Today in 1907, US Patent 857461 A was issued, an invention of Emil Clemens Horst and John Ehrhorn, for their “Hop Picker.” There’s no Abstract, though it’s described this way in the application:
Our invention relates to a machine by which hops may be picked or separated from the vines upon which they grow. It consists of an endless traveling screen upon which the hop vines are thrown, and through which the hops upon their stems are caused to depend; a means for severing the hops from the stem.
