Mundy’s Farm

Mundy's Farm. This was a place that I really enjoyed. Because we lived next door, it was very easy to spend time with the Mundy family and the many animals. It was an 80-acre farm that was established in the mid-1700s. The farm had been handed down through the Voorhees family line to Mrs. Mundy. It was in quite good shape. The house still had the brick and straw insulation in the walls and all of the exterior was original. There were hooks in the ceiling above the stairs to the second floor. I was told that they were put there during the Revolutionary War. There was a need for horses for George Washington's army. The owner at that time had a prized horse and he was afraid that they would take the horse. He installed the hooks and used a block and tackle to raise the horse to the second floor. They put blankets on the floor and kept the horse up there until after the army had left the area. The barn and the house and a few small out buildings were part of the original farm. The timbers in the barn were thick hand hewed. They were thick enough for us to walk from one side to the other. The ladders going into the hay loft were made by splitting a tree and then using the branches for the ladder rungs. The barn had a large door for the hay wagons and hay lofts on either side. It was a great place to play. We often went into the loft and jumped from the timbers into the hay piles. As I grew older I began doing many of the normal farm chores. The Mundy's had one son who was not interested in staying on the farm. After the war broke out he was eligible for a farm draft deferment, but he decided that going to war would be more fun. So off he went, leaving his aging parents to run the farm.

Later in the summer the corn was cut and stacked in the field to dry before it was brought to the barn to be shucked and stored in the corn crib. In the fall we would cut the soy beans and bring it in for processing. During the late fall and winter, the activity was based on taking care of the animals. This consisted in feeding them the hay that was stored and cleaning up after the animals. By this time Bob Lewis and I had enough experience that we were able to do most of the outdoor chores. That is when I fell in love with the John Deere Model B tractor. It had a two cylinder that was started by spinning a large flywheel on the side of the engine. It would start using gasoline and then after it warmed up we would switch to diesel fuel. The front wheels were small and close together. The clutch was a hand lever, there was no gas pedal. Instead, there was a hand lever next to the steering wheel. The brakes were only on the back wheels. Each brake had a separate foot pedal. This made it very easy to control because you could turn the tractor by simply pressing one of the brakes. If you wanted to make a very sharp turn, you could turn the wheel and step hard on one brake and the tractor would pivot on the stopped wheel. At full throttle in 4th gear, you could travel at 4 mph. Of all the tractor chores, I enjoyed plowing and mowing best. To go into a field and drop in the plow and smell the new moist earth and see the black dirt as it turned over was a great experience. Mowing a field was a different experience. The smell of the new mown hay and the neat rows behind you made you appreciate what you had done. The farm was a small dairy farm. There were 19 milk cows, one of them was named Joe. She was about 17 years old. She didn't give much milk, but they did not want to get rid of her after all the years. She had horns that were growing in a circle back toward her head. Every year they would have to saw off some of the horns to keep them from growing into her head. There were 3 pastures that were used for grazing. One of them was next to our house. The cows were put in one of the pastures after they were milked in the morning. About 3 pm the cows would gather at the gate and moo until someone would open the gate. They would walk down the road until they got to the barn gate and in they would go. They would walk into the barn and stick their heads into the stanchion and start eating the feed, they were ready to be milked. The cows were so familiar with the routine that no one had to do anything except open the gate and put in the feed. The Mundy's also had two horses. They were only used to pull the hay wagon. Naturally, with all the cows and horses there was lots of manure. This had to be shoveled into the manure spreader. Then of course it had to be spread. The trick was to put the tractor into high gear and take off. At high speed the manure would be thrown up and out in back of the wagon. However, I learned the hard way that is great as long as you are running into the wind. When I turned and had the wind behind me, I was suddenly bombarded. It was a lesson that I learned quickly.

The farm was quite self-sufficient. We grew corn, soy beans and hay. I really enjoyed the planting and harvesting the crops. The routine was to start by plowing in the spring, I remember the smell of the new earth as it was turned over. Then the soil had to be broken up with a device called a disk and then had to be raked smooth with a device called a harrow. After these operations the field was ready to be planted. In early summer we were able to cut the first crop of hay. The timing was critical because the hay had to dry in the field, then raked and then picked up and loaded on the hay wagon and get it into the barn before there was any rain. The hay had to be completely dry before it was stored. Wet hay can cause a situation called "spontaneous combustion", which will ignite the hay. Dry hay was very important to prevent a barn fire. There were a few times that we had to race a storm. One day I was using the small flat bed tractor pulled wagon. A storm was coming up so I was going at high speed (with a John Deere Model B tractor, that would have been about 4 miles per hour) to get back to the barn. There was one sharp turn that I took at too high a speed and the load slid onto a pile on the ground. Luckily the storm was slow in developing and I was able to get the wagon reloaded and then proceeded at a reduced speed into the barn just before the storm began. Later in the summer the corn was cut and stacked in the field to dry before it was brought to the barn to be shucked and stored in the corn crib. In the fall we would cut the soy beans and bring it in for processing. During the late fall and winter, the activity was based on taking care of the animals. This consisted in feeding them the hay that was stored and cleaning up after the animals. Bob Lewis and I did almost all of the field work. I liked it so well that I wanted to become a farmer and applied for agriculture school after I graduated from high school.