Grandpa's Garden

The Taft family backyard once stretched to Young Street and included an orchard, a vegetable garden, a pasture for livestock, and a barn and stable in a rural suburban setting. A cow and calf grazed in the pasture, and a horse and carriage traveled along a dusty dirt path. In the late 1860s, spacious back lots like this were often used to raise crops, and the Taft garden and animals supplied fruits, vegetables, milk, and honey to supplement market goods. Young William Taft helped his grandfather tend the garden for an allowance, and Grandpa Peter Taft took pride in his bee hives. The family enjoyed the relaxed atmosphere of the back lot during their residence there, but the garden, pasture, and outbuildings are gone today, and nearly 30 feet of fill covers the original site.

Cincinnati, Ohio · United States