WOI: News Clip 432

Clio Wortman just brought a load of schoolchildren in from the tour out of the other farm now you're volunteering why are you volunteering because I'm on sick leave and a little something to do why I came out here to volunteer is the children as they come through to see the history [for them? farm?] now you said it's been a long time since you have had horses like this that's right it's been about 33 years since I've driven team of horses and I think we better go and find out where all of these horses came from this is Chet Randolph and you are is it executive director of Living History Farms now tell me about the horses first well since we're holding these two today got these a beautiful pair of Percheron four-year-olds they're excellent type geldings they weigh around eighteen nineteen hundred pounds stand over seventeen hands and don't you think they're pretty nice and gentle for four-year-olds they're real nice they're real real nice they're really nice aren't they lots of power there and we take them on the hay rack to take the children out to the Pioneer farm as well as we do have a tractor as a backup also now actually will they be working the fields at all not not this year now next year we'll have the 1900 farm to follow up after the Pioneer 1840 Pioneer farm that we have operating with oxen now and when we do we'll have a little bit smaller farm type horse these are a bit more of the heavy draft horse that's particularly popular now and the old Percheron you know came from France and then of course we've got our big Belgian team that comes from Dick Sparrows forty horse hitch and they're pretty famous now of course these are the ones that were pulling the cart that shall we shall we go over there and see doc and Brian oh wait I didn't introduce you properly here this is major hello major he's big and you see he's going to grow yet because he's only four years old and then this is Prince and there are a nice up headed team that's real good in fact there they're just too quiet you can you can leave them pretty well okay let's go over and let me introduce you now this is Barney Oh Barney this is from Dick's from Dick sparrow's forty horse hitch and you know that's the first forty horse hits since 1902 and this is doc right over here doc hey come here attaboy they're 11 years old but they're just as quiet as can be the children come up and pet them you know and we lift up their feet so they can see how big they are and it's great to have dependable horses like this they'll weigh a ton each you know who's gonna shoe them well i'll tell you I'm not sure but we're gonna have him shod all right on crass festival time and at other times during the year but these Belgians come from Belgium and they're a very popular hitch now these were the core and the most dependable horses out of the 40 horse hitch and of course they were in the Washington DC cherry blossom parade and all that and we get to use them here for quite a while we appreciate that now I suspect some children just think that these may be our nice little glasses or something well the blinders are on now these horses wouldn't need them but some horses might get skittish about what's behind them if they can't see it they don't worry about it now but just you indicated these are very gentle horses and when you're talking about the children around now during the school year you have the groups what about the summer time yeah well I was just going to say do you know for example this week we have 600 school children coming groups 30 40 50 coming from several parts of the state coming all three groups a day let's say and then in the summer time it'll be mostly families off the highway and we think that families that are going from Chicago to Denver let's say will enjoy a rest stop here and and they can go out and enjoy the quiet of the Pioneer farm and then hit on their way of course being right on Interstate 80 and 35 it's a wonderful location to pull off now if you the full tour would take a couple hours but if folks don't have that much time they can walk in the barn and see our ewes and lambs and of course not did you see the setting hands in there I didn't see them I saw the little lamb and I saw the some of the hens we hope to have little chicks before long and we set them here and once the chicks are a little watched barney kind of he shakes head once in a while why we take them out to the pioneer farm we think it's well to let the chicks have a few days of age same way with the lambs and then they go out there so and then of course we have pigs coming frequently and we find that the children well we ask the children what do you like best well actually they like it all including the treadmill now in the treadmill is is back there well maybe we better just take a look now behind us is the barn the big barn that you would see right when you first come over and there is the main house and those were built in 1870 by mr. Flynn they're quite architecturally interesting and now there's work to be done a lot of work to be done but we have many volunteers as well as others who are supporting us with the funds and with time now as you go around then you you have the little building there then you have the loom house it has a very old loom which again many I've heard several older ladies say now there's one I haven't seen in a long time and we have spinning like out again the Pioneer farm most daily and then when we have our special events we have the weaving as well as the loom so you see we can show particularly children but I think many older folks like to go from the ewe with the wool through the carding through the Loom and the spinning and all now and then if you go on around here you have the repair shop and the museum and some other things yes that's right and our Pioneer Museum is just a start but again many folks have given us things and they'll be giving us more now that we're more prepared and this will gradually improve in its display now could I just the second on the treadmill you see when we have younger children it's a little hard for them to comprehend history I mean you know three years seems like a long time let alone a hundred but if we can get them on the treadmill then they can see that when they didn't have electricity Barney just take it easy and when didn't have gas engines you had to use a sheep or a goat and a treadmill and we put youngsters in there and they can see what it was like to grind corn for cornmeal let's say or for the pigs and they get a kick out of it but they learn something I think by it now of course this is all here with Museum and all this now you keep saying going to the other farm now how do we get to the other and if we were just coming off the interstate yes would we be seeing the other one you come off the interstate and spend a little time here in the headquarters about a half an hour let's say and then we go either by horse and hay rack or if they prefer depending now some of the older folks like to have a little nicer seat why then we'll take the tractor or it's a little faster back up and it's about a mile over to the Pioneer farm now unless it's tough to walk we like to let younger people like you and I and unless you know like to walk across the creek we have a footbridge and then up the hill and as you turn the hill you all of a sudden there is the cabin and the smokehouse and the oxen and the Pioneer farmer working in the garden or making shingles or whatever it is it's a nice sight and it isn't just looking because we've the Pioneer farmer's there you get to visit with him he shoots his right rifle which is a hundred and thirty years old obviously why don't we just go visit well now that's that's good and he's there every day you know so we can go any time and he's you will find him working there and so with Chad Randolph we'll go visit the other farm we're now on the way over to the Pioneer farm actually the pioneer farm and we're coming by the wagon through the mud pot yeah we went under the interstate which we're fortunate to have and now you see we're in the farm section a different temple of life here and as we head down across the creek here why we're in the wonderful timber area it's peaceful we've got a lot of squirrels because of all the oak trees rabbits muskrat swimming in there you know it's really nice and of course quite a few cows and calves that look good on the on the green hillsides and then fairly soon when we come up around the rise why you'll see the holding back there Clio that's it we'll see the pioneer cabin come into view now this you have as the route that you bring most of the people in that's right, mhm now of course next year we'll add another to the route and that is the 1900 horse farm but for this year we have the Pioneer farm completed and that's our feature and so that we're going to have actually a 50 year span on the farm what about the one int he future well that'll be the year after that and again we want to look ahead as well as look back which tells the total story of agriculture we want to appreciate the heritage some of the courage that it took but at the same time we want to look at the progress that we've made and and get an appreciation of our food supply and the farmers who raise it now actually Darwin has tied both of them up and he's putting on the yoke which he made himself the yokes that we had here weren't big enough because these oxen which came from Maine weigh a ton of piece and they were just too big and buck on this side with broad over there the off ox the near ox is buck here but you can see that's a pretty good size job fortunately they're quiet now how much he's the 4-h girl trained these and they were also in the logging business up in Maine and Darwin works them here again where are the pins for the top oh he has them in his pocket he's got them yeah the thing again is that we have the oxen power because it wasn't until at least 1850 that the horses came in prominently oxen were dependable they were sure keepers and they had lots of power now they weren't too fast but they were dependable were they cheaper to keep Darwin were cattle cheaper you think they graze easier they're cheaper and you could eat them (inaudible) that's right but you could they do a little better and grazing on their own and again partly they didn't fuss and fret you know you can see how docile that they are they don't waste any energy probably couldn't hear Darwin but he was saying that they were cheaper not only yeah that you could eat him if necessary mhm yeah now actually to hitch him up to the wagon you actually take the tongue of the wagon and put it in to what it goes in the oak ring that's the iron ring that's hanging between the oxen and oxen different from horses and pulling a wagon and that the oxen pull from the end of the tongue and the horses pull from the double trees at the back of the tongue now actually if you were pulling a log you'd put the chain there too wouldn't you you use a log chain then yes I have an 18-foot chain that I generally use in the timber with them now how do you train an oxen well there's two ways you can break them out as a calf which this team started when they were about two weeks old and they're about nine years old now and then a lot of the logging companies and the road companies that worked great numbers of oxen many times rough broke three-year-olds which is just putting a unbroke three-year-old steer and the yoke with oxen ahead and behind and one broken beside them and they either came along or were dragged along how did you get interested in oxen well we worked a couple of teams over in the Glidden area where we had our own Museum for five years obviously this is late spring and this is the garden and and nothing's come up yet well we've just gotten our garden in it's been a little wet this spring and I potatoes and onions in yesterday and we have parsnips and turnips to go in yet today are there any special techniques that you use that the other gardeners of Iowa would not be using well nothing particular of course it's not fertilized or anything and all hands baited and all this pretty much yeah we still use the old way here now as far as this area over in here what do you have well this area over here is our place where we do the single making and saw our firewood and just generally work with the wood over here do the people enjoy coming out what about the little children I think they especially enjoy it they get to see some things that they're maybe not aware of before and I think that they do enjoy it do you plan to stay oh I've been here three years so and you now see the cabin that's about two years old it was built by Darwin TD and if you come to visit the living history farm perhaps you will see him work over a period of time and see the results of part of the work and Thank You Darwin thank you in order to get to the Living History Farms take the Hickman Road exit for I-35 and I-80 that's interstate 35 and interstate 80 exit number 32 if you're driving out of Des Moines directly take Hickman Road the address is really 2600 Northwest 111th Street but that is Hickman Road if it went that far for opportunities this summer have been offered for attending special festivals the summer special events are Crafts Festival May the 12th and 13th 50th anniversary of the department of agriculture June the 23rd the green harvest festival in late July and the corn harvest festival October the 6th if you want more information concerning these events or if you wish to visit at other times contact chet Randolph executive director his address is living history farm 2600 Northwest a hundred and eleventh Street in Des Moines with a zip code of 50322 and the telephone number is 2 7 8 8 9 3 6 it is listed in the Des Moines phone directory