A postcard from a bygone agricultural era

Brian Mackey wrote this exceptional story for the Springfield State Journal-Register about the historic Manske-Niemann Farm, which is south of Litchfield, Ill., just off Route 66.

An excerpt:

Perhaps the most remarkable fact about the Manske-Niemann Farm is that it has been continuously occupied and worked by the same family since Abraham Lincoln was in the White House.

In 1863, a Prussian immigrant named Michael Manske spent $1,615 to purchase a small farm about four miles south of Litchfield.

From humble beginnings, the Manske-Niemann Farm grew to its present 462 acres — by comparison, the Illinois State Fairgrounds occupies 366 acres.

For more than 30 years, the lone resident, caretaker and farmer has been Ophelia Niemann, Manske’s great-great-granddaughter.

At the heart of the farm is a white house that dates to the 1860s. It’s surrounded by a grass-covered road that angles among 21 major buildings, all dating to between 1860 and 1935. There are separate barns for horses and cattle, hog huts and chicken houses, a smokehouse, corn cribs, an innovative granary and more. Between and around the buildings are horse and cattle pastures, a garden, what remains of an orchard, an apiary and a hog lot.

Many of the barns are picture-calendar ready, painted red and highlighted with distinctive vertical slats. Inside, the roughhewn lumber and traditional methods of joinery hearken back to a time when Americans were more intimately connected to the nature of our natural resources.

Ophelia Niemann nearly died in a traffic accident on Route 66, then had to fight to keep the farm 35 years ago when a sister tried to auction off the farm. Ophelia managed to buy all the land, plus much of the equipment. The sister has since died, and Ophelia tends to the day-to-day duties of keeping the farm running. The farm was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2003.

Landmarks Illinois and other preservationists would like to preserve the farm as a museum once Ophelia dies. But the prospects of that remain uncertain because of the state’s poor financial condition, plus the popularity of museums being on the wane.

Another option is a conservation easement, in which the entire farm’s buildings and land are run by someone else — like Ophelia runs it. But she’s reluctant to go this direction.

Until then, she has no plans to leave. There are always more chores to do.

“I’m happy where I’m at,” Niemann said. “I’ll be here ’til I die. I hope to die here.”

UPDATE: A photoblog by the State Journal-Register contains many more wonderful photographs from the farm.