On Thursday, April 1, we joined friends, Judy and Guy and went to the Sauer-Beckmann Living History Farm in Stonewall, TX. The setting for the present-day living history activities is an authentic Hill Country farm. Johann and Christine Sauer, along with their four children settled this land in 1869. The family prospered and grew and, by 1885, several stone buildings were built near the original rock and log cabins. Eventually the Sauers had 10 children. One of those, Augusta Sauer Lindig, served as midwife at the birth of President Lyndon Johnson.
The farm raises it own cows for milk and also to butcher in the fall, along with hogs. They also have sheep, chickens, and mules.
Guy, Judy, and Bill are standing in front of the fenced in front yard. The building at the left is the "summer kitchen" where produce is canned, animals butchered, corn ground, and lye soap made, among other chores. The main house is in the background to the right.
Some of the chores are seasonal, such as canning and butchering. As you can see, they put up a large variety of fruits and vegetables from the garden grown on the farm. These are the foods that feed the interpreters every day. They grow all that they consume.
Another daily job is "separating" the milk. Raw milk is poured into the large bowl at the top, then, by turning the handle, the milk is separated, cream going out one spout and skim milk out the other. I can remember my dad and brother separating milk on our family farm back in the 1950s in Pennsylvania. Mom would churn butter with the cream and the skim milk was fed to the pigs with their mash.
Costumed interpreters carry out the day-to-day activities of a turn-of-the-century Texas-
German farm family. Here in the kitchen meals are cooked daily for the "help", butter is churned and cheese is made. Today they were having cornbread and chili. The gentleman at the left was raised on a farm such as this.
They also have time for planting flowers by the fence that surrounds the house. The Beckmann family acquired the property in 1900. A good cotton crop in 1915 allowed Emil and Emma Beckmann to build a new barn, to add a frame room onto the old rock structure and to construct porches connecting to a lovely Victoria house covered with fashionable pressed tin.
The barn is empty today, as all the animals are out in the fields.
In 1966, Edna Beckmann Hightower sold the site to Texas Parks and Wildlife Department. Restoration work was undertaken and the farm opened to the public in 1975. Since then time has stood still and the farm remains forever a small piece of Texas as it was at the beginning of the 20th century.
No comments:
Post a Comment