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John L.Marsh

Edinboro State College
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Description of the Project:
an interpretive study of the Todd Goodell
farm and farm family,Edinboro,Pa.

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’’history- -purpose- - s ignif icance
For a decade and more northwestern Pennsylvania’s Oil
Region captured the attention.Of-the nation--Colonel Edwin
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Drake’s well,drilled near Titusville in 1859,signaling the
beginnings of a fabulous industry.Elsewhere in the area--on

the fringesrof the oil hysteria--life went on largely untouched

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by the speculative mania only miles' from country doorsteps.In
Edinboro,for instance,only One' well was drilled locally and

though a refinery operated for a time,the community’s prin-

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cipal resource In the 187O’s and 8O’s was agriculture not oil.

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In point of fact,Edinboro (some 40 miles northwest of Titusville)

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was the very epitome of a dirt street town committed to serving

the needs of the surrounding farmers and their families.

Its citizenry included such solid men as Layton Bentley

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Goodell,who had established himself as a blacksmith as early as

1836.Evidence of Goodell’s prominence was his election to the

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first boro council and then to several terms as burgess or mayor.
Not the least of his interests was the buying and selling of
local real estate,a passion he transmitted to one of his sons,

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George Seymour Goodell--for some forty years a dealer in groc-

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eries,provisions,and notions in a store adiacent to the family

John L.Marsh

Edinboro State College
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George Goodell was especially

attracted to farm prop­

erties and in 1876 he purchased the first farm east of Edinboro
on the Waterford road from one,of the sons of an Edinboro

physician,Dr.Thomas R.Randall,who had conducted his practice
from a small surgery on the grounds.Goodell did not occupy the

property himself but employed a succession of individuals to
live on the land and farm it for him.During these years one of

his sons,Todd Goodell,was a frequent visitor and,upon his mar­
riage in 1907,Todd brought his bride to the farm,where they set

up housekeeping in the structure previously occupied by Dr.
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Randall.Having decided to make his livelihood by farming,the

young husband worked the land utilizing teams and horse-drawn
implements.lt was not until 1940 that he purchased his first

and only tractor,and,even then,Todd Goodell continued for a

decade to plant with a team,discontinuing ^his practice only
when the harness became too heavy for him to lift.
Upon his death in 1956 the farm came into the possession

of his daughters,Carrie and Margaret Goodell,who have preserved
it much as it was in the early days of the twentieth century.As

a consequence,the farmhouse and barns contain a wealth of art­

ifacts that envision the rural experience associated with an
era of horse power.Mote to the point,the daughters of Todd Goodell
can identify and detail the use of long forgotten tools and imple­

ments. Both women are conscious of the historical value of the fango^j
and they are ready to co-operate in a project that would detail

and visualize an important moment on the local and national scene.

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John L.Marsh

Edinboro State College
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With their support we propose a? descriptive and inter­

pretive study of the Todd Goodell farm and farm family that

would image in text and pictures the life of a farmer and his
family in northwestern Pennsylvania during what has been desc­

ribed as farming's golden era.Initial research would focus on
the story of the four generations of Goodells who have lived in
Edinboro.Subsequent investigation will reconstruct the story of

the purchase and development of the farm property.Successively

the story of each of the farm's buildings will be detailed and
complemented by a selection of photographs of present and defunct

structures.Next the farmhouse itself will be subjected to scrutiny
with special attention given to its lighting,heating,and furnish­

ings.
Out thesis is that the Todd Goodell family,like farm

families throughout our region,had (and has) at once a strong

sense of family and of property.They knew who they were,from
whence they came,and what they--as well as theirneighbors--

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owned.Morepver,they put what was theirs to gainful use.Their
compulsive utilitarianism is seen particularly in the farm

buildings and the Goodell farmhouse.The former have little
pretensions to style,while the latter,despite a number of modif­

ications , exhibit ss the lineaments of a countrified classicism that
emphasized the functional-at the expense of the-architecturally
harmonious.In a similar vein,surviving artifacts image a practical

people not altogether immune to the fashions and fads of the day
but content once they had brought something home to 1ive with it

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John L.Marsh

Edinboro State College
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for the object's life--especially if it could be identified

with a particular individual or moment in the family's history,
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The Goodells were not traditionalists for the sake of
tradition,but they valued and continued long established modes

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of farming and housekeeping.Thus our study takes a look at Todd
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Goodell,the farmer;at Ella Parsons Goodell,the farm wife;and at
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Carrie and Margaret Goodell,their children.The family,individually

andcollectively,is given dimension through family documents and

photographs and especially through those items associated with
their daily existence--from the wash boilers and meat jars of

the wife to the harness and farm tools of the husband.Our goal

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is a verbal and visual image of the regimen of farm life as

previous generations knew it
From our point of view farm families,like the Goodells,

are among the mbst important preservers--materially and idealogically--of our national heritage.Without conscious intention

but with commitment and dedication they clung tenaciously to the
well worn and the locally manufactured amid a society that demanded

the new and the improved as well as the city-made.Strong in their
sense of family,they honored the old people and the old ways,pre­

ferring always what had been to what might be in a progress-haunted
era.To talk with a Carrie or a Margaret Goodell is to partake of a

continuum--as opposed to a rediscovery--of points of view that

hark back to Franklin's "poor" Richard Saunders and to Emerson
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and Thoreau's self-reliant individuals.To visit the Goodell farm

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is to step back into an era we have labeled,though scarcely accurately,

the good old days.

John L.Marsh

Edinboro State College

"plan of work"
Initial research,as indicated,will focus on the story of

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the four generations of the Goodell family to reside in Edinboro.

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Once their story has been detailed from deeds and the family's

extensive archives,it is our intent to develop the story of the
farm property and the farm buildings.Not the least part of this

effort will be devoted to assembling an extensive series of pic­
tures of the barns and other outbuildings.Their contents will be

photographed with individual items being identified by Carrie and
Margaret Goodell.The farmhouse will be subjected to much the same

scrutiny.Together with its contents it will be photographed in
detail and its furnishings identified by the sisters.

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To aid and extend the process of identification and
classification,the services of five area specialists will be

sought.These will include the executive director of the Warren

County Historical Society,who serves as the editor of an ongoing
series of publications: "Historic Buildings in Warren County."
Other specialists will include individuals with an extensive
knbwledge of farm buildings and implements, of furniture and

period household utensils as well as of lamps and toys.

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Every effort will be made to develop a picture of the

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farmer,his wife,and children through the artifacts particularly
associated with them and the routine of their days.Old family

photographs will be copied hnd audio tapes made of the sisters'
recollections of their parents,grandparents,and the familv's

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John L.Marsh

Edinboro State College

season-to-season activities.Toward assembling the text.pictures,

and audio tape,the following working outline has been devised:

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Guide to the Goodell farm anf family

I.the Goodell family in Edinboro
A. 1st generation
B. 2nd generation
C. 3rd generation
D. 4th generation
II.the farm property
A. initial 40 acre purchase
B. subsequent additions

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III.the farm buildings
A. farm house
1.initial structure (ca.l850)
2.subsequent additions
B. outbuildings
1. tenant house (ca,1855)
2. girls' playhouse (ca,1915)
3. garage-coalshed (1930)
C. defunct structures
1. windmill (ca.l895)
2. milk house (ca.l913)
D. barns
1. horse barn (ca.l850)
2. sheep barn (ca,1850)
3. storage barn (ca.l860)
IV.the farmhouse
A. lighting
B. heating
C. furnishing
1.kitchen
2.living room
3. parlour
4. bedrooms

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V.theifarmer:Todd Goodell
A. as seen through family photographs
B. as seen through personal possessions and implements
used in his day-to-day activities
C. as seen in photographs of plowing,harrowing,planting,
and sowing;of cultivating,reaping,and threshing
D. as---..
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seen in the. recollections
of ’his
daughters

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John L.Marsh

Edinboro State College

VI.the farm wife:Ella Parsons Goodell
A. as seen through family photographs
B. as seen through the artifacts associated with her
daily life
C. as seen in the recollections of her daughters

VII.the
A. as
B. as
C .as

farm
seen
seen
seen

children:Carrie and Margaret Goodell
through family photographs
through personal possessions
through the recollections of their contemporaries

VIII.the rural experience
A. captured in a series of taped recollections by Carrie and
Margaret Goodell
B. extended by similar taped sessions with area farmers of
the Goodells generation
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The end products visualized include the creation of a: descriptive

and interpretive essay that would image in words and pictures the
look and life of a farm family in northwestern Pennsylvania.Using

this document as a source,three film strips of approximately 70

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frames each will be prepared.Accompanied by cassette tapes and
appropriate study materials,these will focus on the Goodell farm,

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on the farm family and its labors,and on Edinboro as a dirt street

town serving an agricultural community that included citizens
like the Goodells.
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"disseipination'
Six copies of the essay with its supporting visual material
will be prepared and distributed as follows: 2 copies,Edinboro

State College Library;! copy,Erie County Historical Society;!
copy,Conneautee Historical Society of Edinboro;! copy,Penna.

Hostorical and Museum Commission;! copy,Penna.State Library.
The cassette-film strips will be distributed as follows: 3

copies each unit,the regional instructional materials center

serving Erie County;! copy each unit,Penna.Historical and Museum

C mmission and the Frrmers' Museum in Lancaster,Penna.

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John L.Marsh

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fidinboro State College

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„4"V'‘fc^^^t:ime frafne”

Because of the particular nature of the proposed project
and Edinboro's

peculiar climate,we are requesting what amounts

to a summer grant.By way of explanation,our immediate area exper­

iences protracted and severe winters (160 plus inches of snow,
1977-78).Travel becomes uncertain and it is often extremely

difficult to reach barns and outbuildings because of drifting

snow.Then,too,the latter are unheated and often without electric

. light.Both working in them and photographing in or around them
is often counter-productive in adverse^

weather.To take advantage

of optimum working conditionsctogether with good natural light,we

would like to accomplish our onsite study and photography between

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