Sunday, February 22, 2009

Hurdle Mills

Has seen better days. What is well preserved is charming, history that still stands bravely in a resplendent setting of rolling countryside.

Yet there are so many ruins of better times gone by.

I really wonder what life was like 100 years ago here.
It is probably wrong to think of the past as "simpler times". It must have been unspeakably hard to try to farm without the convenience and insurance of irrigation, modern technology, etc. But then, it must have been more pure. I often wish that I could talk to the farmers that were here before the green revolution, before we literally beat our swords into ploughshares and turned our munitions factories to the task of cranking out ag chemicals. I would love to know why they did what they did and what it meant to them. I bet they didn't expect to have fresh tomatoes and strawberries in the winter!

3 comments:

Gorilla Bananas said...

I suspect they did it to have enough to eat and reproduce. That has traditionally been the objective driving life on Earth.

Jane Le Galloudec said...

I love your photographs and I share a desire for a time machine for quick jaunts into the past... but if you think about it... someone in a hundred years time will wonder about you and why you do it!

Sara said...

For sure, but maybe they will open up this dusty old blog and get an idea...