The Story of Rocky Ridge Farm

 How Mother Nature in the Ozarks Rewarded Well Directed Efforts after a Fruitless Struggle on the Plains of the Dakotas. The Blessings of Living Water and a Gentle Climate

July 22, 1911

Editor's Note:--Among the stories received in the course of our farm home story contest, the following came from Mr. Wilder, [2] with the request that it be published, if worthy, but that it be not considered an entrant for any prize. We certainly consider it worthy--one of the most helpful and interesting--and believe all contributors to this feature will approve of our giving it good position on this page since we cannot give it a prize. The list of winners will be found on page 5.

To appreciate fully the reason why we named our place Rocky Ridge Farm, it should have been seen at the time of the christening. To begin with it was not bottom land nor by any stretch of the imagination could it have been called second bottom. It was, and is, uncompromisingly ridge land, on the very tip top of the ridge at that, within a very few miles of the highest point in the Ozarks. And rocky--it certainly was rocky when it was named, although strangers coming to the place now, say "but why do you call it RockyRidge?"

The place looked unpromising enough when we first saw it, not only one but several ridges rolling in every direction and covered with rocks and brush and timber. Perhaps it looked worse to me because I had just the prairies of South Dakota where the land is easily farmed. I had been ordered south because those prairies had robbed me of my health [3] and I was glad to leave them for they had also robbed me of nearly everything I owned, by continual crop failures. Still coming from such smooth country the place looked so rough to me that I hesitated to buy it. But wife had taken a violent fancy to this particular piece of land, saying if she could not have it, she did not want any because it could be made into such a pretty place. It needed the eye of faith, however, to see that in time it could be made very beautiful.

So we bought Rocky Ridge Farm and went to work. We had to put a mortgage on it of $200, and had very little except our bare hands with which to pay it off, improve the farm and make our living while we did it. It speaks well for the farm, rough and rocky as it was that my wife and myself with my broken health were able to do all this.

A flock of hens--by the way, there is no better place in the country for raising poultry than right here--a flock of hens and the wood we cleared fromt he land bought our groceries and clothing. The timber on the place also made rails to fence it and furnished the materials for for a large log barn. 

At the time I bought it there were on the place four acres cleared and a small log house with a fire place and no windows. These were practically all the improvements and there was not grass enough growing on the whole forty acres to keep a cow. The four acres cleared had been set out to apple trees and enough trees to set twenty acres more were in the nursery rows near the house. The land on which to set them was not even cleared of the timber. Luckily I had bought the place before any serious damage  had been done to the fine timber around the building site, although the start had been made to cut it down.

It was hard work and sometimes short rations  at the first, but gradually the difficulties were overcome. land was cleared and prepared, by heroic effort, in time to set out all the apple trees and in a few years the orchard came into bearing. Fields were cleared and brought to a good state of fertility. The timber around the buildings was thinned out enough so that grass would grow between the trees, and each tree would grow in good shape, which has made a beautiful park of the grounds. The rocks have been picked up and grass seed sown so that the pastures and meadows are in fine condition and support quite a little herd of cows, for grass grows remarkably well on "Rocky Ridge" when the timber is cleared away to give it a chance. This grass and clear spring water make it an ideal dairy farm.

Sixty acres have been bought and paid for, which added to the original forty makes a farm of one hundred acres. There is no waste land on the farm except a wood lot which we have decided to leave permanently for the timber. Perhaps we have not made so much money as farmers in a more level country, but neither have we been obliged to spend so much for expenses and as the net profit is what counts at the end of the year, I am not afraid to compare the results for a term of years with farms of the same size in a more level country.

Our little Rocky Ridge Farm has supplied everything necessary for a good living and given us good interest on all the money invested every year since the first two. No year has it fallen below ten per cent and one extra good year it paid 100 per cent. Besides this it has doubled in value, and $3,000 more, since it was bought.

We are not by any means through with making improvements on Rocky Ridge Farm. There are on the place five springs of running water which never fail even in the dryest season. Some of these springs are so situated that by building a dam below them, a lake of three acres, twenty feet deep in places will be near the house. Another small lake can be made in the same way in the duck pasture and these are planned for the near future. But the first thing on the improvement program is building a cement tank as a reservoir around a spring which is higher than the buildings. Water from this tank will be piped down  and supply water in the house and barn and in the poultry yards.

When I look around the farm now and see the smooth, green, rolling meadows and pastures, the good fields of corn and wheat and oats; when I see the orchard and strawberry field like huge bouquets in the spring or full grapes, I can hardly bring back to my mind the rough, rocky, bushy, ugly place that we first called Rocky Ridge Farm. The name given it then serves to remind us of the battles we have fought and won and gives a touch of sentient and an added value to the place.

In conclusion, I am going to quote from a little gift book which my wife sent out to a few friends last Christmas:

"Just come and visit Rocky Ridge,

Please grant us our request,

We'll give you all a jolly time--

Welcome the coming; speed the parting guest."

 [2] Although this piece was bylined A.J. Wilder, what existing manuscript evidence there is of Almanzo's writing strongly suggest to scholars that Laura did all of the for-publication writing in her household.

[3] Almanzo had suffered a paralysis of his leg while in the Dakotas. None of those I interviewed forty years after his death could tell me which leg he favored.