System of Crop Rotation Made the
Wheels Go Round Smoothly on
Washington's Plantation.
As military leader and statesman, George Washington is the great figure in
our history. His greatness as a farmer is not so generally appreciated.
Yet as soon as the Revolution ended he turned his attention to agriculture
with a keen eye to improve his estate.
Finding that the cultivation of tobacco exhausted his land, he gradually
substituted grass and wheat, as better suited to the soil. He began a new
method of rotation of crops, drawing up an exact scheme by which all his
fields were numbered and the crops assigned for several years in advance.
The extent of his farming operations appears in the following account,
printed many years ago in the _Maine Cultivator_:
The farm of General Washington at Mount Vernon contained ten
thousand acres of land in one body--equal to about fifteen
square miles. It was divided into farms of convenient size,
at the distance of two, three, four, and five miles from his
mansion house. These farms he visited every day in pleasant
weather, and was constantly engaged in making experiments
for the improvement of agriculture.
Some idea of the extent of his farming operations may be
formed from the following facts: In 1787 he had five hundred
acres in grass; sowed six hundred bushels of oats, seven
hundred acres of wheat, and as much more in corn, barley,
potatoes, beans, peas, etc., and fifty with turnips.
His stock consisted of one hundred and forty horses, one
hundred and twelve cows, two hundred and thirty-five working
oxen, heifers, and steers, and five hundred sheep. He
constantly employed two hundred and fifty hands, and kept
twenty-four plows going during the whole year, when the
earth and the state of the weather would permit.
In 1786 he slaughtered one hundred and fifty hogs for the
use of his family and provisions for his negroes, for whose
comfort he had great regard.