Story: Rural workers

Header harvester, 1930

Header harvester, 1930

In the late 1920s the first Sunshine header harvesters were imported from Australia, followed by American machines. Header harvesters cut and threshed wheat and bagged the grain. They were the death knell for threshing machines, which had been used in New Zealand for more than 80 years, but declined in use in the mid-1940s. By 1966 there were some 3,000 header harvesters working in the South Island.

Using this item

Alexander Turnbull Library, Making New Zealand Centennial Collection (PAColl-3060)
Reference: MNZ-1616-1/4
Photograph by Green & Hahn

Permission of the Alexander Turnbull Library, National Library of New Zealand, Te Puna Mātauranga o Aotearoa, must be obtained before any re-use of this image.

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How to cite this page:

Carl Walrond, 'Rural workers - Changes in the rural sector', Te Ara - the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, http://www.TeAra.govt.nz/en/photograph/17221/header-harvester-1930 (accessed 27 April 2024)

Story by Carl Walrond, published 24 Nov 2008