Don't all of our family's come from farmers?

On my side of the family, my maternal grandparents were farmers and my Mother grew up on the farm. My Dad grew up in a large city, and I grew up in small towns and then the suburbs.

On my husband's side, as far back as they can trace his family ( at least 8 - 10 generations) have been market gardeners in England. He grew up in the business as well, so he has all sorts of growing and homesteading skills. But some things are new to him here because he's only been in the country about 6 years. He met tomato hornworms for the first time last year!

Lynda

Well I seem to be the odd ball in my family.

My parents and Grandparents were city folk ( New York City city folk at that, who thought trees grew in concrete ).
But my parents bought a place in southern upstate New york when I was 3.
I got involved in 4-H as soon as I could and had friends who had farms and orchards, that I helped out at.

Thanks to 4-H and my friends I actually qualified as a state dairy judge at 17.

I'm now getting back to my love of the land. My wife and I have bought a small homestead ( just 5 acres ) but I'm hoping to be able to raise a lot of our own food ( poultry, sheep, Dexter cattle, and a large garden ). I don't plan on making a living off of this land but I'm hoping to pass on my love of the land and a rural / farm life to my kids who are now both in 4-H.

I'm lucky my DW, who also was suburbia raised, also loves the idea of a small semi-self sufficient farm and is enjoying this place as much as I am.

Bob D. in FL.

Mother's side were business owners in Germany; father's side all farmers, came here from Germany to have farm land. I guess that is why I enjoy open spaces, digging in the dirt and having critters. Husband's has farmers on both sides for generations, all germans. He claims that he hates farming, however you be hard pressed to find him anywhere near a city, most times you will see him either planting or on a tractor. Still I can't picture my daughters having gardens and animals when they have their own places.

My father's family kept trying to get out of farming (gg grampa was a cooper, his son was a baker) or else they were inept and kept losing the farms.

My mother's family farmed and were preachers on the side.

My parents owned a paving company....and I am thrilled to live over 3 miles from the nearest asphalt!

One side were blacksmiths from the late 1600's until the mid 1800's when they began tobacco farming..

The other side were sailors and fishermen..who all smoked tobacco

a nice blend..LOL..

I think if you go back six or seven generations you've got a heck of a lot of grandparents that are possible farmers. If you can find a farmer in your family from, say, 1850, you can be assured that there will be farmers in every generation of that family back to the year 1.

My people have been everything under the sun if you follow my genealogy back any distance, but in the last 200 years we've mostly been farmers and/or preachers.

Of the relatives I know, there are now only two of us farming anymore. It's really too bad, but the younger generations don't want to do it anymore. When I was a kid everyone I was related to farmed, now almost none do.

Jennifer

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-Northern NYS

==> Ours on the paternal side has been traced back to roughly 1200 with farmers ever since

Ditto ours. My aunt has traced us back to 1300's in Wales, but the records go no farther back, and are pretty sparse for the last 200 years of that. I've never really looked at her records to see if "farmers" are in there. From the relatives I know of (which only goes back a handful of generations) we've got a computer programmer/developer (me), claims adjuster (father), coal miner (grandfather (fathers's side)), factory worker (grandfather (mother's side)), aunts/uncles alive today: Truck driver, PE Instructor, Drill Sergent, Nurse, High School Administration (assistant principal) -- going back even further I've got: silversmith, watchmaker, beekeeper (does that count as farming or livestock?), accountants galore, lawyers galore, librarian, ... The list goes on and on with nary a "farmer" in sight.

I guess I'm the oddball. I'm not a true "farmer" by profession, but I use every square foot of my 9 acres that I can towards the goal of "self sufficiency".

My folks farm, and have for generations as far back as anyone knows. Dh's grandparents farmed, but his folks did not.