NMH Magazine : Spring 2007

Down on the farm

The NMH farm is a survivor of sorts. It has touched three centuries and seen a tuberculosis epidemic, the rise and fall of prize dairy herds, the opening and closing of an agricultural program, devastating barn fires, its demise in the 1960s, and its rebirth in the 1970s. Resurrected, the farm is an earthy paean to hard work and old-fashioned values in a thoroughly modern world.

the hogger myth

NMH’s athletic teams are known as the Hoggers, ostensibly a common name for the farm workers who tended the school’s hogs a century ago. In fact, says school archivist Peter Weis ’78, that notion is bunk. “Around 1969 Mount Hermon was referred to as ‘the Hog,’ and somehow it caught on,” he says. “The first printed references to ‘Hoggers’ show up in 1970. There are no earlier references.”
Ah, but what about the other story? The one in which Deerfield headmaster Frank Boyden referred to NMH as a bunch of pig farmers—causing our students to adopt the association out of stubborn pride? Says Weis, “Frank Boyden was retired from Deerfield in the late 1960s, when he reputedly said that. There is no record of his statement, and the dates don’t work out.”
No matter. NMH students proudly embrace their identity as Hoggers. Pig imagery prevails on school T-shirts, coffee cups, and flyers, putting more pigs on campus than there ever were on the school farm.

the early years

Northfield and Mount Hermon had farms from the start— the norm for country boarding schools in the late nineteenth century.

running their own farms allowed these institutions to be self-sufficient and provide fresh food inexpensively. Paid staff took care of the Northfield farm, which was primarily a dairy operation. At Mount Hermon, however, students provided the bulk of the farm work force. As part of their work job, Mount Hermonites fed and cared for horses, cows, chickens, and pigs (slaughtering the latter for the dining hall); ran a large milking operation; cleaned stables; hayed; gardened; grew apples, corn, and potatoes; drove and repaired farm machinery; and maintained school grounds.
This unpaid labor (students back then worked at least two hours a day) helped keep down the cost of a Mount Hermon education; it also personified school founder D. L. Moody’s belief that gritty hands-on work improved both soul and character. The farm, with its Currier and Ives views and muscled young scholars, was eloquent testimony to the efficacy of his beliefs.

the agricultural program

in 1904 mount hermon added an agricultural department—an exception to its otherwise strictly academic program. Harry Hayward, an 1890 Mount Hermon grad and former assistant chief of the dairy division of the US Department of Agriculture, was its first director. In his two years as head of the Mount Hermon department, he introduced courses in agriculture, horticulture, animal husbandry, and dairying, coordinating the farm work with classes. He planted large plum and apple orchards and founded a Holstein dairy herd that became nationally famous.
For two decades, under two subsequent directors, the agricultural program continued—hitting its peak during World War I, when a “back to the farm” movement piqued interest in agricultural production. When the war ended in 1918, however, so did the school’s farming surge. In 1928 the school eliminated the agricultural department, which, due to scant interest from students, was barely limping along. The farm was largely unaffected by the change and continued its normal operation.

farming on the wane

from the 1930s through the 1950s, the farms at Northfield and Mount Hermon kept busy producing milk, pork, vegetables, and apples for dining halls on both campuses. Through the end of World War II, the farms were profitable and pivotal to the school’s operation. In fact, in the midst of food shortages during the war, the Mount Hermon farm ramped up its production of poultry and pork, buying 4,000 chickens and raising 83 pigs. A dedicated contingent of faculty wives even canned surplus from the vegetable gardens.
In the postwar years, however, farming was on the downswing nationwide. As the country became more urbanized, and the farming process—especially dairy production—increasingly mechanized, the school farms and their emphasis on manual labor became anachronistic and expensive.
By the 1950s, the farms were no longer saving the school money (as of 1960 the farms had racked up a deficit of more than $100,000). At the end of the decade, Mount Hermon phased out its truck gardens, potatoes, orchards, and chickens.
A trustee committee appointed to study the dairy operation determined that it was cheaper to buy milk than produce it, and in 1961 both Northfield and Mount Hermon sold their dairy herds. Last to go were the pigs, which were trucked up to a Vermont farm in 1963.

back to the earth

the farms lay fallow for a dozen years. As cobwebs collected in the barns and the orchards ran wild, a back-to-the-earth movement began stirring nationwide. Earth Day was inaugurated in 1970. Five years later, faculty members Bill Compton and Jim Blackaby worked with students to revive Mount Hermon’s apple orchards. They pruned, picked, and acquired an ancient cider press; in their first year of selling apples and cider, they made $450.
As environmental awareness increased in the 1970s, the school recognized the educational value of having a working farm. NMH reinstated the Mount Hermon farm in 1977 and hired faculty member Richard Odman as director, a position he still holds. In those first years, Odman started a sugaring operation, brought the gardens back, and turned the orchards into rows of thriving apple trees.

the farm today

a late-spring visit to the farm shows lavender fields in early bloom, grazing cows and draft horses, and a few scrabbling hens. A student dumps a wheelbarrow full of manure on the pile, while another weeds the lavish flower garden.
Farm crops include asparagus, broccoli, pumpkins, and raspberries. Three dairy cows produce milk that goes to the dining hall or is used to make cheddar cheese. In the fall, students pick apples from local orchards and press them into cider. Maple sugaring is a mainstay of the farm; student work crews spend their spring break collecting sap and making about 650 gallons of syrup each year. Lavender-growing is another sideline, courtesy of a sabbatical Odman spent in France studying lavender distillation.
Teachers bring their students to the farm to learn hands-on lessons about science and the environment, while faculty children come to pet the calves or play in the hay in the new post-and-beam barn.
“The great thing about the farm is how diversified it is,” says Odman, whose long beard is a nod to the Amish way of life that he admires. “Students have the chance to work with large animals, witness births, manage vegetable and fruit crops—there’s a big range of things to do.” A divinity school graduate whose parents were missionaries, Odman finds a rare blend of peace and earthiness on these rolling acres. “I’ve been working on the farm for thirty years, and I keep staying because it’s so interesting and unique. I think that’s what brings the students down here too.”

To view a film of the NMH farm circa 1948, go to www.nmhschool.org/farm/.

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