Down on the farm, 1800s style

PETERSBURG - Horse drawn plows, historic farming equipment and agricultural techniques from the 19th century will be featured during the Antique Farm Show scheduled for Saturday, May 2 from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. at Lincoln's New Salem State Historic Site near Petersburg. The event is free and open to the public and is co-sponsored by the New Salem Lincoln League.

Visitors are invited to watch horse drawn plows work the fields in the village of Lincoln's New Salem. Spud and Tom Eldridge from Greenview and other central Illinois farmers who still use horses for farming will be on hand with their horse teams and antique equipment to demonstrate early plowing, planting and other agricultural work. The fieldwork demonstrations will be held weather permitting.

A display of historic farming equipment will be set up in a field by the Blacksmith Shop near the entrance to the village, allowing Antique Farm Show visitors to learn about the latest developments in agriculture from Abraham Lincoln's time to the early 1900s. The Vintage Ag Association of Menard County will have an antique tractor display in the parking lot by the Visitor Center.

Lincoln's New Salem State Historic Site, administered by the Illinois Preservation Agency, is a reconstruction of the 1830s log village where Abraham Lincoln spent six years of his life. It is located about 20 miles northwest of Springfield and two miles south of Petersburg on Route 97. It is open Wednesday through Sunday for free public tours, expanding to seven days per week from May 1 - September 7, 2009.