The tools that Son McCormick and his neighbors used in harvesting their crops were the same as those used by Great-grandfather McCormick on his farm back in Pennsylvania. After using such tools for many years, Son McCormick bought a scythe he had seen the farmers along the coast using to harvest their grain. They called the new kind of scythe a cradle scythe because it had long wooden fingers on the handle just above the knife. These fingers cradled, or held the grain until the knife had finished its work, then laid it in neat rows at one side. The picture on page 279 shows men using cradle scythes.

Fifty years went by, and the sons and grandsons of the first McCormick who had settled in the Shenandoah Valley were still harvesting their grain with the cradle scythe. One of the McCormick sons spent every moment of his time in his workshop. There he had discovered several new ways of making many of the old farm tools into new tools which did a great deal more work than any of the old ones had ever been able to do. But try as he would, he could not find any better or quicker way of cutting the ripe grain.