We followed the kind woman's directions which led us through rolling hills and farm land. We drove past a U-shaped cement tunnel leading into the side of a farm field and realize that I've seen that in one of grandpa's old pictures!
I found out later that it was a lysimeter which is a very specific device used to measure soil moisture. We pulled up a little farther and came to a large rock with two plaques. One was in recognition of the North Appalachian Experimental Watershed and Hydrologic research station. The other plaque recognized the Civilian Conservation Corps which had also been on the same site. Not surprisingly but to my dismay, there was nothing about the CPS camp and the men who had contributed to the research there.
From there, I have to admit that I went down the rabbit hole of trying to find out what kind of research was done there, when, and how significant it was. I found out that the research station had started collecting data from 1939 to 2009. They studied how different farming practices affected the various experimental watersheds that they created. They also developed some unique instrumentation that was later used all around the world. They developed weighing lysimeters (the first in the history of lysimeters) and the Coshocton wheel. For more information about the research station, check out http://www.ars.usda.gov/Aboutus/docs.htm?docid=8680 . Since Grandpa was there from 1942 to 1946, I wanted to find out what research was being done at that time. I found a paper from the US Dept. of Ag. titled Evaluation of Agricultural Hydrology by Monolith Lysimeters 1944-1955 which described what the lysimeters were, how they were built (with pictures) and what type of data was being collected at what time. The lysimeters were measuring runoff and percolation data during the time when grandpa was there. It was an amazing feeling to learn my grandpa and like-minded guys had contributed to such unique research that other scientists are still using!!! I wondered if his time doing farming research was one of the reasons why he wanted to be a farmer and always had a garden behind the barn back home.
I also found out that the hydrologic research station was shut down in 2009 and the property is going up for auction. This was disappointing to me since I felt like the CO's contributions hadn't been recognized even by the locals or by the owners of the property (Granted this feeling only came from a few short talks with people). I thought about trying to at least put up a peace pole in their memory there. I have spoken to a few very nice and informative soil and water conservation folks about the research and the property. Overall, it was an amazing find.
