OpenTube

The History of Fieldstone Walls — Why New England Farmers Built America’s Largest Handmade Rock B...

Kronoset

190,670 views

How did New England end up with the largest handmade rock barrier in human history? 🪨 This video traces the story from the Ice Age and glacial till to sheep fever, deforestation, abandoned farms, and the silent stone walls still winding through the forests today. A forgotten piece of American industrial and agricultural history, built one stone at a time.

If you enjoyed this deep dive, subscribe to kronoset for more stories from American industrial history 🇺🇸
Leave a comment if you’ve ever found an old stone wall in the woods - or if this is your first time learning what they really are 👇
Like the video and share it with someone who loves history, geology, or hidden landscapes 📚🌲

#NewEngland #StoneWalls #AmericanHistory #IndustrialHistory #AgriculturalHistory #Geology #IceAge #SheepFever #MerinoSheep #FarmingHistory #ColonialAmerica #RobertThorson #DryStoneWall #NewEnglandHistory #HistoricalGeography #RuralHistory #AbandonedFarms #LandscapeHistory #USHistory #kronoset

00:00 Intro
02:19 Hidden Rocks Beneath The Forest
04:43 Farmers Begin Moving The Stone
06:33 Napoleon, Merino Sheep, And The Wool Boom
09:25 New England Becomes A Wall Of Pastures
11:27 The Sheep Economy Collapses
13:35 Forests Return And Walls Remain
15:11 Reading The Landscape Through Stone Walls
16:35 Stone Walls In War And Poetry
19:24 What Survives Today And Why It Matters
21:22 Protecting A Vanishing Agricultural Monument
24:09 Outro

20 Comments

@daveneil3963 2 months ago

I agree with Robert Thorson. Those stone walls need to be preserved. We don't need to bulldoze everything and erase all of our history!

@OriginsofObjects 2 months ago

Never realized fieldstone walls held so much history.

@JohnR-gk7ch 3 months ago

Fascinating history on the evolution of stone walls in New England.

@Maribel-p5o7h 1 month ago

I my self am from HARTFORD and never knew this WOW THANK YOU FOR YOUR TIME AND WISDOM.🇵🇷🌎❤️

@MsCaleb79 1 month ago

Lifing Stones is the best way to keep warm in the winter. I have seen this job being done in Sweden. The smaller stones are for women and children, the bigger for men and ox. Sometimes they used a lift and wagon

@patn4615 1 month ago

They not only built walls but what they called cobble stone houses.
Many are still used in upstate NY along route 104.

@Super68chevelle 1 month ago

Many hedgerows in north western mountains of New Jersey. We continue to “grow” those walls on our farms.

@TR-if7yr 1 month ago

I'm from central Connecticut and very familiar with these walls and stones.

@williambrown4356 1 month ago

I'm from East Hartford /Manchester , Connecticut , and there's a whole town (Buckland) that is all just woods now , but there's rock walls all through it and foundations all through. People look at me like Im crazy when I tell them we have way, way more wooded country than 200 years ago. Thanks. Good stuff!

@Pauliesr 1 month ago

Stone walls are all over central NY. Farmers had an old saying in the spring, " Plow an acre, pick up 2 acres of rock"
It was Hell on farm equipment!!
That kept Blacksmiths Very busy!!

@sandrabugler9813 1 month ago

We discovered a rock wall in the woods behind the house we had built. It was wooded area that had been developed. I thought that at one point they had been used as property markers. I had never heard this story. Very interesting. The walls were all through our development.

@jackvoss5841 1 month ago

Here’s a rough guess. New Englanders had more stone walls around their fields than other areas, because their fields bad more stones in them.
In Michigan, where several glaciers came, and then dumped rubble as they melted away, farmers have stone piles, stone houses now and then, and some stone beds for roads. Glaciers were here before Caterpillar bulldozers, and they moved a lot of soil etc southerly. The land in Michigan is still rebounding upwards from the compression effect of glaciers. It rises an inch or so in about 25-30 years.

@raymcgeorge5169 1 month ago (edited)

Having resided for several years in Newmarket NH, the rock fences there were not only beautiful, but definitely practical. Lots of beautiful cemeteries there.

@mitchofficial9103 3 months ago

this was very informative. I live in worcester and would find these al the time exploring the woods never had any idea how old they were and why/who put them there. now when I see them I will look at them different

@friedrice9535 1 month ago

I grew up in Peterborough NH. These walls are everywhere. I was told, if you ever get lost in the woods, follow a wall and it will bring you to a road.
We had a small garden. Every spring we would pull the new stones out of the ground. A lot of work. I can't imagine doing it for acres.

@drpegueros 1 month ago

I moved to Rhode Island from Los Angeles. I had never heard of fieldstone walls. Someone told me they had been built by the enslaved Africans who were brought to New England. I had not heard anything credible to contradict that theory until now. Bravo, well-done!

@JS-jh4cy 1 month ago

That's what you do when the damn fields grow mostly stones every year

@Brenda-k3t4g 1 month ago (edited)

Thanks. Very interesting as a Yankee New Englander whose maternal forebears came from the UK in 1648 and 1721 I have seen these in many places in different states here. Not only on private properties but at historic homes and historic inns.. Saw them all over in Connecticut years ago. Ironically at my late grandmothers house built in 1776 there weren't any. Must have taken them out but her neighbors had them even into the mid 20th century. 1776. Just 250 years ago, in the time frame of 1000 years, really not that long ago when you look at those numbers! Food for thought. ❤