Butternuts

Lynne Tanner demonstrated a considerable commitment to conservation by acquiring two large mowed fields across the road from her original property to enhance its preservation values. Tanner’s 64-acre property in Butternuts includes several historic structures, among them a late-Victorian vernacular farmhouse (circa 1890), a drive shed (circa 1850), a red sandstone wall, and the stone foundation of a barn that burned in the 1920s.

Anticipating her eventual need to sell the property in the years to come, Tanner wanted to ensure that its “country quality” stayed intact. “It’s so beautiful and open, and you can see the stars at night—you can’t do that in many places anymore,” she reflects.

Tanner’s property is emblematic of Otsego County’s history, retaining the look and feel of a working farm—the use that once sustained the land. The historic structures listed above were once common on 19th-century farms, but have now become endangered species. The drive shed is a particularly rare survivor—although once common in the area, as they were used to store agricultural machinery, drive sheds like Tanner’s were too small for most tractors, and so have largely disappeared from the landscape. The stone wall marking the property boundary, its unique red color reflecting the area’s geology, is also a relic, and a testament to agricultural progression, as most were destroyed to allow the expansion of fields, the use of horse drawn equipment, and later, the use of tractors.