2004-02-13 - 8:47 a.m.
My Brother-in-Law, Jimmy Mabry, recently applied to have our farm designated a Centennial Farm. This year marks the 100th year the farm has been owned by the Mabry family. It has been continualy farmed during that whole time. Below is a brief history of the farm Jimmy included in the application, I thought you might enjoy it, I know I did.
A 40-acre land lot was purchased in 1904 by my grandfather Virgil Mabry. By 1914 He and his brother Harley Mabry had acquired 180 additional acres making a 220-acre farm. Virgil sawed the timber on the 40 acres and used some of the lumber to build a farmhouse. Virgil borrowed the money and purchased Harleys interest in 1918. Virgil grew cotton, corn to feed the farm animals, and a vegetable garden to feed his family. He operated a dairy until 1925. In 1936 Virgil was severely injured in a sawmill accident. (The doctor at the hospital left him in a room for 3 hours waiting for him to die) when he did not die he was admitted to the hospital and recovered from the injury. After the accident Virgil used all his savings making the mortgage payments. In 1942, behind on the mortgage payments, Virgil called a meeting of his 5 children and asked them to pay the mortgage payments. My father J. N. Mabry made the first payment even though he had 2 small children and his wife (my mother) had to wash all their clothes on a rub board. After my father used the family savings to make a mortgage payment my mother went to Sears and Roebuck and purchased a washing machine on credit. My aunt Edna Mabry Dean made the second payment. The other children decided not to make any mortgage payments. After the mortgage was paid off in 1944 the farm was deeded to my father, J.N. Mabry, and his sister, Edna Mabry Dean, Virgil Mabry retained a life estate in the farm and continued to grow corn and soybeans until 1960. In 1961, J. N. Mabry and Edna Dean divided the 180-acre farm with each getting 90 acres. In the early 1950’s, J. N. Mabry converted his half of the farm to a beef cattle operation. In the late 1960’s, Jim Mabry took over the beef cattle operation and added honeybees. In 1988, Sue Mabry Harris added a berry and grape pick your own farming operation and named it Rock Farm,
Today there are 70 acres in the Mabry Farm consisting of a pick your own berry and grape operation, horse boarding, beef cattle operation and honeybees.
There have been 3 farmhouses erected on the Mabry Farm; the last one was built in 1987. There are 4 generations of the Mabry Family who call the Mabry Farm their home.
