Brewing up funds
Volunteer farmer Brian McGuire
Rachel Carlson
Tammy Funk, Drew Hauth and Carolyn Seymour
As you probably would agree, preservation is preferable to the wrecking ball.
But, as Rachel Carlson points out, “150-year-old buildings tend to eventually have some structural issues.”
The president of the Upper St. Clair Historical Society’s board of directors is descended from the folks who founded Gilfillan Farm, one of the very last vestiges of Upper St. Clair Township’s rural roots. And it’s to remain a working farm in perpetuity.
While leading a group around part of the remaining 15 acres, Carlson pauses by the smokehouse, where family members of yesteryear performed the essential culinary task of curing meats. These days, a series of two-by-fours surround the structure for support.
”This damage has just been really within the past two years,” Carlson explains. “There are springs all over the property, so there’s the potential that a spring shifted, and now the ground is wet there. All of the bricks in the buildings were actually fired on the property, so they’re softer bricks because they were made with clay from the site.”
The Gilfillan Farm is on the National Register of Historic Places, deemed “worthy of preservation” by the National Park Service of the U.S. Department of the Interior. As such, repairs must follow a “super-high standard for preservation,” as Carlson puts it.
“So the price tag to fix our smokehouse is $90,000,” she says. “The process will actually be to take every brick down and number it, so that you can put it back in the place where it was.”
As larger buildings – the main house, for example -start to require similar work, the price tag is bound to be higher.
When Margaret, the last of the Gilfillans to live there, died in 2001 at age 100, she left the property and buildings to the historical society “with the idea that it be used for educational, historical and cultural events,” Carlson says.
With that in mind, the group’s leaders thought about how to combine her wishes with a steady revenue stream. And so they made the decision to make the farm available for celebrations such as weddings.
“My husband and I actually got married here in 2010,” Carlson explains. “We were very picky, and we couldn’t find places that would do what we wanted. So we came here, and we did exactly what we wanted. We had our waffles instead of wedding cake, and our macaroni and cheese.”
The historical has partnered with Atria’s as exclusive caterer and Windswept Party and Event Rentals to offer an array of possibilities for people who are looking for a distinctive South Hills venue.
”This is still a working farm, so we actually have a volunteer farmer,” Carlson says about often-on-the-scene Brian McGuire, “and the cows are his. And the cows, despite being giant, are kind of like dogs. They’ll come over and let you pet them sometimes.”
Along with fauna, the property has some distinctive flora.
“Margaret, the last woman to live here, used to give her brother John a dozen daffodils on his birthday every year,” Carlson relates. “And the story goes that he would walk out to the field, throw them up and then plant them where they landed. So through the years, they’ve spread. We’ve tried to keep up with that tradition, so there will be hundreds of daffodils blooming.”
The daffodil field serves as a backdrop for portrait photographer Tracy Montarti, who conducts sessions at the height of the bloom each year, with a portion of the proceeds donated back to the farm.
Also helping the cause is the Barnyard Beer Benefit, which debuted last spring with a tremendous turnout to sample regionally brewed beverages. This year’s event, organized by the historical society and the Bethel-St.Clair RotaryClub, is scheduled for May 27.
For tickets, visit eventbrite.com. And for more information about Gilfillan Farm, visit hsusc.org.