It just required a little American resourcefulness, perseverance, and fossil fuels.

The gas-powered tractor was invented by German immigrant Froelich (pronounced fray-LICK).

According to Denise Schutte, executive director of the Froelich Foundation & Museum in Iowa, "he was quite an amazing man," Fox News Digital was informed. 

"His intellect was highly imaginative and creative. All he wanted was for everyone to live a better life." His invention—the gasoline traction engine—sparked startling increases in agricultural output. 

Planting and harvesting crops got easier nearly immediately. The tractor that Froelich invented in his grain mill in Iowa quickly became a global tool.

Among other things, this meant that farmers could stop using valuable land to raise food for the large, ravenous animals that dragged their plows. Food prices and availability decreased as a result of the sharp expansion of food supplies. 

Small farmers would eventually suffer from overproduction. However, more productivity and abundance contributed to the victory over famine, one of humanity's greatest threats.

In a scholarly study on tractors, UC-Davis researchers Alan L. Olmstead and Paul W. Rhode noted, "The farm tractor was undoubtedly one of the most revolutionary technological innovations in the history of modern agriculture." 

They went on to say that the machine was in charge of "reshaping the rural landscape, raising productivity, and vastly increasing the supply of farm power."

"Detractors were silenced"

Cereals such as wheat, barley, and corn serve as the basis for civilization. Once it was discovered that grain could be grown, hunter-gatherer people began to congregate around the crops they utilized for personal sustenance. 

Agriculture had its start at that time. Villages were the hubs of farming communities, which later developed into towns and large cities. Grain was the foundation of civilization as we know it, including trade, finance, business, and art. 

For millennia, draft animals like oxen, mules, and horses helped farmers sow, produce, and harvest grain using the most basic tools: the hoe, scythe, grain cradle, and flail. 

The introduction of steam-powered harvesters during the Industrial Revolution caused the first significant disruption. With his knack for mechanics, Froelich was keen to take use of the new technology.

"Every year at harvest time, he dragged a crew of hired hands and a heavy steam-powered thresher through Iowa and the Dakotas, threshing farmers’ crops for a fee," said History.com. 

The steam-powered device was dangerous, unwieldy, and difficult to maneuver. Wood and coal, or "just about anything they could burn," were the boiler's fuel sources, according to Schutte. 

In a parched field of summer wheat, the fire required to run the steam engine posed a threat. 

"One spark from the boiler on a windy day could set the whole prairie afire," according to History.com.
"John Froelich got the idea that a gasoline powered tractor would answer these problems," Schutte remarked.

He assembled a 16-horsepower, single-cylinder Van Duzen gasoline engine on a wood laminate frame with hand-built steam engine shafting, gears, and pulleys in an Iowa grain mill, collaborating with veteran employee William Mann to create the agricultural engine of the future. 

It was the first gas-powered tractor with a two-way drive system. In actuality, it was among the earliest gas-powered cars ever made.
Complete Article: https://www.foxnews.com/lifestyle/meet-the-american-invented-gas-powered-tractor-john-froelich-helped-feed-world