In 1893 Frederick Louis Maytag, who came to Iowa as a farm boy in a covered wagon, joined his two brothers-in-laws and George W. Parsons each contributed $600 for a total of $2,400 to start a farm implement company. The company produced threshing machine, band-cutter and self-feeder attachments invented by one of the founders of the company. When Fred L. Maytag and his partners went into business in 1893, farmers often suffered injuries as a result of threshing machine accidents. One of the company's earliest successes was a threshing machine feeder, a device which fed straw more safely into the threshing cylinder.

Fred Louis Maytag

  By 1902, the company was the largest feeder manufacturer in the world, and by 1904, The Ruth was the most popular model.