Billings Farm and Museum – Woodstock Vermont

Continuing with the 15^th day of our summer adventure in the northeastern United States…

Our first stop on this beautiful day was at another attraction that I would like and that I knew that Laurie would like.  She loves critters and history!

Our goal was the 643 acre Marsh-Billings-Rockefeller National Historical Park just outside Woodstock Vermont.  Other than a portion of the Appalachian Trail, this is the only unit of the National Park System in the State of Vermont.  The park was established in 1992. 

Beautifully situated in the low hills and pastureland of central Vermont, the Marsh-Billings-Rockefeller National Historical Park is the only national park that tells the story of conservation history and the evolving nature of land stewardship in America.  The park was formerly the boyhood home of George Perkins Marsh and later the home of Frederick Billings.  Its most recent owners were Laurance and Mary Rockefeller.  The Rockefellers transferred the property to the Federal Government in 1992…

Note: Laurance Rockefeller was an advisor to 5 different Presidents of the United States.  Even more significantly the Rockefeller family has created or enhanced more than 20 American National Parks.

Since I had one other historic mansion on my ‘places to visit’ list for this trip, we limited our visit to the March-Billings-Rockefeller National Historical Park to just one segment, the Billings Farm and Museum.  This is a view of one of the barns from the parking area. 

Frederick Billings (1823 – 1890) was an attorney and financier.  He made a lot of money settling land claims in the California Gold Rush.  Later, he served as the President of the Northern Pacific Railway.  He purchased George Perkins Marsh’s former estate in 1869 and began putting Marsh’s theories on conservation into actual practice.  Billings and his heirs bought up many failing farms and reforested much of the estate.  Today the property includes what is perhaps the oldest managed forest in the USA.

To learn more about Frederick Billings, you can go to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frederick_H._Billings.  

To learn more about George Marsh, just go to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Perkins_Marsh.

To learn more about Laurance Rockefeller, go to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laurance_Rockefeller.

By way of contrast, here is an historical painting of Woodstock and the surrounding area.  Note that most of the area is treeless… FYI, today Vermont has over 4,500,000 acres of forest land…which means that the state is 76% forested. 

I had to include photos of the farm animals didn’t I?  Goats sure are cute!

The Billings Farm and Museum has a horse barn, cow barn, chicken barn, wagon barn and an activity barn.  There also is a visitor’s center, a theater, the Farm Life Exhibit building and an 1890 farm house with an accompanying ice house.

FYI, It was estimated that there were 2,500,000 goats in the USA in 2010.

Isn’t this a cute photo?  Two pigs cuddling… I don’t remember if they share their quarters with the chickens or if they live on the lower level of the wagon barn.  We took photos of the small flock of chickens too but since we had to shoot through ‘chicken wire’, the pictures were blurry…

In 2017, there were an estimated 71,000,000 pigs in the USA!  It’s estimated that the world-wide chicken population had reached 50,000,000,000 by 2009…

As I mentioned at the start, Laurie loves critters.  Here she was able to give a snack, more grass, to a hungry sheep.

 

By 2017, there were 5,250,000 sheep in the USA.  By way of comparison, New Zealand has about 27,000,000 sheep, Australia 75,500,000 and China 175,000,000.

We thought that this was a nice pastoral photo.  These Jersey cows are key to the working dairy farm at Billings Farm.  The Jersey is a relatively small breed of dairy cattle.  Originally bred on the Channel Island of Jersey, this breed is popular for the high butterfat content of its milk, lower cost of upkeep due to its lower body-weight and its gentle disposition. 

This young cow decided to come over and say Hi to Laurie…or maybe it thought it might get a treat.

Laurie’s favorite farm animals are horses.  She was happy to see these beautiful Belgian gelding draft horses out grazing in a pasture.  Their names are Max and Banner...

A bit later, we watched Max and Banner being led back into the barn.  They are truly powerful horses… Belgians are also known as the Belgian Heavy Horse or Brabant.  They originated in the Brabant region of Belgium.  

Belgian Draft Horses are the most numerous breed of draft horse in the USA.  They are very docile and willing plus they are very strong.  A pair of Belgians weighing 4,800 lbs. pulled/dragged 17,000 lbs. (8.5 tons) of weight at an event in Colorado.  

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Once the horses were back in their barn, one of them decided to check us out.  Given their calm disposition, Belgians are readily trainable and are ready to work whatever the task.  Max and Banner each weigh about a ton and they stand 18 hands tall at the shoulders/withers.  

A Belgian named "Big Jake" is currently the tallest horse in the world.  He measures 20.275 hands at the withers...or about 6 feet 9 inches!

Of course, a ‘cow face’ can be appealing too!

Jersey cows are relatively small.  They typically weigh between 880 and 1100 lbs.  Jersey bulls are another matter.  They can reach 1800 lbs. and unlike the cows, they do not have a great disposition!  Many in the business consider the ‘boys’ to be the least docile among the dairy related bulls.   

This is obviously the cow/milking barn… Two of the ladies in the aisle work at the farm, working with the cows and answering visitor’s questions.

In this photo the ladies had just demonstrated the procedure of hooking a cow up to the automated milking machine.

FYI…a Jersey cow named Mainstream Barkley Jubilee holds 2 records for milk production for a Jersey cow.  She produced 49,250 lbs. of milk after calving at 3 years and 6 months old and 55,590 lbs. after calving at 4 years and 8 months old.

I took a photo of this ‘show worthy’ buckboard wagon in one of the barns…just because it grabbed my attention.

This historic 1890 Farm House at the Billings Farm was built as a multi-purpose addition to Frederick Billings' expanding farm operations.  It was a model farmhouse, incorporating state-of-the art creamery equipment as well as many indoor conveniences.  It served as the home and office for the farm manager and his family.

I really love the art and design elements involved in these old stoves.  The Farm House literally has one in every room that doesn’t have a fireplace.  These were 2 of the most ornate. 

The living room/sitting room in the farmhouse is very upscale!  Classy even… The entire Victorian era home has been fully restored to its late 1890s glory.

This is the home’s dining room.  Billings Farm’s first professional farm manager, (a native Scotsman) his wife and 4 daughters lived in this house from 1890 until he died in 1910.  Even after that, the home served as a residence for the farm's managers, their families and other employees for many years.  

Laurie loved this pantry with its plethora of shelves, drawers and cupboards! Personally, I’d just be happy with that collection of stoneware crocks…

Think 1890 and then imagine what a luxury…a delight even…that this bathroom represented!  It has an indoor toilet, running water, a stove for heat and that magnificent steel and wood bathtub… The manager and his family were living well!

Now this is an office!  Love the beautiful wood furniture… The office is the only room in the house with several pieces of original furniture, including that spectacular desk.

All of the investment and effort that Billings and his farm manager put into this farm paid off big time!  At the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago, the Billings Farm took top honors. 

The basement of the farmhouse is also home for the creamery/butter making exhibit.  This is actually where fresh cream from the Jersey herd was churned into butter.  About 5,000 pounds of it were produced each year.  It was shipped via rail to Boston, New York and beyond.

 

When the farm was built, this was cutting-edge equipment.  The machinery includes 2 Cooley Creamers and a water-powered Davis Swing Churn.  FYI…the Cooley Creamer was invented by William Cooley of Waterbury Vermont in 1877.  He sold his patent to the Vermont Farm Machinery Company and it became one of their best selling products nationwide. 

The Davis Swing Churn was also produced by the Vermont Farm Machinery Company.  They were available in 12 sizes.  The largest was 300 gallons and it was suspended from the ceiling beams of the creamery.  For an extra $16 you could purchase a treadmill attachment that enabled you to use a dog, goat or sheep to supply the power to swing the churn. 

After touring the farmhouse, we moved on to the Farm Life Exhibits.  This huge space contained a wealth of exhibits relating to life on a farm back in the early days.  We took a lot of photos but for the sake of brevity, I’m only showing a few of them.  This photo shows a variety of early seeding devices and machines. 

This delivery wagon transported fluid milk to markets.  As competition from the Midwest grew and impacted the butter and cheese business, Vermont’s dairies shifted to milk as their principal product.  They had the advantage of proximity to the big markets of Boston and New York for this perishable product.

This particular milk wagon is from Plymouth Vermont where President Calvin Coolidge’s grandfather used it to transport milk from his dairy to his cheese factory.   

Well, if you can have a dog churning butter, why not a horse or mule threshing grain?  Grain wasn’t a big item in New England but it was grown for local use.  Threshing machines like this could be easily transported and were frequently shared by a number of farmers.

As our summer journey has already shown, general stores are still important in rural New England villages.  Back in the 1900s and early 2000s, they were critical to the community.  Locals could buy necessities, exchange news, obtain medicines and of course, utilize the post office. 

There also is a cutaway full size 1890’s typical Vermont farm house.  Visitors can compare the basic living conditions and what the morning chores were like for a rural housewife as compared to the Billings Farmhouse.

Other real life historical exhibits in the Farm Life complex include ice harvesting and sugar maple harvesting equipment, and a large number of small and large farm implements. 

We happened to visit Billings Farm during the 32^nd Annual Quilt Exhibition.  There were many spectacular quilts to view.  This annual event is a juried exhibition of quilts that were made exclusively in Windsor County Vermont.  Quilting demonstrations, programs and other related activities were held for both children and adults.

Daily activities and special events are part of the attraction at Billings Farm.

Billings Farm and Museum operates with the Marsh-Billings-Rockefeller National Historic Park.  Admission to the Farm and Museum can be purchased as a combination ticket.  Admission to the Farm and Museum alone is $16.00 for adults between 16 and 61.  Seniors 62 or older are $14.00.  There also is an AAA discount.

To learn more about the Marsh-Billings-Rockefeller National Historical Park, just go to the National Park’s website at www.nps.gov/mabi.  We really enjoyed our visit. 

Just click on any of the photos to enlarge them…

Thanks for continuing to accompany us on our 2018 summer adventures!

Take Care, Big Daddy Dave