Corn and soybean fields stretch as far as the eye can see across much of Ohio. Holsteins, Herefords and Angus roam pastures across the state.
Barns dating back two centuries still stand sentinel over the landscape – and the legislature designated them as the official historical architectural structure for Ohio – even as many have fallen due to neglect or because their ancient beams and siding are coveted by woodworkers who make flooring, cabinets and chairs from them.
Despite economic challenges for farmers and increasing development pressures in central Ohio to turn farmland into factories and home sites, agriculture and food production combined are the largest industry in Ohio. The state generated about $15.9 billion in agricultural cash receipts in 2022, the latest numbers available. The highest valued commodities are soybeans, corn and eggs.
While Ohio continues to lose farmland – more than 1 million acres since the year 2000 alone – families who love the land and their legacy in farming carry on traditions that stretch back across time to the earliest settlers of the Northwest Territory in the late 1700s and early 1800s. In fact, 87% of Ohio farms are still owned by families, according to the Census of Agriculture.
The Ohio Historic Family Farms program recognizes the dedicated families who have owned and continuously farmed their land for generations. The program was established in 1993 to honor family farms that had been in operation for at least 100 years, and since then, the program has expanded to include Sesquicentennial Farms owned and operated for 150 years and Bicentennial Farms for 200 or more years.
The program originated with a collaboration between the Ohio’s Country Journal magazine and the Ohio Historical Society, initially called the “Outstanding Ohio Century Farm Program.” The two organizations would pick regional winners that were recognized at the Ohio State Fair. In 2003, the Ohio Department of Agriculture adapted the program and expanded it to recognize all qualifying farms.
Now, farms inducted into the program receive a certificate signed by the governor and the opportunity to buy signs with the farm name and year the family started farming it to place along the road.
In 2008, in honor of the bicentennial of Licking County’s founding in 1808, the Licking County Soil & Water Conservation District compiled a booklet of 65 farms in the county that had been owned by the same families for a century or more. Among them, 26 also have been inducted into the Historic Family Farms program by the Ohio Department of Agriculture.
These families, like most Ohio farming families, face pressures as central Ohio sees increasing growth and development spreading into farm fields from Columbus. Families like the Shaws east of Newark and the Maxwells north of Granville have had many offers to buy their land.
So far, both families have chosen to keep their farms, but the future isn’t certain for everyone. Farms across the county face growing economic challenges and development pressures. As a result, 62% of Ohio farmers have primary jobs off the farm to make ends meet, according to the Census of Agriculture.
Some don’t have willing or able next-generation family members to take over the land and keep the farms in their family name. That leaves some proud farmers wondering whether the Historic Family Farm status will end with them.
To qualify for the Historic Family Farm designation, owners must fill out a form and document that their farms have been owned by the same family for at least 100 years and have been continuously farmed. They submit these records to the Ohio Department of Agriculture for review and approval. Today, there are more than 2,000 farms across Ohio that have received the designation, and there is at least one Historic Family Farm in each of the state’s 88 counties.
“It is just another one of those opportunities to tell the agricultural story, in this case, dating back to the history of some of our farms all across our state,” said Brian Baldridge, director of the Ohio Department of Agriculture. “It’s lifting up the narrative of how important the multiple generations and the history of our farms here in Ohio.”
Baldridge said that Ohio farmers face challenges: “Inputs continue to be high, and right now, we are in a downturn as far as the agriculture economy.”
Baldridge is a seventh-generation member of a Historic Family Farm in Adams County, in southern Ohio.
“My grandbabies are going to be ninth generation,” he said. “I hope it stays there forever. I am currently remodeling the 1852 homestead that I grew up in. Sure, it would have been easier to tear it down and start over, but it’s in the middle of our family farm. I hope that what I am doing today with our family farms makes sure the eighth, the ninth generations will continue the legacy.”
The work Baldridge does now could inspire the next generations, as it did for Thomas Maxwell in Licking County.
“My father and grandfather put so much effort into this place and that pushed me to want to carry on the same level of work, if not harder,” said Maxwell, who raises beef cattle on a Historic Family Farm north of Granville and whose son will be the next generation to do so.
Erin Dillon, director of the Historic Family Farms program, sees the excitement in families while preparing their applications.
“Some people start two years before they can receive their recognition,” she said. “They will reach out to me ahead of time. Others, I never hear from other than their application in the mail, and to us, it is all the same.”
Dillon works to digitize records and create an interactive map, which makes the history of the farms more accessible to the public. The program has seen an increase in interest in recent years, in part because more farms are hitting their 100-year marks, and also because awareness of the program is growing.
Dillon said that when inducting new farms into the program, she likes to quote a previous director: “‘You can look up and down Main Street and you don’t see many businesses that have been in business for 100 years.’ It’s not very many, but that is not necessarily the case when it comes to farming. You pass it from one generation to the next, and if nothing else, it’s just a special type of business.”
Delaney Brown writes for TheReportingProject.org, the nonprofit news organization of Denison University’s Journalism program, which is supported by generous donations from readers. Sign up for The Reporting Project newsletter here.