" We're here to let you know a little bit more about the story of land conservation and stewardship of the land because it's really a movement and a concept that's born right here in Vermont. If you'd been here in 1850, looking at Blake's Hill, you would have seen a totally barren landscape. The reason for that is that the farmers here in Vermont allowed their sheep to graze openly year after year to the point where the hillsides, and indeed, most of the valley was denuded of all vegetation, and this had really caused ecological"

" fortune. Instead, he became a lawyer, and he made a fortune. And during his business career, he became enamored of the concept of conservation and preserving the natural beauty of the United States. He was the key individual behind photographing and documenting the beauty of Yosemite, which eventually led to its being declared a natural park. Billings made his real fortune in railroad construction, the Northern Pacific Railroad, and of course, that's 1 of the reasons why Billings, Montana exists today, but once he had amassed that fortune, he came home with it, and 1 of the things he did was to buy the old Marsh homestead, a beautiful little federal house that he proceeded to enlarge and really turn into kind of a Queen Ann style mansion. He created a beautiful farmstead here and put together about a thousand acre farmstead, and he hired George Aiken, a Scotsman, to come and be his land management expert. Because what they were doing here was no longer just conserving the land and the hillsides, but also beginning what is the basis for scientific farming. 1 of Aiken's achievements was to put together 1 of the finest Jersey dairy cow herds anywhere in the country, and to this day, we have a lot of beautiful cows roaming the valley here. Billings died in 1890. His widow and daughters continued to maintain the farm operation here through the depression years. It was in 1934 that Mary Billings French married Laurence Rockefeller. The Rockefeller family had already been involved in land conservation, and of course, for the rest of the 20th century really, Mary and Laurence Rockefeller made this their summer home and created the farm museum that we're about to visit. Let's go inside and meet Bob Bent."

" Welcome, Bob, to Billings Farm and Museum."

" Thanks, Bob. Now what is it about this farm that made it a scientific operation."

" I think the most significant fact that we have been able to uncover in our research is the importation of the Jersey cows from the Isle of Jersey to improve the herd, which improved the quality of product, butter, that they would be producing here."

" Billings was a rich man, but he was trying to salvage the agricultural industry in Vermont at a time when a lot of people were just leaving the green mountainscape. They were going to Ohio Valley locations and starting farming all over again."

" This exodus from the state by many of these hill farmers was having serious impact, and Billing's dream was that through daring, he could demonstrate that with improved herds, the same effort would provide greater and greater profit, they could keep people here. And the big event was the 1893 Columbian Exposition where the cows were sent to the show. It all came together in that year. They took them to Chicago. They won top honors that became recognized, and then had the opportunity to sell the heifers and the calves across the country to improve other herds."

" Right. So, to this day, the breeding operation here has been registered. There's a record of every single cow that's been through here."

" That's correct, Bob."

" And that was 1 of the secrets to the success of the operation. I love to look at the furniture. Now, is this something that was always here?"

" It was part of the operation in 1890."

" A standing clerk's desk, and of course, the display of some of the bills and ledgers. Can we see other parts of the house?"

" We can. Let's go into the kitchen."

" Alright. It's warm in here and it smells very good."

" Well, Bob, just like the offices, the hub of the scientific farm operation, the kitchen here was the hub of domestic life, and Hildy, 1 of our interpreter frequently demonstrates the preparation of food."

" Hildy, what are you making here?"

" I am making potatoes and onions, and that's the fragrance you smelled."

" And of course, you do have a real wood burning stove here."

" Oh, yes. I can show you if you want me to open that for you?"

" Sure."

" Here, is a very small fire going because I'm pretty much finished cooking for this."

" Yeah. So this would have been going all day long all year round. What are the ingredients that they use?"

" Oh, the ingredients of a [unk], you use produce that was available [unk]."

" This is lard, isn't it?"

" And this is lard."

" And butter that would have been made here."

" Butter that would have been made here."

" So you mix that with the potatoes?"

" And I put most of it in the potatoes and the onions."

" And potatoes and onions."

" And what about the eggs?"

" and storage for your items. And to----"

" So you bring the flour barrel right into the house, and you'd have a bin like this so that you could access it easily."

" And what about indoor plumbing. I noticed there's a lot of pipes in the ceiling here."

" Well, this was a very important aspect of the restoration that went on was detailing out exactly how this plumbing system worked. Basically, it starts out on the roof with the rainwater being captured and saved in a large brick cistern down in the basement."

" Okay."

" Then we need to pump it up to a holding tank up in the attic."

" So that's what this did right here."

" That's what that did right there."

" Alright."

" And that provides gravity flow to come back down to the stove. And from this tank, it runs into. It spikes into a water back where the heat of the stove heats it and returns it into the tank. The hot water naturally comes to the top."

" So the hot water naturally flows to the bathroom or to the sink."

" That's right. You draw off and it will flow."

" Can we see some of the dairy operation?"

" Oh, we should."

" We have hot and cold running water in the creamery as well."

" We do. It's connected in a continuous loop with the piping up in the kitchen and the cook stove. And we have an auxiliary water heater right here that will allow plenty of hot water for sanitation of the milk can."

" Okay. Now, what about all these other stuff? What did you do with it?"

" Oh, what you have there Bob is an original coolie framer. The museum, in the restoration, did a reproduction for use with our programming. And it's an elevated framer."

" So, the whole milk would have been put into these containers here? It would have. It's brought up from the barm, lowered in ice water."

" This is ice water."

" 12 hours later, you would come back, and you would see a skim milk on the bottom and separated cream on the top."

" So that you could get rid of the skim and just have the cream to make butter with it."

" That's correct."

" What did you do----"

" [unk] skimming all this by hand. You can see what an innovation this was."

" And here, what did you do?"

" The cream vat allowed us to have a reservoir of up to about 50 gallons of cream to put our churn here."

" Okay."

" We could also temper that cream and slightly sour it."

" And this is the churn that actually made the butter. How did it work?"

" It's called the Davis swing churn made by a company right here in Vermont, The Vermont Farm Machine Company, and it's powered by water motor. Basically, what we need to do is bring water through the pipes into the mechanism of the motor."

" And that drives itself."

" It drives itself and then we need to----"

" Engage"

" engage it. And we can flow the seep by the amount of water. Imagine this is right under the bedroom."

" Yeah. That's pretty impressive, and its working condition is great. All this is really kind of high technologies for 1890, and it implies a pretty good quality of life."

" It was a progressive movement on Mr. Billings part to have this for his farm family. They lived well up there."

" Can we take a look at the farm?"

" Let's do."

" Wow, it's a pretty elaborately decorated room, isn't it for a farmhouse in 1890 in Vermont?"

" It certainly reflects the invention of the age in which the technology allows for mass manufacturing and production of household goods such as [unk], furniture, carpets, even pile on the fireplace."

" And this elaborate wallpaper. Well, it's a beautiful place. Bob, thanks for the tour."

" Thank you, Bob."