Old-Fashioned Farm Life Coloring Book: Nineteenth Century Activities on the Firestone Farm at Greenfield Village (Dover American History Coloring Books)

Life on a farm before the advent of tractors relied on horse-drawn equipment and the skills and labor of many people, as the detailed drawings in this fascinating book reveal. Accurately rendered by A. G. Smith, 43 ready-to-color illustrations depict a wide variety of farm activities in mid-nineteenth-century America. Based on scenes re-created on the Firestone Farm at historic Greenfield Village in Dearborn, Michigan, the drawings include authentically detailed views of kitchen chores (churning butter, preparing foods), seasonal occupations (shearing sheep, mowing hay, gathering pumpkins, “harvesting” and “sugaring off” maple syrup), as well as plowing, planting, caring for livestock, splitting firewood, raising a barn, and many other activities. Peter H. Cousins, Curator of Agriculture at Henry Ford Museum & Greenfield Village, has written an informative introduction and provided fact-filled captions for this entertaining and educational view of life in bygone rural America.