Kitchen Garden
Relations
Workshop
Community
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I like to think of myself as an advocate for “urban homesteading” – although this term is somewhat complicated.
To give a brief history of what this means, perhaps we can first reflect on the history of homesteading in America. In 1862 President Lincoln signed the Homestead Act to encourage settlers to establish land west of the Mississippi river. Homesteaders paid a small filing fee and were required to complete five years of continuous residence before receiving ownership of the land. After six months of residency, homesteaders also had the option of purchasing the land from the government for $1.25 per acre. The Homestead Act led to the distribution of 80 million acres of public land by 1900. There are controversial aspects to this movement as well. Not the least of which is the problematic notion of “free land” which was at the time occupied in many locations by Native American tribes who would eventually be driven off their land to reservations.
Today homesteading has taken on a new face to suit our times. Rather than catering to the needs of landless but eager settlers, urban homesteading is based on the principles that we are capable of being self-sustaining members of our society. This means committing to making a small footprint on our environment, conserving energy, growing your own food, learning skills to build and maintain your belongings, and working to foster personal relations. Along the way urban homesteaders learn and teach valuable skills that allow one to feel more connected to our daily lives and feel the satisfaction of working with our hands. At the heart of these ideas is striving to be an intentional member of one’s community. For this reason I have also chosen to include material here from time spent with friends and family.
I have loosely categorized my activities into Kitchen Garden,the Workshop, my Relations (a term borrowed from Winona LaDuke), and the Community. These will be repositories for various ongoing projects and activities. Click on the links above to access the blog updates for each.
Some Family History
Part of my attraction to the idea of self-sustainability comes from feeling a personal connection to family history. My father grew up in St. Francis in Aroostook County – a very northern part of Maine. His father Earl (a veteran of Iwo Jima) and grandfather Sam were among a dozen or so families of French Canadian descent that settled deep into the woods above Allagash Falls (then considered a local marker for remote territory). For work they alternating between running logging camps and acting as guides for hunters – as well as hunting themselves for trade. An issue of National Geographic visited their homesteads in October 1948. Below are a few pictures from this issue as well as an image from a local paper in 1943.
In a strange twist on this subject, these homesteads were taken by eminent domain in 1966 with the establishment of the Allagash Wilderness Waterway – partly an effort to protect these forests from extensive logging. Today the house sites serve as camping pull-outs for travelers on the river. I have marked their general location on the below map with a red star.
I thank my father, Erwin, for taking me to these locations on multiple occasions and passing down the family knowledge and skills I have found invaluable in my own homesteading projects.
