Focus on the positive Farm family recognized
By Rick McCrabb
Staff Writer
HAMILTON — The Beeler family has more than the same last name.
When you’re born into this family, you inherit a love of farming, calloused hands, and early morning chores.
In 1901, Richard and Elizabeth Beeler purchased the 110-acre farm on Garner Road that borders Oxford and Okeana and is a short drive from Brookville, Ind.
Now, 111 years later, the farm still belongs to the Beeler family, Edward and Rosemary Beeler, who bought it from his parents, Earl and Lillian Beeler, in 1993.
The Beeler farm recently was recognized by the Ohio Department of Agriculture as a century farm. A century farm has been owned by the same family for at least 100 consecutive years.
Their farm was the only one recognized in Butler, Warren and Preble counties, and only one of 52 in all of Ohio.
By the time Edward, now 57, was 7 or 8 years old, he was driving a tractor instead of, say, a bike. He graduated from Oxford Talawanda High School in 1972, and remembers completing chores before basketball practice.
When asked why he entered the farming business, he said with a smile: “I didn’t know no better.”
His mother, Lillian Beeler, who still farms, added: “You have to be involved in farming. It’s part of our life.”
And the business certainly has changed over the last century. Horses used for planting have been replaced by air-conditioned tractors that are operated by computers. One tractor can cost more than an entire farm did 100 years ago.
One of the Beelers’ structures is full of farm equipment. “Take a guess what all this stuff costs,” Edward Beeler said. “Then double it.”
Because of government regulations, every seed, every ounce of fertilizer Beeler applies to his soil must be accounted for.
He admits the price of grain has increased, but at the same time, so has the cost of operating the farm.
His goal, he said, is to “turn a profitable yield,” nothing more.
His 79-year-old father once told him: “Don’t abuse the land. It’s a gift from God, and keep it that way.”
The farm where the Beelers live was built in 1932 after a fire destroyed the original structure. The labor for the house was bartered for farm and garden products, said Rosemary Beeler, the family historian.
Up until recently, the Beeler farm was a dairy. Now it’s full of livestock.
Contact this reporter at (513) 705-2842 or rmccrabb@coxohio.com.