The Ryan Dairy Farm was a landmark in Ewing nearly a century ago. Located on Pennington Road, the farm’s homestead was the old Temple Family Farmhouse, a presence in the area since c.1750, a structure now known to us as the Benjamin Temple House, the home of the Ewing Historical Society.
But there were other buildings on the 160 acre dairy farm in the 1930s and 40s, none of which moved from their original location near Bull Run Road and Pennington Road to the current location of the Temple House when the historic home was moved out of the path of I 295.
Since few of us now are likely to recall the farm in its heyday, Peter Ryan Jr.’s richly descriptive recollection of life growing up on the farm provides mental images for us of the entirety of the farm as it once was. Here are some excerpts describing some of the farm’s outbuildings from that loving remembrance (Text is all Peter Ryan’s except for that in italics):
“The Horse Barn was a favorite place to me, as it offered a wonderful array of the scent of a farm, with hay, raw oats, corn, and the organic odor unique to horse rearing. We raised a variety of draft horses, primarily Suffolk, as well as a team of Belgians named Frank and Barney.
The stable was a neat, orderly affair, with individual stalls, each with a hay manger and bin for feeding grain and hay. The horses were secured by halter and bedded down with a generous layer of straw. Horse droppings were collected by shovel into a wheelbarrow, transported and unloaded into a manure pit located outside of the stable, for distribution to the fields in the Spring.
There were huge steel water basins at the stable ends, and the horses were backed out of their stalls to drink several times daily. The feeding, watering, and shoveling was part of the daily routine for farm hands.
The Wagon House was a multi-purpose building that housed, off-season, a variety of implements, with the upstairs a full harness maintenance shop, complete with rivet machines. (It also housed) Aunt Kid’s ‘39 Buick Sedan.
The Wood Shed was a vital unit providing storage of wood for the cook and pot-bellied stoves, as well as the central workshop. It housed a huge workbench with massive vise, horseshoe repair equipment, and a variety of hand tools. There was every garden/nursery device imaginable, along with foot-driven grinding wheels for sharpening mowing equipment.
There were two Chicken Coops. The larger Hen House provided for the dozens of Hens and the ever-popular Rooster. Table-like Arrangements along the back wall offered roosting bars on the upper section with nests suspended from the underside for comfortable straw filled egg laying.
Screened Windows provided for both ventilation and security. The chickens fed from homemade wooden feeders which released feed on demand. Likewise, water vessels were placed to provide ample water. Supplying the water and feed was a daily task for the caretaker.
The Brooding House was a smaller unit adjacent, for raising chicks. It provided water and feeding, as well as a heated brooding shield. We also raised a few ducks on the property.
The Spring House was an ingeniously-designed small building located down a long lane extending from the house partially into the meadow. The building was framed around a shallow concrete trench, perhaps 36 inches deep, 30 inches wide, which surrounded the perimeter on three sides of the interior wall.
Fed by an eternal spring, the trench provided clear, cold water year round: ideal for cooling canned milk. The evening milk production, generally 4 – 5 40-quart cans, was pushed down each evening on a cart and deposited into the water, (and picked up each morning by ‘39 Chevy truck).
The Milk House was located at the far end of the cow barn, and contained the milking gear. In later years, a large cooler was added, eliminating the need to transport evening production to the Spring House.”
There will be more for our contemporary minds to imagine next month—including the Dairy Barn, Hay Barn and Swine Shed.
Helen Kull is an Advisor with the Ewing Township Historic Preservation Society.
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