Mountain Farm Museum

On our drive through Smoky Mountain National Park, we stopped to visit the Mountain Farm Museum. It's a recreation of a typical Appalachian farm in the 1800s. The buildings were moved from various locations in the area.  

The house was made of huge split logs. Joints were simply covered by boards fastened to the inside of the logs. Cooking and heat were provided by wood burning fireplaces. The farm was essentially a subsistence operation. Everything that a family needed to live on was produced by the family living on the farm. While these families were able to provide nearly everything they needed, it is important to note that every aspect of this subsistence existence was labor intensive.

The apple room (essentially what those of us in more northern climates would call a root cellar) was a primary food storage facility. Apples were a staple for these Appalachian farm families.

There were two other crops that played key roles in the lifestyle on these farms. One was corn; the other was sweet sorghum. Corn provided a food source for the family as well as most of their livestock. Sweet sorghum was grown and used to produce molasses. Molasses substituted for sugar. The picture shows the device used to boil sorghum syrup down to molasses.  

Livestock includes hogs and chickens mainly. Hogs were a primary source of meat and other byproducts such as lard. Chickens produced eggs and were also a source for meat.

An adequate drinking water source was critical for these families. The Farm Museum had a spring as a fresh water source.  A fenced gardens provided a variety of additional food products for the family.