Spring on the Farm
The Spring on the Farm sponsored by Watkins Mill Association will be on April 18, 2009 from 11:00 A.M. to 4:00 P.M. This educational event will be held at the Watkins Woolen Mill State Park and State Historic Site. There will be different activities that visitors can learn from and enjoy at the same time.
Spring on the Farm will feature activities that you can learn from like the 1870s sheep shearing method. The American Livestock Breeds Conservatory is where the endangered livestock are kept. You can also watch the Heirloom Garden. It will have interpreters that wear 1870s customs and will raise the bed to plant last years Heirloom Garden seeds.
Watkins Woolen Mill State Park and State Historic Site was bought on 1964 and it was also the first time it was considered as a historic site. But the place was only declared as a National Historic Landmark on 1966. The Missouri community voted to give fund for the improvement of the Watkins Woolen Mill State Park and State Historic Site on 1981.
The original owner of the Watkins Woolen Mill State Park and State Historic Site was Waltus Lockett Watkins. Versailles, Kentucky was the birth place of Waltus. When he turned 18 he went to his uncle to learn how to weave and be a machinist. After a few years he moved to Liberty where he started his first successful business. On 1834 when Watkins went back to his home town he got married and had 4 kids.
After a while Waltus relocated again at an 80-acre farm 16 miles north of Liberty, a farm that he called the Bethany. Although the first few years were hard, he lost two of his sons in the first years. He was able make his farm successful by his success livestock, crops and orchards. With the success his farm was having he was able to purchase more land making it grow to 1,300 acres. With the success that he had help him to establish a community by assisting in making the community school and church.