The Vass Homestead

Located alongside White Lake in Hardwick is the old Vass Homestead. Born Johann Wass, he emigrated to America in 1764 and changed his name to Vass. One of the first settlers in the area he ran a successful farm, and his sons established a business selling ice taken from White Lake, and mining the shells from the bottom of the lake and crushing them for use inf fertilizer and cement.

The farm house has been preserved, the other buildings on the property, not so good a shape. You can read more about the man and the property at this website.

More pictures

Unnamed research facility

i would love to tell the story behind this place but doing so would reveal its location. its a nice find and although there is some graffiti its pretty untouched and I wanna keep it that way. Plus its highly visible and highly illegal. All ill say is that it used to be a farm and later became a research lab.

all the Flickr pictures

Abandoned PA Greenhouse

The farm is being leveled and being turned into townhouses. Someone went in with backhoes and big machines and leveled all the growth that had occurred inside. I couldn’t say how long this place had sat unused but it must’ve been a while judging from the density and height of the growth.

More pics here

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The Turkey Vulture Property

I dont know anything about this property. I was driving in PA and saw it and said “lemme check this out” There were 4 buildings and 2 were pretty well sealed up. the 3rd was wide open and the 4th was wholy unsuitable to enter for safety reasons. I call this the turkey vulture property because there was agigantic turkey vulture flying overhead as I pulled up and he justkept circling.

Abandoned farm in Phillipsburg

An explorer friend of mine messages me and says “Hey I found this great big farm! I didn’t have time to check it out because it was almost dark. Wanna go with me?” How could I resist? So I met up with him Friday and checked it out. It appears to have been abandoned for maybe 8-10 years or so. The place was pretty well cleaned out. We didn’t find the usual leavings, like mail and garbage and clothing. We found a few toys here and there, a little bit of junk amongst the weeds and bushes but very little else. There was no evidence of kids or squatters either. No beer cans, bottles or drug use. No graffiti. I like to find stuff left behind, sometimes you can learn a bit about the people or the place. Not here, but it was nice to not see a place ruined by vandals either.

It looked like your typical farm. there definitely were animals raised here, and there was a fairly large corn field that was fallow. Interestingly the corn was still growing in neat rows. Apparently the birds eats the corn cobs as they fall but enough kernels remain to seed new plants. The buildings are in rough shape but nothing that couldn’t be salvaged. The buildings were probably built in the 50’s. There was a garage/shed type building, one large main barn with some smaller wings built off to the side, as well as the two actual houses. The houses had a very weird layout, I suspect it was expanded at some point. Its the only way to explain the layout.

I’m surprised it is still here and that its pretty untouched. Its in what I would say a prime retail location and is easily visible from the road…..

All the photos are here or go to the Facebook group

Sussex County Farm

One of many abandoned farms in Sussex County. Located on a main road it was an easy find.

Big red barn in PA

There’s not much to say about this barn. it’s highly visible on a main road in PA in the delaware water gap. I was pretty obvious as I entered the property. Some would say I was brave. Others would say stupid. They’d both be right.

a not so bandoned farm in PA

Yet another farm near the Delaware river in PA. I’m pretty sure somebody owns it, they jsut ain’t doing anything with it right now. Didn’t go inside any of the buildings, they were sealed fairly tight. There was 3-4 buildings including one which was leaning so far to the side I wouldn’t go in if you paid me. It was right on the road, so doing anything more than just wandering would’ve been… unwise.

not

Abandoned PA farm

This farm lies not far from the Delaware on the PA side. it sits on state forest land and is on a hiking trail. Every building has a do not enter sign and for once I followed the rules. There’s 6-7 buildings and there was plenty of beauty to take pictures of outside. Judging by the price of the gas on the pump I’d say this farm was abandoned (or bought out) around the early 70’s, making it as older then me. The only thing of true note was the old fashioned drying press I found in one building. You ran the clothes thru two rollers and it squeezed the water from the clothing. There’s a fair amount to see here and I enjoyed the trip.

Washington twp farm purchased and preserved as open space.

The farm is the 65th tract to be preserved.