Ref: Town and Country Newspaper Pennsburg, Montgomery County, PA Saturday - July 23, 1904 FARMING IN YE OLDEN TIMES The cow is still the mainstay of the very earliest settlers. We find that the first cows were introduced into America by Columbus in 1493, but history is silent as to any particular breed, while later during the permanent settlements of Virginia, the fore-mothers of that colony were in time provided with these animals. In 1610, three years after the founding of Jamestown, a few cattle were brought from the West Indies and the penalty of death, for killing them, enacted, and by 1920 five hundred cows were found in Virginia alone, and from this small beginning, the cow has step by step, pushed herself to the front, so that she is to-day the Queen of every farm in the land, particularly so, in this rich Perkiomen Valley, where she has always been the farmer's money maker. In ye olden times butter making was an art and the woman who could make butter to satisfaction was considered an epicure of the farm, as butter making much depended upon the taste the woman had herself, if she was unable to taste the bad from the good, she was unable to make butter to satisfaction. In those days the number of cows milked depended upon the hay supplying capacity of the meadow land, then the only source of hay for horse or cow. One hundred years ago a typical farmer could keep a dairy of five milkers. From these he produced for the early winter market about eight crocks of butter, of from forty to fifty pounds each. Summer pasturage was no item. Only the meadows and fields under cultivation were fenced in and all the vast acres of unimproved lands were pastured. They were the great common pasture grounds of every farmer in the vicinity. Every farmer marked his cattle, when they were first run loose into the wilds. The mark in vogue was a peculiar cut in the ear and served to identify heads that had strayed into flocks of neighbors. Each herd had a bell cow, or bell sheep, and the farmers knew by the tone of the bell the location of their herd by night-fall. Every boy could relate his adventures while endeavoring to locate the cows and bring them home. From April to Holiday season, butter was salted down for market. Then came the annual trip to Philadelphia, an event of supreme importance and interest. Here we introduce to our readers that old familiar Conestoga wagon, which was used as early as 1775, when one hundred and fifty such vehicles were used in the Braddock expedition. The widely seperated communities scattered over Pennsylvania first suggested the Conestoga wagon. One of its peculiarities was the decided curve in the bottom, of a canoe shape, the object of which, was to prevent freight from slipping too far to the front of the wagon, when going down hill or too far to the rear when going uphill. This wagon received its name from the fact that the horses which hauled the earlliest wagons were bred in the Conestoga Valley of Lancaster county, Pennsylvania, as well as, from the fact that the earlier wagons were made there. The demand for immigration built up the Conestoga wagon industry and during the War of 1812, Conestoga wagons came into very extended use. With such a great canvas covered wagon and four newly-shod horses hitched thereto and being equipped with provisions for man and horses, a bed for the man, etc., the oufit was considered complete. The distance was always estimated at from forty to sixty miles, in accordance with the locality in which the farmer resided, and practically from three to four days were consumed in making the round trip, while weeks however were required to complete the preparations for it. This market load consisted of butter, eggs, poultry, corn, rye, wheat and many other farming commodities, not only from one farm, but from many another neighbors' farm, as the neighbors alternated in making the trips and took one anothers' farm products along, selling them as if they were his own, a neighborly act indeed, which was in vogue prior to the advent of the country huckster. When butter was good it sold readily from a "levy" to fifteen cents per pound. The crocks were tested one by one, by plunging a curved blade to the bottom of the butter, twirling it to inscribe a small circle and lifting out a cylinder of butter. If so uniform in quality that the different layers in which the butter was put into the crock were scarcely noticeable, it was proclaimed good and commanded the best price, which varied only a few cents during many years. When below the standard quality only from eight to ten cents per pound could be realized. Happy was that farmer who did not need to offer any Philadelphia dealer, butter which had already been tested. Tested butter was a second hand article. It was worth what the shrewd dealer chose to give. The expenses of the trip were inconsiderable, since all needed provisions were carried. At night shelter was secured at one of the many inns which lined every much used route of travel, and during the early periods, the main thoroughfares had a hotel for every mile of road. Zieglerville, Perkiomen Bridge, Chestnut Hill and Flourtown were a few of the popular resorts for the farmers of the Perkiomen Valley, who made semi-monthly or weekly trips to the Philadelphia markets. The capacity of those hotels was always stated in terms of the space they had to shelter horses for the night. The number of beds for accomodation of travel was no item. Teamsters carried their beds, which they were allowed to throw upon the bar-room floor or elsewheres when that room was filled. Those reminiscences of the frequent bar-room experiences, when those old tillers of the soil came together, would make an interesting volume of reading matter by itself, if still enough of those old heroes could be found to tell the incidents. These journeys afforded the only contact with the outside world, which many experienced, either directly or indirectly, and were the sources of education as well as money. Next came the country huckster and poultry, butter and eggs were about the only products he bought of the farmers. He bought them on the go as you please plan, as was the custom at that time and which in some few localities is still practiced today, where farmers have no direct markets and are not able to sell their farm products direct to the best markets. He relieved the farmer of his commodities, took them to market and turned them into money, and afterwards gave the farmer what he pleased. This has of course been changed since, and farmers are so well posted by the daily newspapers, that they demand cash on delivery or a guarantee of what they are going to get for their products. In the early huckster days the trips were also made by team, while now the goods are all shipped by rail and sold the same day. What followed we all know, as no butter is made anymore to any amount and we now have the community creamery, or else our milk leaves before sunrise for the city of Philadelphia. This has relieved the work of the farmwife, and she no longer has to attend to half a hundred crocks of milk or help to turn the butter churn for several hours. Among the many household duties on a well regulated farm, the baking of the bread and pastry is quite an item, and today the farm house is rare to which an old-fashioned bake-oven is attached, and the old fashioned hearth bread baked by grandmother is no more, neither is rye bread used on the farm as was the custom half a century ago. With the passing of all this, went the cottage cheese, and in its place have come the many fine preserves, delicious cakes and pies, which do not always agree with the hard working farmer. The spinning wheel is stored away on the garret, and most of the old time operators have joined the great majority. Homespun, made from the wool clipped from the sheep, that were constantly kept in large flocks on the farms half a century ago, cannot be seen anymore and people now buy their clothes ready made, which relieves the wife of another task, and leaves only the mending part to her. Where is the grandmother that can still darn a pair of stockings? No more you say. Yes, nearly all are gone. How we boys used to wear those old blue stockings and how warm our feet were. No frozen ones, then, as now. While the good farm wife is still able to find work, wherever she glances, she however finds moments to spare, and her existence as Queen of the Farm Household is no more a monotonous round of cooking, making and mending clothes, dish-washing and out-door labor, but she can have her summer outings, go to church regularly, attend the social and literary meetings that are constantly held in her immediate community. She is no longer dependent on the horses which have a perverse way of falling lame, or being needed, when she plans to have an outing or visit a friend at some distant place. She however enjoys the privilege of the electric and steam railroads, and soon will ride on an automobile and fully enjoy her much needed day of rest and recreation.