As the migrant workers followed the harvest so do the custom combiners. As the combines became more sophisticated, so did the cost of purchasing a machine begin to rise. A small farmer could not afford to own a combine for his operation so he would hire a custom combiner to harvest his crop. This could be one of his neighbors or it could be someone from Missouri, Oklahoma or some other southern state who had completed harvesting his crop in the south and had followed the harvest working his way north.
One man by the name of Pappy Shier first came to Foster County in 1949 and continued to return each year for 29 years before he decided to retire. He started out from Texas that season and by the time he had, reached Carrington they had only threshed 288 acres of grain because of the adverse weather conditions along the way. His first machine cut 10-12 foot swaths. In 1978 his machine was cutting a 24-foot swath. He was operating four combines at the time. They would arrive in the area when the first grain was ready to cut in late August and stay until about October 15. Some combiners stayed in the area later than that with the sunflower crop becoming more popular in the county.
Some of the custom combiners from Foster County left Carrington in June to travel to the South and work their way back home. Chester and Cecelia Malinski joined the combining fraternity in 1965 traveling as far south as Texas in June and working their way across Oklahoma, Kansas and South Dakota usually returning about August 4.
Custom combining costs depend on the crop conditions. In 1980 Malinski charged 12-12-12; $12 per acre, 12¢ per bushel, 12¢ per mile hauling. Overall, the best crops are in Kansas yielding him $25 per acre, poor crops went down to $13.50 per acre.
Source: A History of Foster County 1983 Page 109