Strong Family Farm Pastures

Farmers are Strong
Strong Family Farm Pastures, Vernon
December 2023

This isn’t a trail to go and hike in order to hike a good trail. No.

It’s a spot to go to appreciate the history of place. The trail, such as it is, is merely a vehicle to set you on that path. When Norman Strong died in 2010 the Meetinghouse Hill field was part of the Strong Family Limited Partnership, LLP. Area farmers rented the field to grow corn, harvest the hay, and graze their cows. When the Partnership decided to sell the property in 2014 a few area residents formed Meetinghouse Hill, LLC to preserve this piece of Vernon’s Colonial and agricultural history. Area farmers continue to raise corn and hay and a small herd of beef cattle graze there once in a while.

In 2019 the property was given back to the Strong Family through grants and whatnot from The Connecticut Farmland Trust. It was then that someone decided we needed a trail here. After all, there’s a loop trail behind the middle school across Route 30, also on farmed trust land.

This trail is not a loop trail. And, if you think you’ll just make it one… don’t. Trust me. (You could by road walking Boxwood Drive to Cemetery Road and in fact, I think that’s what you’re supposed to do here. But… blah. That’s a lot of road.)

I parked in the little lot, got my bearings, and hit the old farm road trail. It was a little disconcerting because there’s a farmhouse behind the iconic red barn at the trailhead and I think people live in it. So I went away from it, north.

This area is important to Vernon. When the town’s early settlers received permission in 1760 to establish the parish of North Bolton they immediately began planning their meeting house. In 18th-Century Connecticut there was no separation of church and state so the meeting house would serve as their church, government and social center.

The location chosen was on the old Indian trail that had become the main east-west road through the parish. The preferred location for meeting houses was hilltops and this one overlooked the Connecticut River Valley, such that on a clear day the mother church in Hartford was visible. The site was also close to the only cemetery in the area, on today’s Bamforth Road. Back in the day, roads were undeveloped with most families walking to church. The road they took to church each Sunday for 63 years climbed what came to be known as Meetinghouse Hill. Where it passed over a small brook a fieldstone bridge was built to accommodate travelers.

The road to Hartford became an official turnpike in 1801 and with subsequent improvements was straightened, bypassing Meetinghouse Hill. When the new church at Vernon Center was built in 1826 the road up Meetinghouse Hill, still unpaved, was abandoned by the town.

What is now called Old Meetinghouse Hill returned to use as a farm field. The Strong family bought the field with its red barn around 1900. It had been allowed to deteriorate such that the Strongs had to drain the wetlands, improve the pasture and then used it primarily for their herd of dairy cows. The herd was moved from the field to the farm for milking each day for over a hundred years.

The walk up the old road felt like a walk up an old road. It felt historic. I mean, look at this tree:

That tree has seen some stuff for sure.

When Strong bought the field it was run down with yellow birches and brush. The marshy wetlands had turned into a swamp and a ditch was dug to drain it. There was a good spring on the land that provided the pasture and cattle with water. The spring was also used for a number of years to supply water to the Tolland County Temporary Home For Children near Center Road.

That last fact disturbs me a little bit.

The red barn that I was walking further and further away from, was used for hay and equipment storage – especially in the winter. At times the downstairs was open for cattle to get out of the elements.

As I neared the top of Meetinghouse Hill, the trail completely disappeared. There are animal paths and such, so I followed them… right to a barbed wire fence.

There’s a cool little bench dedicated to the Strong family up here.

I continued along where I thought the trail should be, but it turns out that no, there’s no trail much beyond the bench. And like I said, trying to make a trail will give you tick borne diseases, torn pants, and five feet of muck towards the cemetery. Don’t do it. Just enjoy the views, the history of farming here, and appreciate that Vernon was able to preserve it all as open space.

Strong Family Farm
Damian and I visited the working farm once
Meetinghouse Hill history
CTMQ’s Vernon Town Trails