June 21 - Living History Farms

Tuesday, June 21, 2011

Thunderstorms again during the night. Every night on the bottom of the TV screen there is a crawl showing the counties where a Severe Thunderstorm Warning is in effect and the counties where a Tornado Watch is in effect.  (Including the county we are in now – Polk.)  

Our walk today was at the Living History Farms, an outdoor museum.  LHF contains working farms spanning a 300-year history of farming in Iowa: 

The 1700 Ioway Indian Village features the farming techniques of the Ioway Indians. The farm produces crops originating from the 1700's including blue corn and Omaha melons. Interpreters inform visitors about the Ioway lifestyle including topics such as hunting, roles of men and women, and tool making. Demonstrations include tanning hide, food preparation, and making traditional pottery.

The 1850 Pioneer Farm includes a log cabin where visitors are able to see how women cooked with cast iron over a fire, as well as tasks done by hand such as wool spinning and candle making. Outside, visitors can see an ox-driven plow till the fields filled with crops of corn, oats, and potatoes.

The Flynn Mansion, built in 1870

The 1875 town of Walnut Hill features a general store, schoolhouse, bank, and law office among other pioneer town buildings. The town portrays the relationship and dependency between the town's people, the merchants, and the farmers.  The Italianate-Victorian Flynn Mansion and Barn were built on this site in 1870.  The mansion has been restored and is fully furnished as though the Flynn family still lived there.

No, this is not an outhouse- it's a smokehouse.  1850 Farm

The 1900 Horse-Powered Farm demonstrates the changes that modern machinery and the Industrial Revolution had on farm life. Handwork was replaced by the use of machinery and work within the farm house changed to include methods such as canning.

LHF also has a Crop Walk exhibit about Iowa agriculture.  Corn was first grown in Iowa between 900 and 1000 CE.   Today, Iowa is the largest producer of corn and soybeans in the US.  Two-thirds of Iowa land is in either corn or soybeans. In 1850 it took up to 90 hours of labor to grow 100 bushels of corn.  Today a farmer can grow and harvest the same 100 bushels in less than 3 hours.

Like all good attractions, when you are finished touring, you find yourself at the gift shop.

The 5k walk through LHF was not what I expected.  Most of the walk was on unpaved roads on the property and we did not see very much in the way of “living history.”  We had to walk through a narrow, drippy, muddy tunnel under I-80 to get to the main farm areas. Starting at 9 am, this tunnel was to be used by a tractor-and-cart shuttle for LHF visitors, so we were encouraged to complete our walk before 9 am, as the tunnel was just wide enough to accommodate a tractor. 

The various farms and buildings were not staffed and “open for business” before 9 am, so we didn’t get the full experience during our walk. 

However, we had the opportunity to go back on the tractor shuttle after our walk, and we got to see and talk to people dressed in period clothing, performing everyday farm chores.  There were also real farm animals, and for the most part, these animals were not penned up.  It was interesting to enter the various businesses in the town and see the items that would have been in use in 1875. Each business had a staff member to answer questions about the business.  For example, a blacksmith worked at a forge in the blacksmith building. It was even more interesting to tour the farm houses and see the details of everyday life such as kitchen utensils, cookbooks, table settings, and quilts.

Rating:

Walk Route: B

Walk Documentation: A-