Sunday, February 10, 2008

They (are about to) pave paradise and put up a parking lot

This weekend my dad took me to see my family's dairy farm. It had been in our family since the 1700s, and the ancestor who built the farm actually purchased the land from William Penn. My great-grandfather sold the farm to some Amish in the 1960s, and they recently sold it to the Manheim Auto Auction. They will be knocking down all of the buildings and paving the fields to make more parking. My dad and his brother and sisters have a lot of memories of the farm, and I'm so glad I got to see it for myself before it is gone. I heard lots of stories and took lots of pictures. It is amazing that the farm had been in our family for so long, and in just a few weeks it will be completely gone. The farmhouse:

It looks totally different here than in did when my family owned it. The Amish family really let it fall into disrepair.

Many of my ancestors are buried on the farm. At one point, all of these headstones were breaking and falling down. My great-grandfather gathered them all up and arranged them like this. They date back to the 1700s, and some are written in German.

1 comment:

Steph said...

Oh no!
This is one of my nightmares.
There is a family farm that I love and the idea of it even belonging to a family other than our's breaks my heart. Let alone being paved for the Manheim Auto Auction.
Oh no!