Saturday, January 21, 2023 | Country Acres • Page 1
Country
Acres
Saturday, January 21, 2023
PRSRT STD ECR U.S. POSTAGE PAID PERMIT #861 Sauk Rapids, MN 2 Second Ave S Suite 135 Sauk Rapids MN 56379
Focusing on Today’s Rural Environment
Volume 10, Edition 01
PHOTO BY BEN SONNEK
Ben Barlage and his son, Jude, stop in front of the original brick house Jan. 6 at Brickhouse Farm near Long Prairie. The bricks were sourced from land just across the road from the farm.
PHOTO SUBMITTED
(Right) The original brick house on what is today Brickhouse Farm was built in 1892. The farm’s first owners, Joachim and Heinrike Heinck, were German immigrants.
Brick foundation of
past, present
Sixth generation puts own stamp on homestead BY BEN SONNEK | STAFF WRITER
L
ONG PRAIRIE – The Brickhouse Farm homestead may be over 100 years old, handed down through a family for generations, but there is always something new at the 240 acres east of Long Prairie, whether it is Wagyu beef, lamb, garlic, maple syrup or – perhaps someday – honey. It is not always an easy lifestyle, but being able to be mostly self-sufficient while also selling quality organic meat and produce, all in a family environment, has made a good living for the Barlage family.
ST R
Publications bli ti The newspaper of today is the history of tomorrow.
“I’ve worked multitudes of different jobs,” said Ben Barlage, current owner of Brickhouse Farm. “I’ve hated some, I’ve loved some, but this isn’t a job for me; it’s a lifestyle.” The original farm began when Joachim and Heinrike Heinck immigrated from Germany with their family, settling the farmland in 1890. The original house was built in 1892, and it has the same orange bricks as a couple of its neighbors because they were all sourced from a site right across the street from where Brickhouse Farm remains today. People coming down the farm’s driveway are actually approaching what used to be the back of the house. “The road to town used to come through the backyard, through our woods and into town,” Barlage said. “The house was built to face that way.” Joachim and Heinrike Heinck handed down the
This month in the
COUNTRY: Watch for the next edition of Country Acres on Feb. 18, 2023
farm to their son, Johann Heinck, and his wife, Bertha. Their tier of the family tree only had daughters. “They put in an ad in the newspaper, looking for male farmhands,” Barlage said. “That’s when (Wilhelm) Kroll answered and came to work on the farm.” Wilhelm Kroll married one of Johann and Bertha Heinck’s daughters, Hulda, and the farm operated under the Kroll name for several generations – from them down to John Kroll and then to Hans Kroll. Margaret, Hans Kroll’s daughter, was born in the brick house. She married Barlage, and they took over the Kroll Farm at the start of 2019. They are the sixth generation of family to operate the farm, and their children – Ezra, 7, Thea, 4, and Jude, 1 – could be the seventh someday.
Brickhouse page 2
5
Buferd the bucolic beast Hewitt
10 Sun dogs, a winter joy Herman Lensing column
21 Country cooking Fort Ripley
7
Fence line fiasco Grace Jeurissen column
12 Rabbit rewards St. Joseph
22 Sundress Garden, part four Nancy Packard Leasman column
8
FFA student Belgrade-Brooten-Elrosa
16 Advocating for the future of agriculture Minnesota