that began nearly a century ago right here on these beautiful acres.

Our great-uncle and aunt, Phillip and Freda, built more than a dozen original structures that included a pig pen, chicken coup and corn crib. And “city folk” from Marietta rode the train to the Caywood station to walk up Killwell Run for Phillip and Freda’s strawberries. Our parents moved in on Independence Day, 1967. Running water came from a pump in the kitchen; there were a few bare light bulbs.

The mortgage? $56 a month!

They might not have had a lot of money, but Wendy and David found God and purpose in Phillip and Freda’s wide, open spaces. For more than a half-century, they deepened our family ties to this land – raising a family as well as a continuous herd of cattle and rotating bunches of pigs, chickens, goats and rabbits. 

Despite the fickleness of Mother Nature each spring and summer, gardens filled our cellar with potatoes, corn, squash and countless other veggies, while pear and apple trees and sprawling patches of berries inspired countless jars of jellies and jams and shelves of pies and scones. In the winter, we’d sled the hills as ice crackled the creeks. And Phillip’s and Freda’s strawberries? They were still going strong more than a half-century later!