Day Tripping | The Days of County Farms

By Kathi Caldwell-Hopper

When miserly Ebenezer Scrooge, in the classic story “A Christmas Carol” by Charles Dickens, is asked to make a contribution to the poor during the holiday season, he spats, “Are there no prisons? And the Union workhouses…are they still in operation? Those who are badly off must go there.”

Sadly, in times past, workhouses, alms houses or poor farms as some called them, seemed to be the answer to care for those who had fallen on hard times.

There was no pride in being forced, due to circumstances, to enter a poor farm or almshouse. Visions of deprivation and cold and terrible work conditions came to mind and one viewed it as a last resort.

During the holiday season, when charity organizations work diligently to provide for those less fortunate, we can look back and learn more about poor farms of the 1800s and early 1900s and ask if they were really so bad. What did one living in such a place actually experience and did the Lakes Region even have a poor farm?

For the answers to those questions and a peek into the lives of some of those who lived – and some who died – at poor farms in the area, a stop at the Laconia Public Library in downtown Laconia to see the exhibit “The Belknap County Farm and Alms House” is a must.

As a library card holder at the Laconia Library, I visit often and am always on the lookout for the latest exhibit in the upper level rotunda of the library. It is here that the Laconia Historical and Museum Society holds exhibits year round. The current exhibit, which is on display until December 21, is just one of the many throughout the year that spotlight fascinating aspects of local life long ago. (The library is located at 695 North Main Street in Laconia.)

If you like facts and figures to help you get a picture of something, you will find this exhibit to your liking. (There are listings on such things as the names of those who died at the Belknap County Farm.) If, like me, you are curious what the farm was like on a day-to-day basis, you’ll get answers at this exhibit.

As I started to browse the displays, I saw information and a death certificate for Belknap Farm resident Rebecca, a woman from Barnstead NH who was born in 1835. At the age of 33 she began living at the County Farm, and remained there for 52 years, passing away at age 85. I wondered what was her story? Why did she live there for so long?

I had to ask myself if perhaps the farm and those like it that served the poor were not always the frightening places of old-time fiction. If Rebecca lived there most of her adult life, could it be that the conditions were good enough for her to stay? Or was she ill of mind or body and had no choice but to reside at a place where she could receive care?

More information on the County Farm tells us that from 1873 to 1913, the place was run by a supervisor and his wife. They lived and worked on the farm, with the help of its residents. Further, we are told that it was “a thriving community that produced crops, sold lumber and raised livestock. Some inmates lived and worked on the farm productively for many, many years.”

It was a huge operation, and the residents of the farm, which was located in Laconia, were active in building the house and other structures, cutting 150,000 feet of lumber for the construction.

What caused a person or a family to enter such a farm? The reasons were varied and ranged from financial loss of home and no work to provide for oneself to ill health or aging without family to care for the person, to serving out a jail sentence to a mental illness making one unable to function in society. It must be remembered that in the 1800s and early 1900s, such circumstances were handled and looked upon much differently than today. The mentally ill were often hidden away by families and likely feared by many. The aged were usually cared for and lived with extended families in those days, but if that was not possible, where else could one turn for care and housing when elderly and poor and in failing health? Able-bodied men and probably women who had broken the law were excellent candidates to serve out their sentence on the farm, where they could provide labor for all sorts of chores. Families fallen on hard times may have had no other option but to live on the farm, where they would at least have room and board for their children.

None of these reasons for residing on the County Farm were ideal and it is likely there was stigma attached to living there, but in the time before welfare services, such places offered an alternative and sometimes a salvation for the poor.

 The exhibit offers some old medical equipment and tells us a Dr. Mace was concerned with sanitary conditions of County Farm inmates and pushed to see improvements, such as drainage and ventilation systems, bathtubs and water closets as well as replacing the water supply.

Jobs at the farm, once a person was settled in their new living space, were separated by gender. Generally, the women worked in the farmhouse and helped with baking, cleaning and sewing and laundry. The men worked outside at the many farm chores; should they come to the farm with special skills in such things as carpentry or blacksmithing, they worked on the property in those trades. During the winter, work continued with the men cutting trees and doing other non-field related jobs.

An old black and white photo shows us an elderly woman in a field at the County Farm. She stands beside a dairy cow, and she is grinning and appears to be patting the cow; two youngsters can be seen in the distant background. She does not seem to be downtrodden or unhappy, and it offers a rare glimpse into perhaps a typical day on the farm.

Places like the Belknap County Farm, and many, many others all over the state, came into being when Legislature in 1886 authorized counties to purchase farms and houses to care for “county paupers”. In the early 1800s and well into the following decades, there was a general feeling that being poor was a result of a character deficiency and such people could be reformed by working on a farm. Today we know differently, and that falling on hard times is usually due to economic reasons instead of because a person is of bad character. Further, housing the poor with those in need of mental health treatment or those serving a prison sentence would be unheard of today.

Eventually, the exhibit tells us, after the social changes as an outcome of the Civil War, entrance into a poor house/farm became voluntary.

In Laconia, the County Farm had originally been an insane asylum, built in 1835. By 1871, the original buildings were destroyed by fire, and the county built a two-story house for “the insane, the poor, the infirm, as well as people who had committed criminal acts.” Further reform happened around the start of the 1900s when the County Farm realized the need of separating the “passively insane” from “paupers”.

By the 1960s, a portion of the farm’s land was sold and the practice of housing people at the County Farm was phased out.

The exhibit offers a fascinating – if sometimes poignant – look at what life was like on the County Farm. I found the section with a long list of the names, ages and causes of death of the poor and infirm at the farm to be particularly poignant.

Among the facts and figures in the exhibit, one cannot help but read between the lines. Did people dislike living on the farm? What was it like for children? Were the caretakers compassionate? What did it take to get out of residing in the County Farm?

And in this holiday season, another question surfaces. How did they celebrate Christmas at the County Farm? Who knows if any information exists on what happened on December 25 at the farm? Hopefully, there was turkey and a mince pie and maybe even the singing of a carol or two to mark the day.

We do know that the County Farm in Laconia was one of many around the state. Another farm was located in Merrimack County in the Boscawen area, and others existed as well. Smaller poor farms were located around the state. One such poor farm was near present-day Ellacoya State Park in Gilford.

We have come a long way from the days of Ebenezer Scrooge and shunning the poor. In order to continue to move forward, exhibits such as the one, thoughtfully organized and on display at the Laconia Public Library, are well worth stopping to view.

(The Belknap County Farm and Alms House exhibit will be on view until December 21; for more information, call 527-1278 or go to www.laconiahistory.org.)