Farming in Moorestown

There was a time when the major business in Moorestown was farming. Today, few farms remain. But the is giving residents an opportunity to learn about the township’s past.

From Dawn Till Dusk, Farm Life In Moorestown, will open at the Smith-Cadbury Mansion April 3.

Four farms will be highlighted in the exhibit, including two working farms, and . A 19th-century model farm, Pinehurst, and Hereshome, owned by a gentleman farmer in the early 20th century, will also be part of the exhibit.

Much of the information about farm practices has been drawn from the archives of the Historical Society.

“The exhibit cannot be a comprehensive view of farming,” said Ann Condon of the Historical Society. “It is a sampling of farm life as practiced in days gone by.”

According to Condon, the exhibit will be of special interest to the third-graders who visit the Historical Society each year as part of that grade’s curriculum.

“These kids have never been exposed to what Mooretown used to be,” said Condon. “It was surrounded by farms.”

The exhibit will include oral histories from area farmers, information about the Grange, services to farmers such as horseshoeing and wagon makers, the move from horsepower to motor power and marketing farm produce in the 19th century.

“We fed South Jersey and Philly,” Condon said of Moorestown’s farms. “Farming was big business here. Some made considerable fortunes.”

Moorestown farms grew everything from corn, tomatoes, cabbage and celery to peaches and apples. Moorestown was also home to the Stokes Seed Company, which supplied seeds to farms in New Jersey, eastern Pennsylvania and Delmarva. The company, which began in 1878 as the Johnson Seed Co., is still supplying seeds today. There was also a rare plant nursery in town.

“This exhibit is only scraping the surface,” said Condon. “We could write volumes on farming in Moorestown.”

The exhibit will even include a little bit of glamour as a Moorestown resident was chosen as Queen of the Burlington County Farm Fair in the 1950s. The exhibit will also cover the dangers of fire to farms and the farmettes many residents had in their backyards.

In addition to the exhibit at the Smith-Cadbury Mansion, the Historical Society’s annual meeting, to be held at 7:30 p.m. April 14 at the , will include a talk by Coles Roberts about 19th-century farming. The society will also have the Jack Allen Memorial Early Country Living Exhibit on display during Moorestown Day, which begins at 9 a.m. June 4.

The Smith-Cadbury Mansion is open from 1 to 4 p.m. Sundays.