08:07.520 is also typically at an angle relative to the handle, 0:08:07.720 --> 0:08:11.120 sort of how a razor has an angle to it 0:08:11.200 --> 0:08:14.320 for the purposes of shaving. A scythe is similar, but 0:08:14.600 --> 0:08:18.280 it's much larger. It's a two handed tool. The grim 0:08:18.320 --> 0:08:22.360 reaper carries a scythe, and cutting with either a sickle 0:08:22.480 --> 0:08:27.360 or a scythe involves making horizontal passes, typically at the 0:08:27.400 --> 0:08:30.800 base of the grass, and you cut in an arc 0:08:30.920 --> 0:08:34.640 from one side to the other, and big arcing swings, 0:08:34.920 --> 0:08:38.360 so semi circular swings, and those swings only go in 0:08:38.400 --> 0:08:41.840 one direction. The blade is sharpened on the inside curve, 0:08:41.960 --> 0:08:46.200 not the outside curve, and you're typically going right to 0:08:46.360 --> 0:08:49.880 left because the handle for the forward hand on a 0:08:49.960 --> 0:08:52.679 scythe is meant to be held with the right hand. 0:08:53.040 --> 0:08:55.720 The left hand is meant to hold the scythe further 0:08:55.880 --> 0:08:59.319 back on the handle, So in other words, this is 0:08:59.400 --> 0:09:04.760 yet another right handed tool. Scything can actually be pretty efficient. 0:09:04.840 --> 0:09:07.680 There are actually there's some great videos on YouTube of 0:09:07.720 --> 0:09:11.679 people who have really gotten skilled with scything and they 0:09:11.679 --> 0:09:14.840 can make short work of an overgrown lawn, like they 0:09:14.840 --> 0:09:18.439 can cut that stuff down quickly. I suggest to check 0:09:18.480 --> 0:09:21.160 it out. It's just neat to watch. And the angle 0:09:21.200 --> 0:09:24.240 of the blade determines how short the side will cut 0:09:24.320 --> 0:09:27.400 the grass using a sythe with a good blade angle, 0:09:27.720 --> 0:09:32.040 a skilled wheelder can cut the grass very low and 0:09:32.120 --> 0:09:35.640 pretty efficiently too, and you would have the bottom part 0:09:35.679 --> 0:09:39.320 of the blade actually making contact with the ground as 0:09:39.360 --> 0:09:43.160 you swing the scythe from right to left. They also 0:09:43.480 --> 0:09:46.520 tend to have to rake up the yard afterward to 0:09:46.520 --> 0:09:50.120 gather up all the trimmings. We're usually looking at fields 0:09:50.120 --> 0:09:54.000 that have, you know, grass that's quite high, like maybe 0:09:54.600 --> 0:09:57.679 a foot high or maybe taller, so you need to 0:09:57.720 --> 0:10:00.960 have something to rake up all the the clippings that 0:10:01.000 --> 0:10:03.760 you've left behind. I've seen a lot of videos of 0:10:03.760 --> 0:10:06.480 folks using sides in order to cut back on, you know, 0:10:06.600 --> 0:10:09.480 relying on fossil fuels, and to make use of the 0:10:09.480 --> 0:10:13.440 trimmings in various ways from compost to making hey while 0:10:13.480 --> 0:10:17.240 the sun shines. In some videos, I've seen folks use 0:10:17.280 --> 0:10:20.479 sides more effectively than someone who is using a mechanical 0:10:20.640 --> 0:10:25.440 push mower or a weed whacker, though power mowers do 0:10:25.679 --> 0:10:31.120 tend to be more efficient than a scythe. So a 0:10:31.120 --> 0:10:33.760 push mower, like a mechanical one where there's no motor, 0:10:33.800 --> 0:10:37.920 it's just from human power that versus a scythe, you 0:10:38.040 --> 0:10:40.760 might actually see someone be more effective with the side 0:10:40.800 --> 0:10:43.560 than with the push mower. A weed whackers, same thing, 0:10:44.440 --> 0:10:47.320 the push mower that has a motor on it, those 0:10:47.360 --> 0:10:50.079 tend to win out in the end. So it really 0:10:50.120 --> 0:10:52.240 does start to make you wonder, however, why the heck 0:10:52.280 --> 0:10:55.440 did anyone think to invent the mechanical lawnmower in the 0:10:55.440 --> 0:10:59.520 first place. If a scythe can be as efficient, why 0:10:59.559 --> 0:11:05.840 would any oneever think about making a mechanical invention that 0:11:06.080 --> 0:11:09.800 does effectively the same sort of thing. The first lawnmowers 0:11:10.120 --> 0:11:13.920 were purely mechanical, relying on gears and blades that were 0:11:13.960 --> 0:11:17.480 mounted on a drum like cylinder. And if those aren't 0:11:17.559 --> 0:11:20.200 more efficient than a scythe why would you bother? And 0:11:20.280 --> 0:11:26.320 the answer is drum roll please vanity. See. While in 0:11:26.360 --> 0:11:29.320 the medieval era soldiers wanted to get a good view 0:11:29.360 --> 0:11:33.160 of what might be coming at them throughout Europe, particularly 0:11:33.400 --> 0:11:37.880 in France and England, the strategic usefulness of castles gradually 0:11:37.920 --> 0:11:41.760 declined in the Middle Ages, largely because of advancements in artillery. 0:11:42.320 --> 0:11:46.000 Cannons could make very short work of castle walls and 0:11:46.040 --> 0:11:49.840 so warfare began to change and castles weren't part of that. 0:11:50.320 --> 0:11:52.720 But you still had all these hoity toity types who 0:11:52.840 --> 0:11:56.720 liked the idea of a well maintained lawn. Again, mostly 0:11:56.760 --> 0:11:59.920 in France and England. That's really where this idea took hold, 0:12:00.559 --> 0:12:04.760 and this was definitely an issue of vanity, particularly when 0:12:04.760 --> 0:12:08.080 it came to showing off your prestige. Lawns are not 0:12:08.559 --> 0:12:12.160 natural environments. When you get down to it, they can 0:12:12.200 --> 0:12:16.880 be environmentally unfriendly. They represent a much more limited biome 0:12:17.160 --> 0:12:21.360 than a natural grassy or wooded area. It's an artificial construct. 0:12:21.600 --> 0:12:24.280 It's really an example of humans cutting back nature to 0:12:24.360 --> 0:12:27.640 suit our own esthetics. And really it was only the 0:12:27.679 --> 0:12:32.040 hoidy toidy types doing this, because maintaining a lawn was 0:12:32.080 --> 0:12:34.920 a lot of work. Not that the hoiity toidy types 0:12:34.960 --> 0:12:37.880 were the ones doing the work, mind you, but they 0:12:37.880 --> 0:12:41.840 were the ones who could afford livestock or laborers who 0:12:41.880 --> 0:12:45.600 would trim back stuff for them. So from manor houses 0:12:45.679 --> 0:12:49.440 to inhabited castles you had the practice of maintaining these 0:12:49.559 --> 0:12:53.720 large grassy areas. Now, some of that sensibility would also 0:12:53.760 --> 0:12:55.840 find its way over to the New World where it 0:12:55.880 --> 0:12:58.920 really took hold. Now, the grasses in the New World 0:12:59.080 --> 0:13:03.360 were different than those found in Europe. But when settlers 0:13:03.400 --> 0:13:06.720 came to North America, they brought with them livestock, and 0:13:06.760 --> 0:13:10.400 apparently the livestock really liked the grass in America so 0:13:10.520 --> 0:13:13.360 much so that they ding dang durnate it all. So 0:13:13.600 --> 0:13:17.640 to keep the livestock from starving, the colonists were importing 0:13:17.760 --> 0:13:21.680 grass seeds from Europe and North Africa, including grass is that, 0:13:21.800 --> 0:13:24.600 if you were to go by their names, sound like 0:13:24.640 --> 0:13:29.079 they come from America. Kentucky Bluegrass, I'm looking at you 0:13:29.080 --> 0:13:32.720 you ain't from Kentucky. Thomas Jefferson was said to have 0:13:32.800 --> 0:13:35.559 taken up the goal of creating a manicured lawn at 0:13:35.559 --> 0:13:39.600 Monticello after he visited France, and George Washington had a 0:13:39.600 --> 0:13:42.600 similar desire to turn his estate of Mount Vernon into 0:13:42.640 --> 0:13:46.480 a mirror of European standards. And certainly the idea of 0:13:46.480 --> 0:13:49.760 a well kept lawn managed to really take hold in America, 0:13:50.080 --> 0:13:53.360 becoming something of an obsession really, which we'll cover a 0:13:53.400 --> 0:13:56.720 little bit later in this episode. And certain sports definitely 0:13:56.720 --> 0:13:59.960 helped things along, for which we can largely thank the sky. 0:14:00.800 --> 0:14:04.360 Scottish sports like golf and lawn bowling were brought over 0:14:04.400 --> 0:14:08.160 by Scottish immigrants to America and they became popular pastimes 0:14:08.160 --> 0:14:10.680 for those who had the leisure to pursue such things. 0:14:11.040 --> 0:14:14.079 But to play lawn games, you got to cut the grass, 0:14:14.360 --> 0:14:16.400 Otherwise you're going to spend more time trying to find 0:14:16.400 --> 0:14:19.000 the game equipment than you get to play with the 0:14:19.120 --> 0:14:21.760 darn things. Now we're going to come back to the 0:14:21.800 --> 0:14:24.640 evolution of the lawn, particularly in America, and just a 0:14:24.680 --> 0:14:27.200 little bit as that history ties into a lot of 0:14:27.200 --> 0:14:30.680 other interesting stuff and includes some heavy duty connections to 0:14:30.960 --> 0:14:34.960 other elements of American society, in addition to feeding an 0:14:35.120 --> 0:14:38.600 entire industry dedicated to lawn care and maintenance. But let's 0:14:38.640 --> 0:14:42.240 get back to our early history of lawnmowers. Okay, So 0:14:42.320 --> 0:14:47.080 by the nineteenth century, lawns were the rage in England, France, 0:14:47.280 --> 0:14:50.360 and starting to be in America. But as I said, 0:14:50.400 --> 0:14:53.280 unless you had livestock or the cash to pay laborers, 0:14:53.600 --> 0:14:57.160 you probably couldn't maintain a lawn on your own. You 0:14:57.200 --> 0:15:01.320 certainly couldn't do so to the immaculate standard of the aristocracy. 0:15:01.840 --> 0:15:05.720 The wealthy would spend a lot to get that perfect lawn, 0:15:06.120 --> 0:15:08.200 even going so far as to hire people to use 0:15:08.480 --> 0:15:12.640 handheld shears to cut grass down quite low, and to 0:15:12.760 --> 0:15:15.760 avoid the patterns that you would see if you used sides, 0:15:15.840 --> 0:15:19.160 because cutting grass in those arc swings would leave behind 0:15:19.240 --> 0:15:23.560 patterns in the grass, and that was considered esthetically unpleasing. 0:15:24.120 --> 0:15:27.480 And then we come to an Englishman named Edwin Beard 0:15:27.720 --> 0:15:32.840 Budding born in Stroud, Gloucestershire, in seventeen ninety five. Butting 0:15:32.880 --> 0:15:36.840 started off with some strikes against him. His parents were unmarried, 0:15:37.240 --> 0:15:40.200 his father a farmer, and in England that put him 0:15:40.200 --> 0:15:43.840 at a fairly low social standing class in England was 0:15:43.920 --> 0:15:47.680 a very important concept still can be while over there 0:15:47.880 --> 0:15:52.120 he had the whole working class versus posh and all 0:15:52.160 --> 0:15:55.040 that sort of stuff. So he started off in carpentry, 0:15:55.360 --> 0:15:58.880 but he switched over to working at iron foundries. The 0:15:58.880 --> 0:16:02.320 Industrial Revolution was well underway in England at this point 0:16:02.480 --> 0:16:05.880 and the demand for iron tools and machinery was very high, 0:16:06.280 --> 0:16:09.800 and through experience Butting built up and understanding of engineering 0:16:09.840 --> 0:16:13.600 and problem solving, he would end up inventing several things 0:16:13.800 --> 0:16:17.280 or making his own version of some existing machines. But 0:16:17.360 --> 0:16:19.520 obviously the one we want to really look at is 0:16:19.560 --> 0:16:23.600 the lawnmower. Budding got the idea for the lawnmower when 0:16:23.600 --> 0:16:26.480 he saw a device used by textile mills to trim 0:16:26.520 --> 0:16:30.200 back the fibers that stick out from the surface of cloth, 0:16:30.600 --> 0:16:34.280 also known as the nap of a cloth, and with 0:16:34.360 --> 0:16:37.160 some textiles the goal is to fluff the nap out. 0:16:37.200 --> 0:16:42.680 You use little combs or prickly flowers even to pull 0:16:42.760 --> 0:16:44.600 some of those threads out, and then you comb it 0:16:44.680 --> 0:16:47.400 a certain way, which can make the cloth softer to 0:16:47.440 --> 0:16:50.480 the touch and better at doing stuff like trapping heat. 0:16:50.840 --> 0:16:54.360 But sometimes you just wanted a very smooth piece of cloth. 0:16:54.640 --> 0:16:57.960 Something that wouldn't get caught easily on rough surfaces. So, 0:16:58.080 --> 0:17:02.400 for example, you might want a carpet that could withstand 0:17:02.440 --> 0:17:04.359 more use as long as it did you know, catch 0:17:04.400 --> 0:17:07.919 on shoes and stuff. So you would want to shear 0:17:08.359 --> 0:17:10.639 the nap. You'd want to cut that nap close to 0:17:10.720 --> 0:17:13.560 the cloth. And in earlier days this job was done 0:17:13.560 --> 0:17:16.919 by skilled tradespeople who would use giant sets of shears. 0:17:16.960 --> 0:17:20.000 I mean these things were massive in order to cut 0:17:20.040 --> 0:17:23.320 the nap off the surface of the cloth as efficiently 0:17:23.359 --> 0:17:27.160 as possible. But by Butting's time, some genius whose name 0:17:27.240 --> 0:17:30.040 is lost to history came up with the notion of 0:17:30.040 --> 0:17:34.600 building a mechanical device that has blades arranged around a 0:17:34.720 --> 0:17:39.040 drum or cylinder in a type of helix shape. The 0:17:39.119 --> 0:17:42.439 drum or cylinder rotates, and by running the surface of 0:17:42.480 --> 0:17:46.600 the cloth near this helix of blades, the blades could 0:17:46.600 --> 0:17:49.679 trim back the nap on the surface of the cloth. 0:17:50.160 --> 0:17:52.720 Add in some rollers and some other elements to pull 0:17:52.720 --> 0:17:54.840 the cloth along, and you cut yourself a machine that 0:17:54.880 --> 0:18:00.879 can trim the nap back on cloth evenly, consistently, and efficiently. Aha, 0:18:01.320 --> 0:18:04.240 said Budding. What if I took that same basic idea 0:18:04.359 --> 0:18:06.439 and flipped it around a bit so you could trim 0:18:06.480 --> 0:18:10.359 back grass with rotating blades along a cylinder, And in 0:18:10.440 --> 0:18:13.680 eighteen thirty that's just what he did, securing a patent 0:18:14.160 --> 0:18:17.720 number six zero eighty one in fact for his invention. 0:18:18.320 --> 0:18:29.639 I'll explain more about it after this quick break. Butting 0:18:29.720 --> 0:18:33.080 saw an opportunity to create a device that could consistently 0:18:33.240 --> 0:18:37.080 and reliably cut grass a specific length, so, in other words, 0:18:37.119 --> 0:18:40.520 you could adjust how tall the grass would be and 0:18:41.080 --> 0:18:44.080 without leaving those marks behind that you would get if 0:18:44.119 --> 0:18:46.879 you were to cut grass with scythes and such. Also, 0:18:47.720 --> 0:18:52.560 the lawnmower wouldn't poop on the lawn, unlike livestock. It 0:18:52.600 --> 0:18:57.159 would be particularly handy for parks and sporting grounds where 0:18:57.200 --> 0:18:59.639 the well to do could gather for their leisure time 0:18:59.680 --> 0:19:04.160 and for something orderly and neat, which very much fit 0:19:04.200 --> 0:19:07.919 in with the sensibilities of the elite of nineteenth century Britain. 0:19:08.560 --> 0:19:11.919 So Edwin Beard Budding built a wheeled machine out of 0:19:12.040 --> 0:19:15.680 wrought and cast iron. It had a pair of wheels. 0:19:16.000 --> 0:19:18.800 It also had a pair of rollers and a forward 0:19:18.880 --> 0:19:22.520 roller and a back roller, as well as the blade 0:19:22.680 --> 0:19:26.520 mounted cylinder that did the actual cutting. So imagine you've 0:19:26.520 --> 0:19:29.560 got a mechanical device has a small roller in the front. 0:19:29.920 --> 0:19:31.879 This is the thing that can be adjusted so you 0:19:31.920 --> 0:19:34.880 can control how close to the ground you're cutting the grass. 0:19:35.640 --> 0:19:39.440 Behind that roller, you've got your horizontal cylinder that's got 0:19:39.480 --> 0:19:44.400 the curved blades arranged in a helix around that rotatable cylinder, 0:19:44.440 --> 0:19:47.720 so it rotates along the horizontal axis, is what I'm saying. 0:19:48.480 --> 0:19:51.600 To either side of that are the wheels of the lawnmower. 0:19:51.760 --> 0:19:55.879 That provides stability, allows you to actually aim it and 0:19:56.560 --> 0:19:59.800 push it along the ground. And then in the rear 0:20:00.240 --> 0:20:03.199 you have a big roller. It kind of looks like 0:20:04.040 --> 0:20:08.040 a more narrow and slightly smaller version of a steamroller, 0:20:08.359 --> 0:20:12.920 if that helps you imagine. This Buttings design also incorporated 0:20:13.000 --> 0:20:15.840 a tray to catch grass clippings. The tray was in 0:20:15.880 --> 0:20:19.000 the front because the way this machine worked, it would 0:20:19.040 --> 0:20:22.320 propel the clippings out, shooting them out toward the front 0:20:22.359 --> 0:20:25.600 of the machine. That way, you wouldn't have to follow 0:20:25.680 --> 0:20:29.760 behind the lawnmower with a rake or something like that 0:20:29.800 --> 0:20:33.880 to rake up the clippings. And it was that rear roller, 0:20:34.680 --> 0:20:37.840 the big steamroller type thing in the back that connected 0:20:37.920 --> 0:20:42.680 to the bladed cylinder through a gear drive. That's where 0:20:42.720 --> 0:20:45.480 you've got a series of gears that fit together to 0:20:45.600 --> 0:20:50.320 transfer the rotational motion of the roller that's pressed against 0:20:50.320 --> 0:20:53.919 the ground. So as you push the lawnmower forward, the 0:20:54.119 --> 0:20:58.320 roller rolls because it's making contact with the ground, and 0:20:58.400 --> 0:21:03.720 it transfers that rotationational motion to the cylinder or the 0:21:03.800 --> 0:21:06.239 drum if you prefer, that's got the blades on it. 0:21:06.640 --> 0:21:09.800 And all of this was made out of iron. Now 0:21:10.040 --> 0:21:12.440 this meant the person who was pushing the mower had 0:21:12.440 --> 0:21:15.240 to use a pretty good amount of force because you 0:21:15.240 --> 0:21:18.640 weren't just pushing hard enough to move the mower itself, 0:21:18.960 --> 0:21:21.359 which being made out of iron, was pretty darn heavy, 0:21:21.680 --> 0:21:25.040 but also to power that drive train of gears that 0:21:25.480 --> 0:21:29.879 would transmit the rotation to the cylinder, and each step 0:21:30.080 --> 0:21:34.200 of that process, each gear connection, means that you're losing 0:21:34.240 --> 0:21:37.280 a little bit of the amount of energy you're giving 0:21:37.320 --> 0:21:39.880 to the system to stuff like friction, So it means 0:21:39.880 --> 0:21:41.760 you have to push even harder to get things going. 0:21:42.080 --> 0:21:45.199 But still, Butting showed that the same general principle that 0:21:45.240 --> 0:21:48.320 worked for cutting back the nap on cloth could in 0:21:48.359 --> 0:21:51.399 fact be used to cut grass. He patented his design 0:21:51.520 --> 0:21:54.520 in eighteen thirty and in that patent, Butting sent his 0:21:54.600 --> 0:21:58.919 invention represented, quote a new combination and application of machinery 0:21:58.960 --> 0:22:02.600 for the purpose of crop or shearing the vegetable surfaces 0:22:02.640 --> 0:22:07.680 of lawns, grass plats and pleasure grounds. Country gentlemen may 0:22:07.760 --> 0:22:11.560 find in using my machine themselves an amusing, useful, and 0:22:11.720 --> 0:22:16.679 healthy exercise. End. It's interesting to note that a lot 0:22:16.720 --> 0:22:20.359 of the basic designs introduced by Budding would stick around 0:22:20.359 --> 0:22:24.040 throughout the ages with mechanical push mowers, and the ones 0:22:24.080 --> 0:22:27.159 that we have today have at least some resemblance to 0:22:27.200 --> 0:22:30.520 the one that Budding was making back in the mid 0:22:30.640 --> 0:22:34.560 nineteenth century. Now the new ones are more elegant in 0:22:34.640 --> 0:22:38.040 design and they're made of much lighter materials, but the 0:22:38.119 --> 0:22:42.040 general principle behind the operation remains pretty much the same. 0:22:42.800 --> 0:22:46.840 Budding formed a partnership with an engineer named John Ferrabee, 0:22:47.080 --> 0:22:51.320 who owned a company called Phoenix Ironworks. Faerbe had the 0:22:51.359 --> 0:22:55.360 manufacturing rights to produce Budding's design and fronted the costs 0:22:55.440 --> 0:22:59.160 to develop the prototype, and one of the earliest lawnmowers 0:22:59.200 --> 0:23:02.960 that the pair reduced went to the London Zoo, and 0:23:03.040 --> 0:23:07.160 another one became the property of Oxford University. By eighteen 0:23:07.280 --> 0:23:11.080 thirty two, word had already spread that Budding's machine could 0:23:11.080 --> 0:23:16.320 create great results, and demand was soon outpacing Farabe's capacity 0:23:16.680 --> 0:23:21.080 to produce lawnmowers, and Farabe then began to license the 0:23:21.160 --> 0:23:27.040 design to other engineers, to other ironworks owners, including Ransoms 0:23:27.119 --> 0:23:30.320 of Ipswich, a company that was already in the business 0:23:30.320 --> 0:23:35.119 of producing plows for farmers. They advertised the new lawnmower 0:23:35.160 --> 0:23:38.760 invention saying, quote the machine is so easy to manage 0:23:39.000 --> 0:23:42.560 that persons unpracticed in the art of mowing may cut 0:23:42.600 --> 0:23:46.560 the grass on lawns and bowling greens with ease end quote. 0:23:46.680 --> 0:23:51.400 In other words, they were kind of positioning this as 0:23:51.720 --> 0:23:57.920 something of a leisure activity for the upper class. That 0:23:58.000 --> 0:24:00.399 you know, mowing the lawn with a side that was 0:24:00.440 --> 0:24:02.760 a low class thing to do. That was for laborers. 0:24:03.040 --> 0:24:06.480 You wouldn't see people of the upper classes do that. 0:24:06.760 --> 0:24:10.200 It was beneath their station. But mowing with this exotic 0:24:10.240 --> 0:24:14.280 machine that was something befitting a person of high station. 0:24:15.400 --> 0:24:18.119 And it was, as a matter of fact, pretty simple 0:24:18.160 --> 0:24:21.000 to operate these things. You just grabbed the handle of 0:24:21.080 --> 0:24:23.439 the mower and you pushed it forward kind of like 0:24:23.480 --> 0:24:26.359 a cart. You would exert a little bit of a 0:24:26.440 --> 0:24:29.600 downward push as you did, so it took far less 0:24:29.680 --> 0:24:33.040 skill than scything did. And by framing the activity of 0:24:33.040 --> 0:24:35.760