Life on the (old) Farm

Our first trek was back to a simple Norwegian farmhouse.  A wood stove inside provided heat, but the main kitchen was outside.

The second floor was for children - on the first floor was seems to 21st century eyes to be smallest bed for two you could imagine.

A small pen with straw near the bed was prepared for little piggies that might need to spend their early days inside.

When settlers first arrived to find land of their own they had years of back-breaking work as they cleared acres of trees and rocks.

Maybe you can imagine those days better than me.  As I looked at the farmsteads and conjured up Wisconsin humid summers or snowy winters - I thought of how challenging it had to be.

Just leaving home was hard.  Leaving everything and everyone you know left behind to find your opportunity likely brought a mix of excitement and trepidation to the heart of a young farmer and his family.

It could only be done by those who looked forward.  Hardy individuals who could see lush pastures and bountiful crops. Steely-eyed dreamers could conquer the land through a combination of faith, perserverence, and plain hard work.

Lots of men made the trip first to earn enough money so they could buy land and send for their wife to come join them. Norwegiens, Finns, Germans, Danes, and Swiss found parts of Wisconsin that looked lke home.  The new, but familiar terrain meant they could farm the way they learned from their fathers.

Young farmers raise families.  Not as easy as you'd think back then.  One farm at Old World Wisconsin was settled by a farmer who lost his first wife after giving birth to their second child.  He remarried.  His second wife too, died five days after childbirth.

I wondered, walking through the old farmyards if they even dreamed about mechanized farming or being able to milk 100 or more cows two or more times a day.  What would they have done if given a vision of a John Deere tractor turning over more soil in an hour than a pair of oxen and a man could do in a week.

A nugget of the past visiting our countryside again these days is the concept of diversification.  Farms of long ago raised crops, cows, chickens, and row after row of vegetables.

Maybe they didn't make much money, but they kept food on the table.

These days small farms have keyed into community supported agriculture.  The CSA farms sell shares in their harvest before planting, then share the bounty throughout the year.  It's breathed new life into small farms.

Around German farms, vines wound their way over and through dried vines to create a strong fence and vineyard.

A small Polish farm house was an ultimate duplex.  A door on one side for the one room house and a second door at the other end of the building that was home to the chickens.

The livestock in this living museum are part of the heritage as well.

This glimpse at history is helping preserve heirloom crops and styles of farming.

If you aren't a farmer but like to eat - a visit to these vintage acres will instill an appreciation for the heritage those early farms grew in the hearts and minds of those working the land today.