North Country At Work

Bringing in loose hay on the Bacon Farm on East De Kalb Road with a team of horses, Sanford Bacon is on the left. 1948. Town of De Kalb, NY. Donated by Pat Bacon.

Adeline Hurlbut Thompson feeding chickens. 1920. Town of De Kalb, NY.

Dolph Fluno and one of the Merithew boys getting ready to do some haying on the Maple Ridge Road. 1920. Town of DeKalb, NY.

Adeline Hurlbut Thompson feeding turkeys in front of her farmhouse on Rock Island Road. 1920. Town of DeKalb, NY.

Workers pose before threshing grain on the Ira Poor farm on Childs Road. Circa 1890s-1900s. Town of De Kalb, NY.

Martin Holland with oxen, May Holland in chair, and Edwin Holland and Fidelia Phelps Holland in buggy on the Holland Farm built in 1880. Circa 1880s. Maple Ridge Road. Town of De Kalb, NY.

A three-horse hitch pulling a grain binder to harvest oats on the Stowell Farm on Hitchcock Road. Circa 1930s. Town of De Kalb, NY.

Farmers transporting a load of oats to be threshed, using a two-horse wagon. Circa 1900-1910. Elizabethtown. NY.

Man sitting on a horse-drawn side-delivery rake. The rake was used to roll cut and dried hay into windrows for loading onto a wagon for transport to barn for winter storage.  Circa 1920-1930. Boquet, NY.

Three horses pulling a grain binder, used to cut and bind grains (oats in this case) into bundles, which were then “stooked or shocked” (placed together in small piles) to dry in the field before being threshed to separate grain from chaff. Circa 1930s or 1940s. Essex County in NYS.