Jacob Warner Oberlander was born to a German farming family in 1819, in Chanceford, York County, Pennsylvania. He was the sixth of twelve children born to Michael Baugher Oberlander and Maria Catherine Warner. He was named for his paternal grandfather, Jacob Oberlander, a Lutheran farmer of York County and was donned Warner as a middle name to commemorate his notable maternal family, begun from John George Werner.
The Oberlander’s farm was probably in the family for generations; possibly forged by Jacob’s great-grandfather, Andrew Miller, from land given to him for his service in the Revolutionary War. He served in the York Pennsylvania Regiment.
The practice of awarding land as payment for military service had been a common practice in the North American British Empire. At the time of the Revolutionary War, Colonial governments—under the assumption they would win—offered land to those who enlisted in the Colonial Army. The farm was undoubtedly very large to provide for Jacob’s eleven brothers and sisters: Catherine, Daniel, Peter, Samuel, Sarah, Elizabeth, Mary, Susan, William, Michael, and Christian. It is possible Jacob’s grandparents, Jacob Oberlander and Susan Baugher, also lived on the farm along with other members of the family, as was the German custom of the time.
Most of the farms of that time were 100-plus acres. Jacob’s great-grandfather probably started the clearing-out process of the land that continued with his grandfather and father. Jacob himself surely cut down trees and pulled out stumps to prepare a new field. It wasn’t until the 1850s that settlers in the southern counties of Pennsylvania had more than fifty percent of their property improved.
Agriculture was the main occupation of Chanceford residents during this time. Wheat, rye, corn, orchard fruits, and tobacco were big cash crops that were taken to markets as far away as Baltimore and Philadelphia, and on to the coast for export to European counties.
Few of the farmers in this time were fully self-sufficient. Garden crops and services were traded locally to sustain their existence in the area. Some of the farmers formed “farming districts” and would pool their produce and resources—such as wagons or boats—to make the most of their trips to the distant markets.
Agriculture passed through several phases before moving into the Industrial Age during the second half of the century. At first the land was cleared, the fresh soil was planted and replanted until it would no longer produce. Next came the discovery that lime would replenish the soil.
The Oberlanders probably built a lime-kiln and hauled large limestone shipments from the river to their kiln, where they would burn it before plowing it into the fields. Soon they found it was cheaper to buy the lime at the river already burnt and haul it back to their farm. Liming gave way to other fertilizers such as manure, guano, super-phosphate of lime, and other types of soil additives.
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