Briarcliff Farms

rdf:langString Briarcliff Farms

rdf:langString Briarcliff Farms milk

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rdf:langString A four-story residence

rdf:langString A pale blue glass bottle

rdf:langString A room with tables, chairs, and men seated

rdf:langString Monochrome photograph of farm buildings

rdf:langString Contemporary photograph of a half-timbered building

rdf:langString A monochrome photograph of the front of the New York Public Library's main branch

rdf:langString From Carmino Ravosa's Briarcliff show

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rdf:langString The Dalmeny boarding house and its reading room

rdf:langString Briarcliff Table Water bottle and a company wagon in front of the New York Public Library Main Branch, 1908

rdf:langString Briarcliff Farms dairy 06.png

rdf:langString Briarcliff Farms dairy.jpg

rdf:langString BriarcliffTableWaterBottle.png

rdf:langString Dalmeny Interior.jpg

rdf:langString Images from Our Village, Briarcliff Manor 20.JPG

rdf:langString New York Public Library 1908-alt2.jpg

rdf:langString (Source: "The Inspiration of a Great Farm", Country Life in America, page 13, 1902.)

rdf:langString The arrangement for human beings must be on the highest level. Men and boys who were employed must be looked after to produce a splendid human result. That is, they must not be left to act as so many mechanical appliances or brute force masters of the lower animals ... It seems not yet quite familiar to us that a store should have the Golden Rule for a business maxim; but what are we to make of a farm where the superintendent says, "Not until we apply the Golden Rule to cows will we ever get the best from them?" The walls of the stables are hung with such mottoes as "Speak gently; it is better far to rule by love than by fear." The application of this rule to cows ought to create a moral evolution in the stablemen, so that by and by it could be applied to human folk as well, and thoroughly believed in as a workable law of life.

rdf:langString That a man ...who has acquired wealth by trade or manufacture should leave the city to develop an ideal farm is something new and notable. This is what Mr. Walter W. Law has done at Briarcliff Manor. He determined to have a farm run absolutely on the highest principles—a farm where science should speak the first word and the last word, and all the time. Science is nothing but accumulated experience; what we have found out to be best and truest; and so Briarcliff Manor farms were simply to do the best, instead of second best, or third best, or tenth best. The houses were to be models, the stables were to be ideal, the orchards planted and worked ideally, the gardens must show what possibly could be done in vegetables, and the corn crop and the oats and the wheat must not be left to any guesses of man or nature. Feeding must be done on scientific principles; barns must be as sanitary as houses; stables must be sunny and thoroughly ventilated. Water must be absolutely pure for the cattle, and their sanitary conditions as perfect as those for human beings.

rdf:langString The Independent

rdf:langString Briarcliff Rose

rdf:langString music

rdf:langString Briarcliff Farms was a farm established in 1890 by Walter William Law in Briarcliff Manor, a village in Westchester County, New York. One of several enterprises established by Law at the turn of the 20th century, the farm was known for its milk, butter, and cream and also produced other dairy products, American Beauty roses, bottled water, and print media. At its height, the farm was one of the largest dairy operations in the Northeastern United States, operating about 8,000 acres (10 sq mi) with over 1,000 Jersey cattle. In 1907, the farm moved to Pine Plains in New York's Dutchess County, and it was purchased by New York banker Oakleigh Thorne in 1918, who developed it into an Aberdeen Angus cattle farm. After Thorne's death in 1948, the farm changed hands several times; in 1968 it became Stockbriar Farm, a beef feeding operation. Stockbriar sold the farmland to its current owners in 1979. The farm combined a practical American business model with the concept of a European country seat or manor, with cows being milked constantly, and with milk promptly chilled and bottled within five minutes, and shipped to stores in New York City each night. The farm was progressive, with sterile conditions, numerous employee benefits, good living conditions for livestock, and regular veterinary inspections to maintain a healthy herd. The farm also made use of tenant farming, established working blacksmith, wheelwright, and harness shops on-site, was located around Walter Law's manor house, and constructed numerous buildings in the Tudor Revival architectural style. Briarcliff Farms was the original location for the School of Practical Agriculture and Horticulture, established by the New York State Committee for the Promotion of Agriculture in conjunction with Walter Law. The school's purpose was to teach students in farming, gardening, poultry-keeping, and other agriculture-related skills. The school moved to a farm near Poughkeepsie in 1903, and the school building was run as a hotel for two years until it became Miss Knox's School. After the building burned down in 1912, Miss Knox's School was relocated several times; since 1954, the Knox School has been located in St. James, New York.