PDF overview of the early years of restoration work
Book on the early history of restoration work at PVC

Land-use history as determined by GIS (Geographical Information Systems)

The 1937 air photo
The earliest available air photo of the Pleasant Valley Conservancy area was taken in July 1937 by the U.S. Soil Conservation Service. I purchased a large (9 X 9 inch) contact B/W print of this air photo from the U.S. National Archives. This air photo is of surprisingly good quality, and many useful features can be recognized. I scanned the area including Pleasant Valley Conservancy, created a high-resolution TIFF file, and then georeferenced this image so that it could be incorporated as a “layer” in ArcGIS. Happily, this georeferenced version lined up quite well with orthophotos obtained from wisconsinview.org.

The 1938 Bordner land use survey
The Bordner survey was a state-wide mapping of land use. Although the maps have long been available in archives, they have now been digitized and are available on the web. Here is a brief discussion of the Bordner project, from the UW-Madison Digital Collections.:

“Often called the “Bordner Survey” after its director, John Bordner, the Wisconsin Land Economic Inventory was a Depression-era project to inventory the land resources of Wisconsin so that they could be used more productively. Field workers, usually trained foresters, tried to touch each “forty” in a county and map current land use and land cover, signs of erosion, and size and quality of stands of timber. Included on the maps are such features as houses, schools, churches, taverns, cheese factories, filling stations, and logging camps. Each map covers one survey township. ….Together, these maps present a portrait of the Wisconsin landscape during the 1930s and 1940s.”

The Dane County map was published in 1939. Each township was published as a separate map and the area of interest here is in the Town of Vermont. The part of this township that includes Pleasant Valley Conservancy (Section 5) is shown here. The word “Peculiar” on the west side refers to “Peculiar Corners”, which was what the junction of County F and County FF was called in those days. Pleasant Valley Road is the road running down the middle of the map. The outlines on the map indicate specific land-use areas, which are keyed in by the abbreviations.

I was able to convert this map to a “georeferenced” version, which could be added as a layer in ArcGIS. Since the georeferenced map and lined up reasonably well with the 1937 air photo. The outlines of the various fields and other areas line up quite well. For instance, the two fields labeled “C” in the lower right-hand corner of Section 5 correspond to the Pocket Prairie and Toby’s Prairie.

Once I had all this information layered in ArcGIS, I was able to trace the outlines from the Bordner map and create a new map which is shown on the air photo below.

Several areas should be noted

Cleared cropland: These were farm fields. Today, all of these fields have been converted to prairie. The field just north of Pleasant Valley Road is the Pocket Prairie and the larger field farther north is Toby’s Prairie. The cleared cropland south of PV Road is now the Valley Prairie, Barn Prairie, and Crane Prairie.

Stump pasture: This large area, which today is a restored oak savanna, is one of the more interesting areas on the Bordner map. It was too hilly to crop but was not as steep as the south-facing slope. Most of the trees were cut (hence the stumps), but the large trees were left uncut and still exist today as the large open-grown oaks. This area was fenced (we removed a huge amount of barbed wire when we restored it) and the animals were presumably allowed to run free.

Oak-hickory stands: According to the Bordner survey, most of the land had remained as oak-hickory forest. The labels on this area indicate that the forest was considered poor (third rate). This did not mean that the trees were tiny, but that they were widely scattered, indeed, savanna-like. The numbers indicate the average diameter (breast height) of the trees. Thus, the average oak-hickory diameter at Pleasant Valley Conservancy was 6-12 inches, which were reasonable size trees. Three lines underneath the number indicate that it was a poor stand.

Many of the trees shown in the 1937 air photo are still present at Pleasant Valley Conservancy today, but much larger in size. (Fortunately, there was no significant logging done.)

Summary of pasturage history at Pleasant Valley Conservancy

Unit	Character	Flora	Likely use for pasture
2-3, 6-9	South slope; steep; very thin soil	Prairie remnant; warm season grasses; dry forbs	Spring pasture only; too dry for summer pasture
12A	Open savanna and prairie; moderately steep; moderately deep soils; stump pasture	Patches with warm season grasses; dry mesic-mesic forbs	Spring/summer pasture
11	Prairie with trees; gentle slopes; deep soil; stump pasture	Warm season grasses; forbs	Spring/summer/fall pasture
8, 10	Open savanna; gentle slopes; deep soil	Mainly forbs; small patches of warm season grasses	Spring/summer pasture
22	East Basin; grading from dry to moist; stump pasture	Warm season grasses; forbs	Spring/summer pasture; too far from the barn for consistent pasturage
1	South slope; steep; very thin soil	Prairie remnant; warm season grasses	Not pastured; fenced off; too near Quarry
4	South slope; very steep; very thin soil	Prairie remnant; warm season grasses	Not pastured; too steep for cattle

Photos from the late 1960s

The land that is now Pleasant Valley Conservancy was not settled until 1888 when George Lockwood, one of the original English settlers, purchased the land from a land speculator. George’s son James Lockwood acquired the land from his father in 1898 and farmed it until he died in 1931. James’s son Harold and his wife Helen then took over the farm. In 1937, Harold and Helen were divorced and Harold continued to farm alone until he died at the age of 58 in 1957. The probate records for Harold’s estate show that the buildings on the property were only of modest valuation.

Discussions with local residents who knew Harold Lockwood stated that he never owned a tractor and all his farming was done with horse-drawn equipment. The buildings remaining after Harold Lockwood’s death were in disrepair except for the barn (photos courtesy of Harland Samson).

The house and other buildings. Pleasant Valley Road is between the buildings and the steep hill (south-facing slope) beyond. These buildings are now all gone, as is the large elm tree. Some of the bur oaks above the hill are still there, although 41 years

The barn was below the road, which is not quite visible in the background. Hay was loaded into the hayloft directly off the road. Although this barn is gone, its foundation still exists and is used as a parking area for employees.

Harold’s daughter Gertrude A. Lockwood, sold the farm to George C. and Evelyn A. Cole, who entered bankruptcy two years later. In 1962 the property was acquired by Marshall Erdman and his wife Joyce of Madison, Wisconsin. Erdman was a wealthy builder and developer who owned large amounts of rural land in Dane County and adjacent counties. According to reports, Erdman considered turning the property into a resort, converting the ridge top into a landing field for small airplanes. Whatever the intent, a few years later Erdman sold the property to David Carley, another wealthy Madison businessman. (Carley at one time ran for governor of Wisconsin.) It is not clear what Carley’s intent was. The house was presumably rented to tenants, who may have farmed the property, or the tillable land may have been rented to a nearby farmer.

In 1967, Carley sold the farm to Harland E. Samson and his wife Faye who used the land to raise horses.
The house on the property was only barely inhabitable, and the Samson’s had the local fire department burn it down for practice. A pig pen on the property was converted into a one-room cabin (shack). This shack has been kept in repair and now serves as a field station of Pleasant Valley Conservancy. The barn burned down on New Year’s Eve 1972. It was replaced by a metal pole barn (still in use).

Tom and Kathie Brock purchased the farm from the Samsons in two transactions, in 1980 and 1983. Since 1983 the farm has had no significant development. Restoration work began in 1995 and more seriously in 1998.

Looking up Pleasant Valley in 1969. Although the power lines are gone (now buried), the view up the valley is not much different today.

How was the land farmed?

Evidence from the 1937 air photo, the Bordner 1939 land use report, and from observations during restoration provide some insights into how the land was farmed. When the Brocks acquired the property, only about 10 acres of the property was being tilled, under a rental agreement with a neighbor. Another 5 acres (the Pocket Prairie) had at one time been cropped but since the late 1960s had been in permanent hay, which was cut occasionally to feed either horses or sheep.

Air photos show that another field (the Crane Prairie) had been farmed before World War II but was not being tilled subsequently. This field is adjacent to the wetland and has been tiled (a few tile remnants indicated the location of the tile field).

The steep south-facing had been grazed, as evidenced by fences and visible animal tracks.

The savanna above the Pocket Prairie, which is less steep, was also grazed (indicated on the Bordner report as “stump pasture”). Barbed wire fences were everywhere on the property, and their locations indicate areas that were grazed.

The only area that had not been either tilled or pastured was the small goat prairie at the west end of the property (Unit 1). This unit is adjacent to the small quarry, and the 1937 air photo shows that this area was fenced off, presumably to keep the cows from tumbling down into the quarry.

The 1937 air photo also shows a large area on the ridge top (Unit 11A) that had probably been pastured. This area was virtually treeless and has remained that way until the present day.

Many areas that had been open and probably grazed had become, during the years between 1937 and the present, heavily invaded by aspen trees. This clonal species is a pioneer colonizer of open areas. Aspen grew most extensively in the years from around 1960 to 1990, when cattle were no longer being run. One aspen clone, on the south side of Toby’s Prairie, has prairie sod, including a large population of prairie violets. This prairie remnant could have become reestablished after grazing ceased.

Evidence of native prairie vegetation can be obtained by surveys of the vegetation today. Certain species, such as lead plant, prairie dropseed, and prairie turnip, are known to be eaten preferentially by cattle. One or another of these species was discovered in Units 1, 4, 11A, and 23, where they continue to thrive today, suggesting that these areas were not heavily grazed.