Frontier Culture Museum

This delightful post is written by the principal of our school.....enjoy!

On October 5th of this year we headed out to Staunton, Virginia to the Frontier Culture Museum. This wonderful place consisted of seven farms representing five countries, each within a certain time frame from history. These farms are set within a very pretty park. Staff that work on the farms are dressed in the clothing styles of the time, and share knowledge with the visitors about what life was like on the farm.

These first five pictures depict what a farm in Africa would look like. The buildings here were all made from the mud from this farm site. The staff member here recently came from Africa and these buildings are continuing to be built under his direction.

This farm consisted of four buildings. Two of the buildings belonged to the farmer's wives. Each wife and her children had a building which they ate and slept in. A third building was used as a gathering place where the whole family socialized. The fifth building was by far the larges and consisted of two rooms. This was for the farmer, who up until the time his sons became teenagers, lived alone.

Cailin, under the strict supervision of Brianne, is making a mush type of paste out of peas or beans. This is fried into cakes. Most likely pretty good with hot sauce and a little salt..

As you can tell by the excited expressions of everyone, there was no boredom here. I found myself thinking that the farmer's man cave could have used a flat screen television or maybe at least a Xbox. Of course, electricity would be a must.

Why is it that I must preach and use threats and sermons to get the boys to mow the yard, yet Connor is seen here working on a fence to keep the goats in. We don't have goats, maybe that is the problem.

The house you see in the background was build and lived in around the 1740's. It was dismantled and brought over to Staunton and rebuilt for display. Artisans were hired to make sure that it kept it's originality. Only a few changes were made to ensure safety. It is a pretty cool place.

As you can see we were standing in the Kitchen at the time of this picture. Cailin is attempting to read a recipe for making pancakes. It sounds easy enough except that this stuff is in the Old English style and some words we use, they did not. Some of the words they used, we still do not.

 It was fun hearing Cailin reading it.

As you can see, the pancakes were a bit different than what we are used to today. They were fried in a pan over the fire place. I am thinking that most of mine would have been very well done. Anyway, no maple syrup or butter for this meal. Come to think about it, no microwave, stove or kitchen aid appliance either.

Although Cailin attempts to hide her excitement, she can't wait for another try at carding wool. Of course, Net flicks and computers don't hold a candle to all the fun that carding brings out.

Brianne was into about everything. She loved getting down and wandering around all the buildings.

Liam is trying his hand at Wool Carding. He too was a good sport about trying the different activities. Although he seemed to enjoy it, he still has not ask for a Wool Card for Christmas. Maybe next year.

Every farm had a family vegetable garden. I loved to spend time there. I find that I use ideas from those gardens in my own. We are going to a more raised garden bed like these this coming year. I also like the way everything is laid out with paths and the beds are separated.  It gave it a organized appearance.

This little guy had the good life. He had no work to perform, none that I saw. He ate, slept and hid from all the visitors,..... somehow that sounds familiar. Anyway, the kids loved him.

On this field trip we honestly were able to see Brianne serving in her appointed earth mission, that of making friends and cheering people up. This young lady was with friends who were inside the house that we were visiting. She, because of her wheel chair, could not go in, and was waiting by herself for her friends to come out. Brianne took it upon herself to approach the lady and strike up a conversation. She laughed and talked and blew the horn on the motor chair and had a great time. The lady seemed to enjoy the interruption, Bri left  her smiling.
Although we have no pictures of the second encounter, on our way home we stopped at a McDonald's to feed the minions. There were two people setting at a table nearby that you could tell had some mental development issues. This was a busy place with lots of people in there. Brianne went over and talked to them and their caregiver. They all seemed to enjoy it.
Yes, dad being a over protective cop is never too far away. I am still a little cautious with these encounters.

The building behind Delaney and Liam is a Irish blacksmith forge. As before stated, it came from Ireland and is a functioning forge. It is also from the 1740's time period.

This blacksmith is making a spoon. He also showed us how different kitchen necessities were made. He and his partner, in their day would have provided for the neighboring village, much of the utensils that they would need. Blacksmith shops usually had a "floor man"  who worked with all the horse that needed shod.

These lovely girls are taking a break. There was a lot of walking between farms that day.

Liam, Connor and I are looking at a map display of Ireland. These buildings brought back many memories from my mission. When I was over there we worked in areas where building like these were still common place.

This Irish farm is from the time period of around the 1840's, around the time of the great potato famine. The farmer here would have been a fairly well to do. Please notice the rock walls. They are every where in rural areas of Ireland. It is the one thing that Ireland has in abundance. Walls like these spiderweb over the country side and mark traditional family plots of land.

There are two little black pigs standing in the shadows where Delaney and Liam are standing. They pretty much have the same job that the lamb had. Somehow I feel a kin to them.

Here the little snorters and squealers are looking for a hand out.

This is the earliest model of the Kitchen Aid brand appliances. Notice how it blends in perfectly with the decor of the kitchen.

This monstrosity of a machine is for weaving flax. Flax is a plant that grows here, I am not sure if the early settlers brought it with them or not. It was used to make fabric for clothing. Weavers sold this cloth for a living.

The most quiet time of the whole event, lunch time. Everyone was hard at work.

This is the entrance to the German farm. I think this was my favorite of all. I just liked the way everything was constructed and organized. Everything had its place. For me everything has its place too, usually right in the middle of the floor. Anyway, we all enjoyed this farm. In this picture Bri is all business as she takes a gravel sample from the path.

I wish I could say with some knowledge and authority just what Delaney is doing in this picture, however the best I can do is outright lie. I do think it had something to do with beating children, since Delaney is holding some type of stick. If you don't believe me, ask Vicki.  Also notice the early tooth brushes on display. The mere glance at them is enough to inspire using floss.   Oh my domestically challenged husband, she is clearing the chaff from the flax.  

These wooden buckets do not leak. I was very impressed. So were the kids. It is a funny thing that dishwashers and sinks do not hold the same interest for them.

Liam and Brianne loved these buckets. Before the day was up Brianne was fairly soaked. I am glad it was a warm day.

Both of these little hooligans loved splashing each other and anyone else that was standing too close.

Here Liam is modeling wooden sneakers.

Again, we had to restrain Cailin from becoming overcome with excitement. It was an emotionally draining day for her.

This is the German farm garden. I am working on using this layout, or something similar to these for our garden. I like the walk ways between the boxes and the overall neat appearance of it all. I just came into a windfall of free lumber to use for this project. NO....  it's not stolen..... I don't  think so anyway.

Getting a drink of water was a bit more complicated back then.

This is a similar game to the one that Liam plays where he gathers up lumber scraps and throws balls at them.   Actually, he was inspired by this display and recreate it with all of Barry's lumber scraps at home  (much to the chagrin of Barry!!)

This was a good place to let Brianne regain all her strength from the day. The rest of us are just waiting for her.

This huge building would of housed a whole family on the southern frontier in the early 1700's. I need to point out that these were ONE room affairs, if you were lucky it had a loft in it for one or two of the kids. Privacy was something that was not well known in those days. Still, I wonder how we always seem to end up with a kid or two in our bed despite all the bedrooms that we are blessed with.
  Farmers who build farms like this one were largely responsible for settling the west and southern frontiers before and after the Revolutionary War. After the land was somewhat settled and crops planted, the family would build on to or replace this first crude cabin. Many of the early settlers would come into an area and make "tomahawk improvements" on the land. This was a way of marking boundaries of land claims. It was marks that were placed in trees, usually along with someone initials showing that the land was taken.
These settlers were known for their sheer tenacity. Often they would lose members of their families to Indian raids that seemed constantly to threaten the frontier. They would move east until they remarried again and the next spring or fall would again be back on the frontier raising a family.

Connor is trying his hand at log splitting. As you can guess timber was plentiful here for the settlers. It also was quite a task to remove trees from farm land to make way for the growing of crops like wheat, corn and money makers such as tobacco.

Here Liam and Delaney are acting as human tillers attempting to turn the sod over. As you can guess it was mind numbing back aching work that had to be done if you wanted to have a garden to supplement your meager diet.

Cailin gave into her desire for working with dirt and took a turn at hoeing.

This was a very nice homestead that came from the Shenandoah Valley or as it is also known as" the bread basket of Virginia". These folks were wheat farmers. According to our knowledgeable guides all the wheat was stored in the attic area of the house where it was safe from thieves.

This young lady is cutting pumpkins up in pieces to be dried. This dried pumpkin could then be used in stews and meals throughout the winter months. I wish that I could use everything in my garden as effectively as they did then. I guess when you don't have a Wal-Mart down the road to fall back on you use what you have.

This was the parlor or family room. For some homes this room was used only when important visitors came calling.

Connor has a knack for cooking, not just making mac and cheese. Here he is measuring the right amount of flour out for a pie shell type of bread. According to our guides, these folks did not use much flour for their own meals, this would have cut into their profits, they ate a lot of corn mush and Johnny Cake.

This last home was a farm from the 1860's. You can notice lots of nice things that the other American farm buildings did not have, such as a porch and nice stone chimney. All the tents you see are folks selling home made wares for probably more that a cheapskate like me is willing to spend.

This school building was used until the early 1930's or so. It was in a rural setting and has been moved here and donated by a local  high school.

These were one room buildings with a big wood stove in the center. We were told that farmers depended upon college students that were between classes and looking for money to teach their children. Often the money was lean, but room and board was made available by participating families. The children stayed in school until they were big enough to help with the labor of the farm.

As you can tell, the children are posing with men dressed as Revolutionary Soldiers.

At the end of the day we all agreed that the trip was well worth it. We missed Ryan being with us. He was attending a college class that is very hard. He wanted to be there. We hope that he will join us for the next one, this is where the memories are made.