August 5 Cross Orchards

Hello Everyone,

Located east of Grand Junction, Cross Orchards Historic Site, part of the Museums of Western Colorado, is a fascinating way to learn about 1900's apple farming techniques. It combines living history by well-informed guides with an opportunity to see two buildings, the bunkhouse and the large barn/packing shed, which are on the National Register of Historic Places. You will also have an opportunity to see a huge model train layout, antique road building equipment, and the Unitah Railway display. It’s a place where you can spend several enjoyable hours.

After you park, enter the building ahead of you. It’s a recreated train depot housing an extensive model railroad layout with HO scale trains. It’s operated on Thursdays by the Grand Valley Model Railroad Club and represents Grand Junction in the 1950's era. The club took 12 years to build it.

At its peak, 20 trains can be run on the railroad. We saw one each of Amtrak and a freight train. All are connected by a main computer with every engine built into a tiny computer so they can do whistles, bells, and more. Towns on the layout represent places like Minter and Aspen, between Denver and Salt Lake City, while the trains represent the historic rail lines that ran through Western Colorado. You’ll also see signage on the history of the Denver and Rio Grande Railroad.

GUIDED TOUR

After viewing the layout, it’s time to take the guided tour led by costumed interpreters representing the orchards during the early 1900s. John McLennan led the first part of our tour.

He informed us that Walter Cross, the owner of the Massachusetts Red Cross Shoe Company, lived in Boston. Cross decided that farming apples would be a good thing. Because of the excellent agricultural land in the area, he moved to Grand Junction. From 1896 until 1923, the orchards were the former home of Red Cross Land and Fruit Company, a 243-acre fruit ranch with more than 22,000 trees.

It was an agricultural showcase for the area since it was the largest in the state. Most local orchards averaged 9 acres. Its purpose was to show off to the rest of the country what great agricultural conditions existed in the Grand Valley. Although most of the fruit ranch was planted in apples, a few acres of peaches and pears were grown as well.

Cross Orchard’s large size also meant higher expenses. Unfortunately, the profits did not increase. The cost of spraying, smudging, and freight took much of the profit with the orchard going deeper and deeper into debt between the years 1909 and 1923. In 1924, the land was auctioned off in parcels.

John showed us several implements they had used at the orchard. These are part of the Swanson display which includes household effects, farmyard equipment, and horse-drawn implements and tools. We saw ones to build irrigation ditches, a one row corn planter, a potato digger, a small plow, and a tiller. The tiller was pulled by a team of two horses and dug deep enough so that the water penetrated.

We saw crevices. Two horses pulled this with the farmer riding on it making two crevices at a time. It had a bar that swung out to measure from the last crevice. He also showed us a wire dispenser for making wire fences and the hexagon shaped summer house where Cross slept.

As we walked to the bunkhouse, we viewed the spray rigs which the men operated to rid the orchard of the Coddling Moth. If the moth was not eradicated, it could eradicate an entire crop. Lead arsenate, a pesticide, was sprayed on the trees during the harvest season as often as monthly. The process was very costly and didn’t always prevent tree damage. Horses were used in spraying. When they were sold, this had to be revealed, as it shortened their lives.

John also told us about the smudge pots. A late spring frost could have as serious an impact as the Coddling Moth. When frost was feared, the men would wake up early in the morning hours and light smudge pots. It was common to use one pot for every two to three trees. In 1909, Mr. Cross purchased almost enough smudge pots for each tree to have its own. They were lit by torches soaked in kerosene.

We learned the manager’s original home fell down. It consisted of four rooms upstairs and four rooms downstairs. A replacement was built in 1940.

BUNKHOUSE

At the restored bunkhouse, our guide was John’s wife, Rayne McLennan. She advised us that she and John have volunteered as guides at Cross Orchards for 27 years. It was obvious as both were extremely knowledgeable and informative. With them wearing costumes representing the early 1900's, it was like we had stepped back into that period.

We learned the bunkhouse during the time the Crosses owned it consisted of three parts. The kitchen, pantry, and cook’s quarters were on the west end. The middle housed the men’s quarters and dining room. The east end was originally used as the carriage room and offices. During World War I, the Crosses purchased a Ford Model T truck replacing some of the carriages. Women had another building where they lived.

Before entering the bunkhouse, we saw a typical wagon they used. The men would stack this wagon with apple boxes that were three levels high then take it to the packaging shed floor.

In the pantry, Earl was delighted to recognize many of the kitchen tools his grandmother had used. We saw canning jars, a butter churn, pea shellers, a sausage maker, and a huge chopper, turned with a handle, for chopping food. The kitchen also had an ice box. A block of ice was placed on one side with perishables in the other. Earl also remembered the ice man making deliveries.

These, as well as most of the items in the bunkhouse, were donated by Colorado Territorial Daughters. To be a member of this group, it is necessary to have a family member who arrived in the state before 1876.

After offering us freshly baked cookies, Rayne advised us that the cook also did the washing, sewing, and cleaning that the men needed. She pointed out the treadle sewing machine which was a Minnesota from Sears.

Then she demonstrated how they did laundry in the early 1900's before washing machines. They started by boiling water in a couple of pots on the stove then adding a little lime water for bleach. In one tub, they stirred the clothing. If they still saw a stain, they then used soap. Soap was homemade. Rayne makes the soap for the orchard now. Women’s arms were the agitators for ten to fifteen minutes.

The next step was to take a laundry fork to grab a clothing item and run it through the wringer in another tub. They used fresh water to rinse.

The dryer in those times was the clothesline. While clothes pins have springs now, they didn’t then. They were two sticks wrapped around by a rubber band.

Electricity didn’t arrive in the Cross Orchards part of the valley until 1937. Instead, they used kerosene lamps. Telephone service arrived in 1911.

They heated the metal irons on the stove and used them until they were cool. Everything in those days was ironed including sheets.

During the 1900's, they used hand operated water pumps to obtain water for cooking and cleaning. These had leather gaskets and had to be primed. The pump was connected to a cistern. Artesian wells were across the nearby river. The average home would bring in pails of water to satisfy their needs.

The bunkhouse in the middle was set up for six men though sometimes ten workers lived there. The orchard boss lived at the end of the building. At the end, near the kitchen, was the cook’s room. On her bed, we spotted a family quilt.

Bathtubs were not used during the era that the orchard was active. Instead, the men used a galvanized tub. They heated water then placed it in the tub, adding more water as it cooled. The tub was never emptied until all the men were done. Then the water was used to mop the floors before dumping it out.

Each man had his own straight shaver and shaving brush. The cook gave them soap. Most shaved, at least partly, a couple of times a week.

The men played dominoes, checkers, and cards in their spare time. They stayed at the orchard full time, year round. During the winter, they pruned trees, cleaned out the branches, dug irrigation ditches, repaired harnesses, and did all the maintenance. If they didn’t work, they didn’t get paid.

They went into town one to two times a year. On Sundays, they sometimes went to Book Cliffs Recreation Area for a picnic.

Not all the men were single as some of them left their wives to make money so they could purchase their own homesteads of 160 acres. The Homestead Act required the men to build a home, to have animals, and to see that much of the land was planted and fenced. They had five years to get a homestead and five years to finish what they needed. Once the men earned their money at Cross Orchards, they would quit and start their own farm.

Rayne advised that those who restored the bunkhouse found old clothing and papers in the attic. Flecks of paint off the clothing revealed what the rooms’ original paint color were. Over the years, various layers of paint had been added each time they patched the rooms.

At this point, Rayne mentioned that she was dressed like a 1914 woman with her long dress and sunbonnet. Women didn’t want to tan in the early 1900's as they felt it made them look like the working class. The sunbonnets protected them from the sun and the weather.

As we exited the bunkhouse, we saw a tractor from the Ford Motor Company. It was made at the same time as the Model T.

When the orchard was sold in 1923, the bunkhouse became three apartments. In 1980, Grand Junction conducted a community-wide fund-raising campaign to save the last remaining buildings of Cross Orchard from demolition and acquired 4.3 acres. They succeeded and it became part of Museums of Western Colorado. The orchard currently has 25 acres and has added several ancillary exhibits.

BARN/PACKING SHED

John took over at the barn/packing shed to explain how the work here was conducted. During the peak periods of pruning, picking, and packing, the company often employed more than 50 part-time workers. Most of these commuted from Grand Junction or set up camp for several weeks during the fall harvest. Jobs at Cross Orchard were very desirable and usually paid better than the surrounding orchards.

During the harvest, sometimes all the members of a family would be hired. Young children could be put to work killing Coddling Moth larvae and loading packed boxes onto a wagon.

Men usually did the picking in October. However, during World War I when a shortage of men existed, it required women to do this work to keep the orchards running. The workers put apples into picking boxes. The company hired teenage boys to carry these boxed apples for the women. On display were the picker bags from 1910, 1920, 1930, 1940, 1950, and 1960.

At the barn, the men would unload the apples onto a sorter where women and teenagers then sorted and graded the apples. Each apple was graded for quality and sorted by its size. If the apple was good, they would wrap each one in wax tissue paper to keep it from ripening too fast. The best quality and largest fruit were always packed at the top. The firm used about 18 to 20 women, mostly from the local area.

Boxes came pre cut. Men and young boys would assemble the boxes on the top floor and send them down a chute.

The Crosses packed for other growers. They used three labels. One had no reference while the other two read “Cross.” Each was stamped for the variety it contained. Seven types were grown: Gano, Ben Davis, Red Delicious (good for eating), Black Twig, Winesap, Rome Beauty, and Jonathan (good for cooking.) Pears and peaches were also run through the packing shed.

The men put flexible lids on the boxes and trucked the boxes around with dollies. The loading dock floor was the same height as the wagons. Then they took the wagons to the railroad siding where they loaded the apples directly into boxcars.

A lot of the time, the apples were picked and out the door the same day. It took ten days to get to market. Apples were sold to the fruit houses in Denver.

While at the barn, John proudly pointed out the foot powered cross saw, dating from the 1930's, which came from Palisades High School. On this saw, he makes lots of wooden toys.

The barn used to have a stable on the end housing nine Percheron horses. It also had a wooden silo. Although we saw a silo there, it was not the original.

OTHER PLACES TO EXPLORE

After our tour, John advised us of the other places on the property to explore including the working blacksmith shop.

One was the largest collection of rolling stock for the historic Unitah Railroad that is known to exist. The railroad hauled Gilsonite (a black, lustrous asphalt ) from Draon, Utah to Mack, Colorado from 1902 to 1938. There it was transferred to the Denver-Rio Grande Railroad. You can see a caboose, engine, and other cars that have been restored by the Rio Grande Chapter of the National Railway Historical Society.

Another housed at Cross Orchards is the Wallace “Boots” Corn collection of vintage road building and related equipment. It contains more than 60 pieces. It includes horse-drawn scrapers, graders, and wagons in addition to other steam, gasoline, and diesel-powered equipment. Look for the trucks and tractors that were modified to work in the orchards. Some of the orchard wagons have their tops chopped off. After World War II, “Boots” established the Corn Construction Company.

Every Wednesday and Saturday mornings from 7:30 a.m. to noon, the Farm and Ranch Market will be at Cross Orchard from June through October. It’s a nonprofit organization for local farmers and ranchers who dedicate themselves to bringing the finest fruits, vegetables, and meats to the community.

Cross Orchards is located at 3073 F Road in Grand Junction. Their telephone number is (970) 434-9814. The orchard is open to visitors from May 1 until October 31 on most Thursdays through Saturdays from 9:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. It is closed for special events and rentals. Admission is free for all ages.