The Changing Farmscape: A Case Study of German Farmers in Southeast Michigan (original) (raw)
Related papers
Preserving the Midwestern Barn
Barns of the Midwest, 2018
THE BIG RED, or white, barn is a readily recognized cultural icon, per haps because many Americans share a relatively recent agrarian heritage and identify with the family farm it symbolizes. To many, the family farm and the tra ditional values associated with farm families have come to represent the antithesis of modern urbanism, which has often been blamed for many of the social prob lems confronting our nation. Agriculture, and agricultural structures, have shaped the image many Americans have of the Midwest. Picturesque barn scenes are fea tured on greeting cards, calendars, and posters, and farm architecture is even rep resented in children's toys (fig. 13.1). Agricultural settings frequently appear in television and magazine advertisements and are used to evoke a sense of security, stability, wholesomeness, or honesty. Despite the romantic imagery and fondness which many Americans hold for barns, these structures are rapidly disappearing from the midwestern coun tryside. Some are being bulldozed, along with the rest of the farmstead, to make way for new housing developments, shopping malls, or office centers. Many more are sinking slowly into the earth as years of neglect and weather take their toll. New "subrural" landscapes are emerging as suburban-style residential and com mercial development infiltrates rural lands and renders alien the existing tradi tional farm structures. The causes of this decline are varied and numerous, and the prognosis for stemming it doubtful. What is encouraging, however, is that more people now recognize that, as barns disappear, a valuable part of our heri tage is lost (Carlson 1978; Dandekar and Bockstahler, 1990). National and local preservation groups, in a shift from focusing primarily on "high-style" or monumental buildings, are beginning to identify barns and other agrarian structures as cultural resources worth saving (Fedelchak and Wood 1988; Stokes et al. 1989). The preservation of vernacular buildings and historic rural landscapes recently has become a major thrust of the federal government's Na tional Register of Historic Places program. The National Trust for Historic Pres ervation launched a Rural Conservation Project in 1979, and in 1987 co-sponsored with the magazine Successful Farming a "Barn Again!" program to encourage farmers
2021
Historic Preservation Program study at Cremona in St. Mary's County, Maryland, uncovered the potential historical significance of an assemblage of antebellum domestic and agricultural outbuildings. Other wellpreserved layers of architectural and landscape history exist at Cremona, creating an exemplary confluence of continuity and change. After a detailed examination of Cremona's antebellum resources to establish the integrity of these structures, this paper details the results of two related yet distinct lines of inquiry to ascertain the historic significance of Cremona's outbuildings as contributing resources. Detailed architectural investigations of three, dated barns at Cremona serve as a starting point for comparisons with other period (1797-1833) Southern Maryland barns. The paper particularly focuses on the functional details related to sheds, doors, and transverse intermediate sills. Cremona's place in Southern Maryland's antebellum era outbuilding landscape is investigated. After establishing statistical outbuilding use via 1798 Federal Direct Tax records, this study identifies comparable, extant outbuilding assemblages in the region in order to determine the significance of Cremona's outbuildings.
2011
Recommended Citation Atkins, Christy Robnet; Barnhart, Rachel; Brown, Jonathan; Carter, Sam; Chi, Xiaomeng; Collins, Courtney; Davis, Adam; Davis, Kevin; Khanian, Hanieh Esmaeil; Federer, Julie; Howard, Ed; Leftwich, Claire; Ramirez, Alexa; Rhea, Amber; Rich, Mallory; Spencer, Jean; Taff, Emily; and Williams, LaVonne, "Valley View Farm: Main House" (2011). Heritage Preservation Projects. 42. https://scholarworks.gsu.edu/history\_heritagepreservation/42
Interpreting Midway Barn: Understanding Frank Lloyd Wright\u27s Agrarian Vision
2021
At first glance, Midway Barn in Spring Green, Wisconsin presents itself as another example of Frank Lloyd Wright’s distinctive, if evolving style, its horizontal massing, tilted roof planes, and natural materials echoing the hilly landscape of the farm and its environs. Analysis of the documentary record and a range of sources on Wright’s life and thought, however, points to a richer story. Part of Wright’s larger campaign to reclaim his hometown landscape after his return to the Jones Valley, Midway Barn reflects his desire to reenact the agrarian lessons learned in his youth through the Taliesin Fellowship. Viewed in this way, Midway Barn offers insight not only into the architect’s biography but also into his complicated and sometimes contradictory relationship to “rural” values, materials, and ways of life. It also allows us to compare the barn’s striking visual innovations to its more conventional program and use, both of which were quite at home in the agricultural landscape o...
Life at the Old Stone House, 1636-1852: A History of a Farm and its Occupants. Second Edition.
published by OSH, Brooklyn, 2021
This booklet describes life at the Old Stone House (Vechte-Cortelyou House) and on the surrounding farm, in the Park Slope neighborhood of Brooklyn, from 1636 to 1852. I begin with the transfer of the land from the Native Americans to the Dutch, and with the lives of the first Dutch farmers who cleared and settled the land. Next I discuss the Vechte family, who immigrated to Brooklyn in 1660, built the Old Stone House in 1699, and lived on the property for three generations until 1779. Then I look at life on the farm during the Revolution and the impact of the war on the Vechtes, their in-laws, and their neighbors. Finally, I discuss the last family who lived at the Old Stone House, the Cortelyou family, who farmed the property from 1790 until 1852, when the house and land were sold to developers.