Dusk is my favorite time of the day. The setting sun seems to set the fields on fire, and my car blazes a black trail along the edge. Unfortunately, these fields of corn are beyond hope. Harvest would normally take place in late October or early November, but the farmers have given up and are cutting the fields to at least get some silage. Very pricey silage at that. A years crop gone.
The old trail is still visible up to the small grove of trees. This is where the farmhouse once stood. Not many in this nearby community remember the house or outbuildings. They're the newcomers who are the first wave of the 23,000 homes that will be built here in the next few years, and not much interested in the history of the community. That is what I find most sad. Progress will come, development will have it's way, but let's not forget our history. That history is rich and meaningful.
3 comments:
Where I live, it is all suburbia, with McMansion homes and strip malls to service them. But there is one farm still left amidst the development, and I keep meaning to tell the city to preserve it as a cultural treasure. It isn't really one now, but in another 50 years it will be such a gem that it would be irreplaceable as an interpretive center and a very thorough glimpse into our past.
What is curious about the farm is the rooflines. The house has a roofline that goes east/west. All of the outbuildings go north/south. I had read somewhere that this was the sign of a meticulous farmer, though I don't know why such a distinction would be made. Was it to show that the human structure was different or separate from the structures for maintaining the animals? This little factoid alone makes the farmsite special to me.
Pablo
roundrockjournal.com
(also, blogger hates me)
Pablo - the location of the observation silo in a previous photo is a perfect example of a family refusing to let McMania destroy the land they love. Rather than sell the land to developers for multi-mega-millions of dollars, they sold to the local park district with the stipulation that it be used for an educational/natural area.
There is an ongoing prairie restoration project, miles of pathways through the prairies and along the lake, and they've added a butterfly house in the summer. That's very popular.
I think also of all these older gearheads that spend $$$$ maintaining and operating those steam powered farm implements. This is all done out of love for the history and the machine. They are each individual museum curators exhibiting in a traveling show!
23,000 homes? That sounds like Florida style development. I'm still wondering where we will grow our food as the farms fall to the concrete.
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