Duffy Farm (115-35 & 115-36): Cultural Landscapes Inventory, Cuyahoga Valley National Park

Regions 3, 4, & 5 Park Cultural Landscapes Program

The Michael Duffy Farm is located in Summit County, Ohio within Cuyahoga Valley National Park. The 23-acre farmstead near the southeastern end of the park consists of the original house built in 1872, an 1882 barn, and a newer house built in 1936. Outbuildings include two privies, a fruit stand, and the chicken house/tool shed. The cluster of structures is surrounded by woods, agricultural fields, and areas for pasture. Apart from the 1936 building, all are contributing features to the historical rural landscape as a residential farmstead that utilized the landscape for dairy and produce farming. The Duffy Farm is locally significant as an example of agricultural development within the Cuyahoga Valley during an era of commercial farming and expanding transport systems. The farm is also significant for the building construction of the 1872 house and 1882 barn, examples of vernacular architecture rising from the rural landscape. The period of significance for the farm begins in 1872, when the original house was constructed, and continues until 1930 when the closing of the Miami and Erie canal affected farming in the Cuyahoga Valley. The farm is representative of agricultural and settlement patterns across the Midwestern frontier: fertile lands along a waterway enticed settlers to an area, and then provided an outlet for transporting their agricultural productions. Changes in the industry, population, and transportation are also reflected in the surrounding landscape. The end of the canal signified a decline in agriculture within the river valley, and farmers relocated to more profitable regions. The farm was listed on the National Register on March 12, 1993. The overall integrity of the landscape as a historical rural farmstead remains intact, making it an important component of the rural agricultural heritage of the Cuyahoga Valley. The farmstead is a functionally-related building cluster of six contributing structures that characterize the cultural landscape, all in their original positions. The 1871 house incorporates Victorian style elegance with vernacular, folk construction. The house does not orient towards the road, suggesting the road might have come later. The 1936 house is positioned northeast of the original house, the newer home being a two-story, three-bay rectangular structure with gable roofs over each bay. This house sits back, but openly faces the road and is a noncontributing feature to the landscape. Two late 19th or early 20th century privies stand amidst clumps of trees and vegetation, one of wood and one of weatherboard construction. The barn formerly had a large shed addition that was removed sometime between National Register documentation in 1987 and the 2001 rehabilitation. Adjacent to the barn is a fruit stand, a small one-story asphalt shingle gable roof with drop siding walls and cornerboards. To the north of the fruit stand and near the wooden privy is the toolshed/chicken coop structure. Other features of the landscape include a well and cistern. The National Park Service (NPS) took over managing the park in the 1970s. Since this time, the Duffy Farmstead has received extensive restoration and rehabilitation in an effort to return structures to their historic appearances. Thus, the landscape looks much as it did during its time of significance. The beginning of a large wooded expanse abuts the northern rim of the property, while the majority of the property that lies to the southeast contains open cultivated fields. The large cultivated field that encompasses much of the property is still used for agricultural production through a NPS lease to a local farming initiative. Some of the historic landscape is overgrown by vegetation; however, its visual association as a rural agricultural farmstead remains.

Duffy Farm (115-35 & 115-36): Cultural Landscapes Inventory, Cuyahoga Valley National Park

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