Child’s Garden

Victor Davis Hanson The American barn was a symbol, its profile a stark reminder that rural America was healthy and raised families as well as food. The old wisdom of my grandfather echoes as the job nears completion, and I begin to get an inkling of what the finished barn will look like: “You can […]

Victor Davis Hanson In the end, I said “Ok, let’s do it”—just as the latest torrential storm hit (so much for the tired warning that the “drought is not over” as we receive two back-to-back near-record years of rain and snow). Over the last two weeks, all sorts of lumber and materials arrived. Manlifts were

Victor Davis Hanson So, 150 years after the barn’s birth, the last month’s California storms started to flop up the roof sheets again. In one gusty hour, I saw the roofline sway and the barn itself shake. Another far more skilled and imaginative roofer came out who two years ago had saved some of the

Victor Davis Hanson When the almond shakers and sweepers of the surrounding orchards kicked up clouds of dust the floors by this November were 3–4 inches deep in dirt. It was in theory a barn, but so perforated and porous that the inside was not much different from the world outside. About 10 years ago

Victor Davis Hanson I was told by my grandfather (1890–1976) that his grandmother Lucy Anna Davis (1832–1923) when she and her boys arrived by train here from Missouri (ca. 1870–71), bought what is now left of our present farm from the railroad (ca. $4 an acre contingent on improvements made within a set period of

Victor Davis Hanson Before the onset of American latifundia (i.e., around the rise of globalization, ca. 2000), the environs here were a patchwork of small farmers, of 40, 60, 120, or 200 acres. All were family owned and worked. Most were diverse—combining vines (raisins, table grapes, or wine) and trees (plums, nectarines, peaches, or almonds

Child’s Garden of AnimalsVictor Davis Hanson The Great Circle When I had three of my own free rangers in the early 1980s, there were even more houses on the farm, perhaps economically a bad idea to bring more of a family onto a farm without increasing its acreage. Our young triad would visit their cousins

Victor Davis Hanson More of the Harder Sort My great-uncle, my grandmother’s brother was one of the harder ones we saw on the free-range circuit. He grew up one of 12 siblings, impoverished, and rode a horse at 13 from New Mexico to Selma, California. His family, after a variety of tragedies, was destitute. And

Child’s Garden of AnimalsVictor Davis Hanson The Softer and the Harder What an array of tutorials we received from the scores of relatives and friends we met free ranging! Beldon was the disabled Philippine war vet. He spoke so softly as to be almost not understandable. He had a heavy bike with a rubber horn

Victor Davis Hanson A Merry-go-Round of Merry People My parents wisely worked in town and outsourced us to the farm both to work and to be watched while they worked. We took the bus and got off at our farmhouse at 3 PM, and most days were alone and free until 6 when my mother