sheaf

noun, pl. sheaves, a bundle of stalks and ears of grain tied after reaping (COD)

“I remember stooking grain, you know. When the binder binds the grain, it puts it in little sheaves, and then you take the sheaves and you stand them up like this.”

“Harvest time, I guess, I started going on thrashing gangs, and I’d be maybe twelve years old, and he’d be pitching on in the field, pitching the sheaves of wheat or grain onto the wagons, and you’d come down to the table, and there’d be tables set for about twelve men.”

“There was a lot of work even before the thrashing machines. You had the binder out there. Cut the grain with a binder, and the sheaves were all kicked out on the ground, and you had to go and stook the sheaves, stand them up so they’d dry.”

“When you thrash, you bring the sheaves of grain in from the field, straw in them, and then the thrashing machine separates the grain out, and then you blow the straw into a big pile.”

“You had to cut it first, then stack the sheaves in the field, and then go around and pick them up and a lot of steps. Today you just drive the big combine down the field and everything’s done.”

“What does a thrashing machine do?”
“Oh, you know, you pitch the sheaves of grain into it, which in the Western pictures was a steam engine sitting out there, and a big drive belt going to it, and a wagon load of sheaves. And they’re pitching the sheaves in, and the straw’s blowing out one pipe, the thrashed grain’s coming out the other pipe.”