History Talk Program at Montauk Historic Site – 6-23-2024

History Talk Program at Montauk Historic Site
Rich Taylor to present program titled “Your Grampa and Gramma’s Farm”

CLERMONT – Montauk turns 150 years old this year and to commemorate we will be having different programs on historical topics throughout the year. Our first program kicks off on June 23rd at 2:00 when Rich Taylor will present on how farming in the late 1800s and early 1900s represents a lifestyle of hard work, inventions, prosperity and depression.

This presentation focuses on a typical farmer, Joshua Secrest, who developed a successful livestock farm. It also reviews the dramatic development of ingenious farm machinery and tools that enabled growth and prosperity. Secrest built a large octagonal barn in 1883. The barn and farmstead were lost in the depression. Old farm tools are shared as part of the presentation. Some you won’t recognize.

Rich Tyler has been restoring the Secrest farmstead and octagonal barn near West Branch. He has researched the history behind the property, including the golden age of farming, the Depression and the architecture of barns. Rich is a Professor in the Departments of Otolaryngology—Head and Neck Surgery and Speech Pathology and Audiology at the University of Iowa.

If you go:
What: Program Your Grampa and Gramma’s Farm
Where: Montauk Historic Site, 26223 Harding Road, Clermont
When: June 23, 2:00 PM
Admission: Free and open to the public.

Hannah Frederick
Montauk Historic Site Coordinator
State Historical Society of Iowa
montauk@iowa.gov | 563-423-7173 | history.iowa.gov
26223 Harding Road, PO Box 372, Clermont, Iowa 52135