Good Fences make Good Neighbors

In the Germanic Rhineland during the 18th century, most farmland was still under the feudal pattern with large holdings worked by tenant farmers; so there was no need for nor practice of fencing. Consequently, most Germanic immigrants were completely unfamiliar with the idea of enclosing spaces with wooden fences. Having no word for fence they adopted the English which became—“fens.”

Surprisingly, here in the Goschenhoppen region I know of no 18th century accounts of any kind describing how the primeval forest was felled, roots and stumps grubbed out, fields established, and what farming practices were first employed. In fact there is no record of any kind that we can use to capture the atmosphere of the fleeting moments during the formative years of early 18th century Goschenhoppen. The Dutchmen’s daily language, Pennsylvania Dutch (German), was an unwritten dialect. Aside from a few scraps such as estate inventories and wills, the history is a blank.

From neighboring Upper Hanover Township, however, we have some monthly journals of Schwenkfelder immigrant David Schultze; the earliest one dated 1743. These are quite brief interleaved as they are on blank pages separating the months of his almanac; but Schultze’s cryptic descriptions of his days’ work can tell us a good deal.

Schultze describes spending much of his time, perhaps up to twenty percent, clearing land and making a type of zig-zag fence now called “stake-and-rider.” Almost every month of 1743 his almanac is filled with notes such as “made rails,” “split stakes,” “built fence,” “made some fence” and so on. It appears then that stake-and-rider fence was the fence commonly used in this area at that early date; other sources declare it to be the most common fence to be found in Pennsylvania during the eighteenth century.

Stake-and-rider fence is a zig-zag fence with added braces. It took less labor to erect than the later post-and-rail fence since there were no post holes to dig, but it required more rails. The most common wood split for rails was the fast growing native chestnut which grew abundantly. Chestnut was strong, straight growing, light, and easy to split. It was slow to decay and kept from contact with the ground would last a lifetime. Alas, this most beneficial tree was wiped out by a blight in the early twentieth century.

The usual length of a section of stake-and-rider fence was eleven feet. In fact panels of eleven feet were standard for all types of wooden fencing. Many road rights-of-way were (and still are) three fence panels wide or thirty-three feet. The Dutch even had a word for a fence panel—“Gefach.” Fencing was bought and erected for a shilling and a few pence per “Gefach.”

As to the erection of stake-and-rider, at the section ends, the bottom rail was usually set on a stone which kept the first rail off the ground. Because of the zig-zag design, these fences were about seven feet wide or a little over three feet from the center line on each side.

The fence space was hardly wasted as cows could graze into the angles or if not, it was a good place for the blackberries and raspberries to grow.

At the junctions of the sections the rails were simply laid alternately one atop the other, so there was a rail thickness between rails which made a tight fence. The usual height was about five feet and employed five to seven rails.

The stakes of the stake-and-rider fence were braces about half the length of a rail which were set at right angles to the fence at the joints forming an X. Usually a round, heavy rail or two was set into the top notch of the X. These braces added stability making the fence harder to push over.

The land of the northern part of the township is covered with a type of extremely hard, gray, granite rock, and there still remain in that area some very early “Schteefens”—stonefence. Stone fences were set up dry without mortar and when properly done were maintenance free and infinitely durable. The stones had to be picked from the fields anyway, and the simplest fence was made by just piling them along the field’s edges. However, the best stone fences were made by fitting stones in two parallel rows so that they would bind against each other. The space between the rows was filled with the smaller rocks cleared from the fields. They were usually three or four feet high and about three feet thick.

It gives us pause to consider the amount of labor required to move and fit the larger stones in these walls. Time and weathering only make them more beautiful.

by Robert Wood