American Original

The 8th grade had this big to do around the middle of April. The teachers gave them 2 months to complete a display with costume, poem, 2 time lines, power point presentation, collage, 5 artifacts, poster, and dramatization of an American Original Figure. Zachery got John Deere This was a lot of work considering, we had no idea what the heck we were doing, or exactly what the teachers wanted. So he did his best. They had to put this on for the school during the day, and community and parents that night. Turned out to be very interesting, and very good for the kids, they all presented their characters very well, and learned alot about many different Historical Figures. Shannon and Caleb are extremely anxious to do their projects next year. (I wish I could say the same--AAGGHHH!)

John Deere was born in Vermont in 1804. His father had sailed back to England to claim an inheritance when he was 4 years old. He was never heard from again. John was raised by his mother. They operated a tailors store. When John was 17 he signed on as an apprentice for a blacksmith here in Vermont. Three years later he opened his own store, and married. They moved to southern Vermont where he had a couple of daughters. Things were going bad, and he was loosing his shop. He decided to head to Illinois to secure a job and a house. After doing that, he sent for his wife and daughters. The farmers in Illinois were having a hard time plowing the clay filled dirt there. So he thought of a steel plow instead of the back east cast iron plow. In 1837 in invented the first plow using an old broken steel saw blade. This is how his trademark in history began. Now it is one of the biggest things in our History.