Adventures with an Apple Orchard 
15 V John Ant h o n y 
Photographs by the author 
I I'he same fever that drove the forty-niners gold seeking is to-day impelling many men to try farming. Often pitifully unfitted in mind and 
body to do the zvork properly, they soon lose their enthusiasm and fail dismally. But there are many golden opportunities for the able and earnest, 
of zvhom Mr. Anthony is one. He has succeeded brilliantly; how he did it is told succinctly in these adventures, of zvhich this is part one. The con¬ 
clusion will appear in the April issue. —Editor.] 
Up in New England where the formerly traveled highway leads past once frequented roadside taverns now unpatronized, is a fruit country that 
need not yield the supremacy in apple growing to the West 
T he “why” doesn't matter. 
It is the reason that 
makes you want to leave the 
city. We didn’t fit, city life and 
1 , and it was daily becoming 
more irksome to get up in the 
morning to face another day. 
i\lv ancestors had come from 
New England and it was to that 
country that I made my way. 
Where the hills rise from the 
valley of the Connecticut, I 
knew a region of forgotten 
farms—a lovely place, the love¬ 
liest that I have ever seen, and 
yet it had been overlooked. 
Earms were for sale for less 
than the value of the buildings. 
Houses could be bought for less 
than the worth of the land on 
A tent was pitched at the end of the orchard to be right on the ground 
to gain experience 
which they stood. The place 
was dead, the sturdy old farm¬ 
ers were dead, or dying. The 
strong young ones had gone 
West: only weaklings remained. 
Of course there were excep¬ 
tions among the farms, and it 
was to one of these that I made 
my way. I carried my tent and 
received permission to pitch it 
at the end of the orchard and 
arranged to take my meals at 
the house. In four weeks I 
had bought the place. And it 
is only now that I know what 
else I bought. Life, hope and 
faith were not in the deed of 
the property, but came with it. 
But right here I want to 
make myself clear. I wish to 
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