Last week, the Daily Post ran a photo challenge about endurance. This is what endurance means to me:
There are a lot of century farms in Iowa, farms that have been owned by one family for a hundred years or more, including mine. They have a recognition ceremony at the state fair every year, and it’s a really neat thing to be a part of.
(c) 2014. All rights reserved.
Suddenly they all died. The end. 
I should have one on my old Triumph Bonneville. “Owned since 1972” Not sure it would do the handling much good, though.
LikeLike
The farm we moved to this spring was in the same family for over 150 years. We’re the first people to own it that aren’t part of the family who originally homesteaded it back in the 1800s. It’s really kind of sad that no one in the family wanted it, but it worked out well for us because Seymour was dying to move back out in the country.
LikeLike
That does sound cool.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Do they have anything like this where you live? Either places that have been held by one family forever, or a recognition of such things?
LikeLike
We do but I don’t think we celebrate it in the same way. Most landowners who have been in one place a very long time tend to be nobles… some are just old families; one of my Dad’s mates, his family had lived in the same house for 900 years, which is pretty good going. A university friend farmed up near King’s Lynn and although his family had been there 300 years they were wryly called ‘the new people’. I think a lot of Irish farms definitely stay in the same families for years. Here in Britain I’d say some do and others probably keep changing hands.
Cheers
MTM
LikeLiked by 1 person
That’s really interesting. Iowa as a state is considerably younger than that, and I think most of the farms around here were homesteaded in the 1850s, shortly after we gained statehood. The further east you go, the older things get since the East Coast was settled much earlier, but I love the historical significance of long family ownership. I mean, how hard must it have been to keep the same place in one family for 900 years? Especially now when small family farms are being run roughshod over by large corporate farms, 150 years in one family is an achievement to be proud of.
LikeLike