WASHINGTON A FATHER OF FARMING, TOO

                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SUNDAY, February 9, 1992                   TAG: 9202090189
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: E1   EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: MOUNT VERNON                                LENGTH: Medium
WASHINGTON A FATHER OF FARMING, TOO
He was first in war, first in peace, and even now should be first in the hearts of America's farmers.
Few people seem to know it, but George Washington was an innovator on the wheat field as well as the battlefield. He not only was the father of the country, but a founder of the means to reap its bounty.
And now the group that runs his fabled Mount Vernon estate is driving home that point.
Thanks to a private $1.75 million grant, the organization is reproducing one of the five farms Washington operated on the property 10 miles south of the capital city which bears his name. It will include a replica of his 16-sided barn, where Washington was among the first to process his crops indoors - to reduce waste.
Other Washington innovations:
He introduced mules to America, animals that all but replaced horses behind plows across the nation. He bred his first mule using a jackass sent to Mount Vernon by the King of Spain.
While most plantation owners were depleting their soil by over-planting, Washington planted different crops in any particular field from season to season - a practice now known as rotating. He also experimented with fertilizers that ranged from tree mold to river mud, according to the association.
"We're hoping to expand people's understanding of George Washington" off the battlefield and outside government, said Ann Rauscher of the Mount Vernon Ladies' Association. "All most people know is that George Washington chopped down a cherry tree - and that old myth is not even true."
"Washington enjoyed farming thoroughly. I think it fascinated him," said James Rees, associate director of the association. "There wasn't a lot of science in the 18th century, so a lot of this was sophisticated guesswork," he said.
"Through this farm we can show how creative he was."
The four-acre exhibition will be constructed on a drained and filled swamp Washington once called a "hell hole," Rauscher said. It wasn't the site of major cultivation while Washington was alive, but the project is designed to be representative of the five farms that existed on the estate, which then spanned 8,000 acres.
Washington struggled to make his farms profitable, Rauscher said. The nation's first president was chronically cash poor and had to borrow the money to travel to New York for his inauguration, she noted.
"People say that Mount Vernon probably would have prospered more as a farm if he hadn't been away as much as he was," she said.
Costumed laborers will work in the fields at the new farm, growing corn, wheat and other crops Washington planted over a 45-year period. Visitors will be able to see how harvested crops were stored, cured, packaged and sold during Washington's time.
The association also plans to increase the number of cows, mules, sheep, horses and other farm animals on the site, and expand its collection of 18th-century tools.
High school and college students will construct the 16-sided barn by hand with handmade brick and with wood from trees harvested on the estate.
Money for the project is coming from a $1.75 million grant from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation of Battle Creek, Mich., Rauscher said. Target date for completion is 1996.

by Bhavesh Jinadra by CNB