By 1901 when Henry Pratt was born the automobile and even the
airplane had been invented* but but their effect on the every
day life of most people was slight. The telephone was the first
of the modern inventions to be used on the farm. Engines,
however, were often used to do work where the source of power
didn't need to be moveable or move on its own accord. In 1906,
Charlie Pratt, just out of M.A.C. persuaded his father to
purchase the first gasoline engine the farm had. It was a three-
horse air-cooled engine with a high pressure pump. This, mounted
on a second hand water tank and hauled by horses, was one of the
first powered orchard sprayers in Berrien County, if not the
state. The second engine was bought in 1908. It weighed 500-600
pounds and had two heavy fly wheels but it only produced six
horsepower. Its purpose was to replace a large windmill which
was mounted on the barn. The windmill had: "Instead of a rod
that moved up and down a wheel which was geared to turn a steel
shaft which ran down the cen