Ben Gravely & Gravely Tractor

Every summer, Americans practice two favored activities, farming and lawncare, and a West Virginian invented a product that is valued for both pursuits. Born in Dunbar in 1876, America’s centennial year, 1876, and given a famous inventor’s name, Benjamin Franklin Gravely would make a great contribution to America’s agrarian culture.  He and his wife were raising five children on two acres of land and their large garden proved helpful in feeding the family. While working in his garden, Gravely was discontent with the plows afforded the everyday gardener, so he worked in the machine shop of his friend F.W. Wilcox in nearby Middleport, Ohio, where he combined a hand-pushed plow with an auxiliary Indian Motorcycle engine, the first Gravely tractor, the first of 65 patents he would have in his lifetime.