Farm names are fascinating to me and I often appreciate the names folks choose for their farms many of which have hidden or not so hidden meanings. The Bible says “a good name is better than fine gold”. This I’m sure is not referring to clever names or names that convey an image or send a message of some type but rather the long and constant work required to have a personal name that is honored among our fellow human beings.

We had a farm near by named Aching Acres, kind of the opposite of the often seen romantic names of farms and farmsteads. I like the name of a local farm that I know of which is Far Wind farm. Conjures up images of a wind from far away places which finds its way to that particular spot on the planet and who knows what the wind brings in the way of blessing or problems. Maybe a needed rain cloud or a warm breeze or a cool one depending on the need of the moment. Storms and pollen and bugs and migrating birds and odors and all sorts of things travel by winds from afar don’t they? Another nearby farm owned by a friend is called Valley View farm and the reason for the name is obvious when you stand at his barn and look east. The valley and far away mountains stand out as a picture of neat rolling fields, wood groves and edges, the smoke from distant chimneys and the commerce of humanity proceeding on the state road far below.

My neighbors farm is called “Morning Star Perennials” which we had named Morning Star Farm before we sold it to them and built our present place to the rear in one of our fields. Morning Star is a Biblical name among many for Jesus and that’s why we named it as we did. After all the good book says that “HE owns the cattle on a thousand hills” and by inference owns the hills also.

So when we moved to our new farm 20 years back we lost the Morning Star name so picked another one of the same type and chose Dayspring Farm also a Biblical name for Jesus. Now our valley has two names which carry the same intended meaning. Other thoughts I am sure occur when our farm name is considered. Thoughts such as a spring of water running daily or the springing forth of a new day come to mind although not to me because I already have a fixed reference in my mind for that name.

The value of a good name brings with it a host of responsibilities and opportunities. The name is a starting point and what is made of it is the challenge. What the name comes to represent is dependent on the background work invested in its’ nature. For instance the name Tidy Gardens Farm (if such a name exists in reality) would not mean much if the farm was planted with overgrown weeds , rusting machinery and abandoned cars.

The name of our farm is fairly well known in our local area because we sold Christmas trees from the farm for 15 years and many folks still think of us as the Christmas tree farm on Darby Hill. Others still refer to the farm as the old Trotter farm which was the name of the previous dairy farmer, Johnny Trotter, who worked the land for his 13 milk cows. Interesting enough, between his ownership and ours the farm was owned my a speculator who did not work or live on the farm and let it go in a sense. His name is long forgotten. Perhaps when we are gone the farm will be known as the Hewitt farm which happens to a lot of farm names here in New England as the human name working the land supersedes the chosen name after the farmer is gone. I think I would like that some day the farm might be remembered as the Hewitt farm. We have a pond that didn’t exist before we built it and we have named it Hewitt Pond a name likely unknown to any geographers or local folks.

Driving out the driveway this morning I noticed the neighbor across the road changed the name of his little homestead from “Easy Street” to “For Sale”. Not a real common name in the Town we live in but a popular one in some areas of New England. Names change and people move about. When we lived in the City, homes had only numbers but farms are different and the longer you live and work a farm the more entrenched and associated it becomes with you and your name. All the more reason to work to make that name ” a good name worth more than fine gold”.

This entry was posted on Sunday, February 25th, 2007 at 12:42 pm and is filed under Blogroll, Daily life. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.