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Leroy S. Starrett, born in 1836, was one of twelve children of a farm family of China, Maine. He started to work at seventeen, and by the age of twenty-six was running a dairy farm in Newburyport, MA. From an early age he was interested in the use of tools and machines and applied his mind to the problems of farming. The “Improved Meat Cutter” was the first of one hundred inventions. He sold his farm interest to develop, manufacture and market the cutter. He was known to slip straps over his shoulders and carry as many of these machines as he could, peddling them around the countryside in New Hampshire, Vermont, and Maine. The cutter was quick to catch on with housewives - used for chopping vegetables as well as meat and was particularly useful for preparing mincemeat and preserves. The cutter became known as the “hasher.” Manufactured in several sizes, this hasher (Number 401) sold for $5.00 and claimed to cut three pounds of meat in three minutes.
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