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Historical Engineering Marker - Headlie Taylor HeaderPrint Page Print this page

21-September-2019
21-September-2019

Photographs supplied by Sandra Brown

The Historical Engineering Plaque is dedicated to the invention of the Headlie Taylor ' Header'. 

The header on exhibition at the museum was built by members of the Henty branch of the United Farmers and Woolgrowers Association in 1969. For 12 months they collected old machines and parts wherever they could find them. Frank Howard from Milbrulong near Lockhart, who actually worked on one of the headers, supervised the construction. The header was originally located in the Memorial Park. 

The Institution of Engineers Australia, through its Heritage Committees, established the Australian Historic Engineering Plaquing Program to acknowledge past engineering achievements and to draw public attention to the significant contributions they have made to society.The Plaquing Program is a means of bringing public recognition to significant historic engineering works and the engineers who created them. The Program is intended to contribute to the conservation of Australian engineering heritage.

Headlie Shipard Taylor (1883-1957) was an agricultural machinery designer who worked for H.V. McKay (later H.V. McKay Massey Harris) from 1914-1954. His major inventions were a header harvester in 1914 and the `Sunshine` auto-header, the first self-propelled harvester to be manufactured in large numbers, in 1924. In September 1914 Headlie  Taylor displayed his wonderful invention publicly for the first time at the Henty Show. It was first known as the "Reaper Thresher". Then in the 1920s its name was changed to the "Sunshine Header" and it continued to evolve and advance with the times, finally developing into a machine capable of harvesting a variety of seeds and changing the world of agriculture forever.

Location

Address:29 Railway Street, Headlie Taylor Header Museum, Bicentennial Park , Henty, 2658
State:NSW
Area:AUS
GPS Coordinates:Lat: -35.519138
Long: 147.036024
Note: GPS Coordinates are approximate.
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Details

Monument Type:Plaque
Monument Theme:Technology
Sub-Theme:Industry

Dedication

Approx. Monument Dedication Date:1995
Front Inscription

HISTORIC ENGINEERING
MARKER
Headlie Taylor Header

Headlie Taylor (1883 - 1957) of Henty patented his grain harvesting machine in 1913. It removed the grains by a cutting rather than a beating action and had other innovations that greatly improved the efficiency of grain harvesting. After an agreement between Taylor and H V Mackay in 1916, the harvester was manufactured in Victoria as the Sunshine Header and is recognised as the basis of modern grain harvesting technology. This header was constructed with parts from nine headers produced between 1915 and 1917.

Dedicated By
The Institution Of Engineers, Australia
And The Council Of The Shire Of Culcairn 1995.

 

Source: MA
Monument details supplied by Monument Australia - www.monumentaustralia.org.au