carriage hill farm

Carriage Hill Farm

5 Rivers Metroparks (Dayton, Ohio)

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The 900-acre Carriage Hill Metropark, just north 0f I-70 on the east side of Ohio 201, is part of Dayton's Five Rivers
Metropark System, and includes Carriage Hill Farm. Carriage Hill is a working farm set in the 1880s, comprised of
several buildings dating from the 1830s to the 1870s equipped with the materials and tools of farming of the period
and staffed with historical interpreters in period costume. It's on rolling, partly forested land. After a few hours
walking around downtown on concrete, it was great to be away from the noise, walking in tall grass, feeling the
breeze, and hearing birds.

This house is a log cabin that was sided over in 1876.

The wood shop is equipped with tools used to repair, restore and construct farm buildings

A shed on the end of the wood shop houses the Empire portable steam engine
used to power the threshing machine.

The blacksmith shop has all the tools needed to make hinges, latches, and parts/repairs for farm tools and implements.

By far the biggest Catalpa tree I've ever seen!

Summer kitchen and wash house. In summer, cooking was done in this open,
screened building instead of in the house's kitchen. A cast-iron cookstove in
an adjoining room took the place of the fireplace for cooking.

Brick ovens were heated by building a wood fire inside. Wood was burned until the bricks
got hot enough that the soot was burned off, and then the wood and ashes were raked out
and the food to be baked was put in. The things that took longest to bake, like bread, went
in first, and things that baked quickly, like cookies went in last. Each item was then taken
out when it was done. It took practice to get it right.

Hay mower

Hay rake

Water wagon to supply water to a steam engine. In a day's threshing, a steam engine can consume a thousand
gallons of water or more, and it was often the job of some of the boys to take the wagon to a pond, creek or well
and fill it with water, and then transfer the water to holding tanks on or near the steam engine.

Percheron draft horses

For some jobs, mules are better than horses