Rd 10
Jeff Forster

My dad says this is where he was born. It would have been the Ralph Hoffman site in the 1930s to 1950s. Had a different house where the trailer is and a garage across the driveway about where that tree is. Had a windmill, wood shed, and a big barn where the brush is now.

Hi there! It's great to hear that your dad has a connection to the Ralph Hoffman site in Putnam County, OH. It must hold many memories for him. I'm curious, do you know what kind of farming your family did on the property during the 1930s to 1950s? Also, have there been any significant changes to the area since the photo was taken in 1980?

What I know is that the barn in the picture was there. Going from the barn in the picture (moving left), there was also a second much larger barn for cows, a concrete pad with hog houses, a huge garden, a 1-car garage, the driveway, and a different house. Behind the garage was a woodshed and well. Behind the bigger barn was a concrete water trough powered by a windmill. The house was probably twice as wide as the house in the picture and was a square. In the back, the garden continued and there was a chicken house. The creek you see in the picture joined with a 2nd creek just off the left of the picture, and you can see the increased water twisting in the left background of the picture. They had cows, hogs, and chickens as well as the garden and fruit trees. You asked about crops. Dad has talked about growing corn. He has talked about cutting the corn by hand, using horses to assist with planting, and then later using a "corn picker' that cut 2 rows at a time. The corn-picker was like a tractor, not like a combiner. He said that they put the corn into corn-shocks, and they were left standing in the field. He has talked about growing soybeans, but at that time, people didn't eat them.... it was used as hay for the animals. When they had it, there was 120 acres plus a 20-acre section across Road H.

I asked Dad about the crops. He said that they had corn, soybeans for hay, clover for hay, wheat and oats. He said that they didn't have the corn picker at that time. Dad remembers that they put the corn into corn-shocks and that his father Ralph (father of 13 kids) always mixed a pack of watermelon seeds into the corn seed at planting. Then when they harvested the corn, they would find the watermelons in random spots and they would stop and have a break. (he says with a grin).