History[edit]
The enterprise was started by Robert Ransome (1753-1830), a brass and iron-founder in Norwich before moving to Ipswich in 1789 where he started casting ploughshares in a disused malting at St Margaret's Ditches in Ipswich, with capital of £200 and one employee. As a result of a mishap in his foundry, a broken mould caused molten metal to come into contact with cold metal, making the metal surface extremely hard – chilled casting – which he advertised as 'self sharpening' ploughs, and received patents for his discovery.[1]
Thrashing machine advertisement c.1885
In 1809 Robert Ransome made his eldest son, James Ransome (1782-1849), his partner and they called themselves Ransome & Son. In 1826 James's son known as Allen but technically James Allen Ransome (1806-1875) went to live at Yoxford, Suffolk, where he established a branch of the business. In 1839 Allen Ransome moved from Yoxford to Ipswich and under his direction the firm of J, R & A Ransome (James, Robert and Allen Ransome) was to assume huge proportions.[2] After about 1841 the manufacture of ploughs and other agricultural machinery was supplemented by production of portable, traction and other steam engines and thrashing machines.[3]
In 1851 export trade was initiated which by the early 20th century was more important than the home market and included distributing agencies throughout the world with a branch establishment in Odessa.[3]
In 1869 four engineers, Allen, who remained the senior partner in the parent firm, his elder son R.J. Ransome, R.C. Rapier and A.A. Bennett, took the firm's railway department aside from the parent business and established Ransomes & Rapier at Riverside Works, Ipswich.
An independent factory was set up for the manufacture of lawn mowers of every class[3] Ransomes produced the 'Automaton' hand-powered lawn mower in 1867.[4] In 1902 Ransomes produced the first commercially available powered lawn mower, driven by an internal combustion gasoline engine.
In the First World War, they manufactured aeroplanes: 350 Royal Aircraft Factory F.E.2 fighters.
In the 1950s Ransomes started producing forklifts, Class 1 Lift Code 5 (Electric Sit Down Counterbalance). With the start of production of the A Series, Ransomes forklifts were sold by the Hyster dealership network under Hyster serial number codes (A21R, A22R, A23R - the R standing for Ransomes Ipswich plant). The codes still show in the Hyster serial number system.
Ransomes also started producing Class 2 Lift Code 3 (Electric Stand On Reach Straddle) machines. Later the company expanded to producing Class 6 Lift Code 1 (Electric Tow Tractors).
When Hyster Corporation bought Lewis Sheppard, the largest market for Ransomes forklifts disappeared. In the early 1980s Ransomes sold their forklift line to Hawkins Mechanical Handling, which produced machines under the Hamech Ransomes brand name. Hawkins Mechanical Handling was later purchased by Crown, and the Hamech name retired, until 2004, when Crown brought it back for use in an Internal Combustion Engined forklift line.
In 1989 the whole of the agricultural implement business was sold to Electrolux and merged with their subsidiary Överum.
This left Ransomes solely as a manufacturer of lawn mowers, with the Westwood and Mountfield mower brands. The company accepted a take-over offer from Textron Inc., USA, and their independent existence ended early in 1998.
The history of the company and preceding businesses is the subject of an exhibition at the Museum of East Anglian Life in Stowmarket, Suffolk and they are also represented in Ipswich Transport Museum.
Ransome Victory Plough
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Ransome Victory Plough, Monze, Zambia
Ransome Victory Plough (American spelling "plow") is a type of single-share mouldboard plough commonly used throughout Southern Africa. Introduced into much of Southern Africa in the mid-1920s via European farmers and missionaries, it was quickly adopted over earlier, heavier models that required multiple spans (teams) of oxen. The Ransome Victory's relatively light weight allowed it to be pulled by a single span of oxen, allowing more smallholder farmers who owned fewer cattle to utilize the technology.[1][2]
The Ransome Victory Plough's most recognizable feature is the vertically adjustable pivot wheel in front of the ploughshare (as opposed to a cutting knife or wheel). This pivot wheel, combined with an offset tension bar to which the chain from the yoke is connected, causes the forward motion of oxen to force the blade into the soil. However, the tension bar is typically far weaker than the main plough beam, and is likely the first part of the plough to break. The difficulty of accessing spare parts causes many farmers to simply chain the oxen to the front of the beam, after which the ploughman must use his own strength to keep the plowshare in the soil. Another notable feature is the relatively short mouldboard, which lessens the amount of draft force necessary to pull the plow.
Introduction of the Ransome Victory and its subsequent widespread adoption led to the rapid expansion of agriculture, particularly in the semi-arid regions of Southern Africa.[3][4] For example, in Northern Rhodesia (now Zambia), the use of the R.V. plough on the Tonga Plateau allowed for a vast expansion in the cultivation of maize by African farmers in the region.[5] This expansion was in large part due to the ability to cultivate exponentially greater amounts of land utilizing the plough, as compared to hand cultivation. The success of maize agriculture was to such an extent that the region eventually gained the moniker "The Breadbasket of Zambia.".[6]
§Advantages / disadvantages[edit]
The advantages of the Ransome Victory plough are that it is relatively cheap ($100–200 USD), allows farmers to cultivate larger areas of land, requires only a single span of oxen to pull, and in wet soils, can be handled by even a youth. It also provides benefits common to all plows, such as burying of weed biomass and loosening of the soil surface. The disadvantages of the Ransome Victory are its relatively shallow draft (20 cm), the fragility of the torsion bar, and the short ploughshare, which tends to leave an uneven, smeared furrow in clayey soils unless well-handled. Furthermore, the Ransome Victory plough is nearly unusable in dry soils, limiting its use until after seasonal rains have sufficiently saturated the soil.
In the context of subsistence farming in Southern Africa, the Ransome Victory plough has the further disadvantage of contributing to soil degradation. For example, in Southern Zambia, annual ploughing of fields without fallowing or subsoiling ("ripping") has led to severe losses of topsoil due to surface erosion. Furthermore, the repeated ploughing at the same depth has caused the formation of hardpans due to the weight of the landside pushing down on the underlying soil. This hardpan restricts water infiltration, limiting the soil's ability to absorb and retain water; it also severely restricts root growth of crops, which in turn has a negative impact on crop yield.[7]
§Robert Ransome[edit]
In 1789 Robert Ransome, an iron-founder in Ipswich started casting ploughshares in a disused malting at St Margaret's Ditches. As a result of a mishap in his foundry, a broken mould caused molten metal to come into contact with cold metal, making the metal surface extremely hard – chilled casting – which he advertised as 'self sharpening' ploughs, and received patents for his discovery.