The Great Sheep Boom
The Great Sheep Boom and Its Enduring Legacy on the New Hampshire Landscape
On the evening of May 2, Steve Taylor from Taylor Farms in Meriden NH spoke to a crowd of folks about the great growth in sheep farming in the early 19th century. In a brief 30-year period back then, the New Hampshire countryside became home to hundreds of thousands of sheep. Production of wool became a lucrative business, generating fortunes and providing the only era of true agricultural prosperity in the state's history. It left behind a legacy of fine architecture and thousands of miles of rugged stonewalls. Farmers overcame enormous challenges to make sheep husbandry succeed, but forces from beyond New Hampshire were to doom the industry, with social consequences that would last a century.
This program was brought to us by the NH Humanities Council.
If you'd like to see the other photos we took from that evening's program, visit our Flickr page : http://www.flickr.com/photos/40521557@N07/sets/72157629594867818/
