Cyrus Hall McCormick

Cyrus Hall McCormick, a native of Rockbridge County, developed the first commercially successful mechanical reaper. Together with Jo Anderson, a man enslaved at Walnut Grove (the McCormick family farm), he designed a reaper that was pulled by horses and cut grain on one side of the team. In 1847, he founded the McCormick Harvesting Company in Chicago to produce, market, and distribute reapers. Over the next decade, his company became the largest farm equipment manufacturer in the United States. This endeavor later evolved into the International Harvester Company., During Robert E. Lee’s presidency, McCormick became one of Washington College’s largest benefactors. Responding to requests from President Lee, McCormick funded “The McCormick Professorship of Experimental Philosophy and Practical Mechanics” and served as a trustee from 1869 until his death in 1884. He called Washington College “dearer to me than any other of its kind in the country”., McCormick’s family continued to support the institution after his death and donated the statue of their father. Unveiled in 1931 as part of a centennial celebration of the reaper, the statue is the work of Serbian-born sculptor John David Brcin. When Washington and Lee renovated and expanded its library in 1941, it was named the Cyrus H. McCormick Library. In 1979, the university moved into its new library building and the McCormick Library was transformed into the School of Commerce, Economics, and Politics, which is now named Huntley Hall., (caption) “Walnut Grove” – Homestead of the McCormick family, Rockbridge Co., VA.