Franz K. Achard (1753–1821) built the first sugar-beet factory (Silesia). Sugar-beet cultivation and beet-sugar industry developed primarily in France and Germany.
Cyrus H. McCormick (1809–84) patented his reaper and began commercial manufacture c. 1840. Obed Hussey (1792–1860) invented a similar reaper simultaneously and independently.
John Deere (1804–86) introduced the steel plow. In 1819 Jethro Wood (1774–1834) had developed a cast iron plow; and John Lane had introduced a steel-blade plowshare in 1833. James Oliver's (1823–1908) chilled plow of 1855 was improved by the Marsh brothers (1857). Mechanical power was applied to plowing with the introduction of cable plowing (1850); by 1858 John Fowler had introduced the steam plow.
Development of mechanical refrigeration for preservation of food products, especially Thaddeus Lowe's (1832–1913) compression ice machine (1865) and Linde's ammonia compression refrigerator (1873).
Application of chemical fertilizers increased food production. J. B. Lawes manufactured superphosphates (1842); Chilean sodium nitrate beds exploited from c. 1870 until methods of fixing atmospheric nitrogen were developed after 1900 by Fritz Haber (1868–1934); use of potash as an inorganic fertilizer from Strassfurt deposits.
