Agriculture - Overview
From butter churns to diesel tractors, the Museum's agricultural artifacts trace the story of Americans who work the land. Agricultural tools and machinery in the collections range from a John Deere plow of the 1830s to 20th-century cultivators and harvesters. The Museum's holdings also include overalls, aprons, and sunbonnets; farm photographs; milk cans and food jars; handmade horse collars; and some 200 oral histories of farm men and women in the South. Prints in the collections show hundreds of scenes of rural life. The politics of agriculture are part of the story, too, told in materials related to farm workers' unions and a group of artifacts donated by the family of the labor leader Cesar Chavez.
"Agriculture - Overview" showing 1 items.
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Robinson and Via Family Papers, 1845-2001
- Notes
- The Robinson family acquired land and began raising tobacco in Prince George's County, Maryland, in 1843. The property consisted of over 170 acres by the end of the 19th century and included a dwelling, a tenant house and various outbuildings. While the principal crop remained tobacco, other grain crops were grown and sheep were raised. By the 1950s-1960s, the Robinson family was farming over 1,000 acres in Prince George's and Charles Counties, Maryland, through a combination of lease and direct ownership. The Via family acquired land and began raising tobacco and livestock in Prince George's Co., Maryland by 1949. The property consisted of thirty acres of owned property and included a dwelling and small outbuildings
- The Via family were also employed off the farm. By 1956 they had moved to Calvert Co., Maryland and were farming full-time on approximately 150 acres of owned property, raising tobacco, small grains and livestock. The Robinson family continues farming on approximately 300 acres of owned property in Benedict, Charles Co., Maryland. By 1993, the Via farm had been reduced to approximately five acres of owned property, and is no longer farmed
- Summary
- Farm records from the Robinson and Via Families of Southern Maryland, documenting family life, agricultural work, community involvement, and rural culture over a period of 150 years. Primarily correspondence, diaries, photographs, home movies, farm account books, and miscellaneous farming papers. Includes scrapbooks, funeral registers, cookbooks, architectural drawings, phonograph records, and postcard albums. 2009 addendum consists of approximately 1.6 cubic feet of papers including six scrapbooks, a music portfolio, two farm account books, a map, funeral memorabilia, and other miscellaneous papers. The 2011 addendum consists of approximately three fourths of one cubic foot of papers relating to the family and the farm, including correspondence, school papers, and diaries. The 2013 addendum consists of two volumes from a nursing school correspondence course
- Several documents are signed with an X
- 2009 addendum consists of six scrapbooks and one bound music folio, one farm account book, five memoranda books about the farm, a road map, funeral memorabilia, and loose papers relating to the operation of the farm
- Cite as
- Robinson and Via Family Papers, 1845-1994, Archives Center, National Museum of American History. Gift of Franklin A. Robinson, Jr
- Date
- 1845
- 1845-2001
- 1980-2000
- 20th century
- 20th Century
- 19th century
- 1930-1950
- donor
- Robinson, Franklin A. Jr (actor writer) 1959-
- Subject
- Robinson, Franklin A. Sr. 1932-
- Robinson, Franklin A. 1841-1905
- Robinson, Robert Henry 1851-1937
- Robinson, Robert David 1962-
- Robinson, Adina Theresa 1963-
- Robinson, Thomas Wells 1803-1869
- Robinson, Martha Walls 1807-1897
- Robinson, Frank A. 1883-1970
- Robinson, Amanda Baden 1849-1940
- Townshend, Martha Robinson 1880-1961
- Via, Adina Mae 1937-1966
- Via, Robert Delano 1933-
- Via, Robert Milton 1906-1983
- Via, Virginia Wood 1914-
- Howes, Grace Bourne ?-1976
- Robinson, Elizabeth Bourne 1892-1976
- Capital Transit Company Washington (D.C.)
- Serenity Farm, Inc
- Local number
- 1994.3003 (NMAH Acc.)
- 2009.3080 (NMAH Acc.)
- 2011.3082 (NMAH Acc.)
- 2012.3106 (NMAH Acc.)
- 2013.3024 (NMAH Acc.)
- Data Source
- Archives Center - NMAH