Beauty Echoing off Old Stone Walls

The case for romanticizing Vermont's greatest cultural resource and its beautiful utility

It is common knowledge that just over a century ago, Vermont was 80% clearcut for farmland. Vermont’s earliest exports were potash and pearl ash, two by-products that came from forest clearing. These were replaced by crops from large diversified farms such as potatoes, grains, and cattle. Over the decades, these exports too gave way to Vermont’s current greatest export: its children. With the youth abandoning the family farms for work in southern factories or to try their fortunes out west since the early 19th century, Vermont’s forests reclaimed the farms and the structures around them. The land that was once 80% clearcut is now 80% forested, but the old roads, cellar holes, and stonewalls remain, and with them, some forgotten wisdom.