St. Joseph's Farm: thirteen hundred acres worked for a university

1866/67–1995 · CLEVELAND ROAD, HARRIS TOWNSHIP

For a hundred and twenty-eight years the largest farm in these townships was not a family's but a congregation's — and farming it was a religious community's daily work. The Congregation of Holy Cross had held Harris Prairie land almost from the settlement: as early as 1853 its local council resolved "that all our land over the Harris prairie should be divided into lots and sold to Catholics" — the congregation acting as a farm-settlement agent on this ground a decade and a half before it farmed here itself. The farm's purchase stands in the record in strands that do not reconcile, and they are printed here as they stand. The congregation's Provincial Council resolved on 30 January 1867 "to buy 1500 acres of land in Harris Township at $10 an acre which could be used as a pasture ground for cattle of the college farm and would supply the college with turf." Brother Aidan's compiled extracts caption the purchase "Bought in 1866 (St. Joseph's Farm)" and describe the place as containing 1,500 acres, "all arable, only 450 acres under cultivation at present," the balance "used for pasture to large herds of cattle, flocks of sheep, etc." Father Sorin's own chronicle records the acquisition as a purchase "of 1,320 acres from Mr. Irwin, 500 or 600 of which are a deposit of turf" — the seller's surname is the same the township record gives its extensive stock-farming Irvins (E. M. Irvin of section 13, director of the county fair's 1858 reorganization, in the fair entry below), though the chronicle does not name him further and this entry does not merge them. Sorin's visitation of 1870 found "a little over 1,300 acres, containing excellent grass and turf. 100 acres have been cultivated and even more has been ditched and fairly drained since it was purchased," with the plan "to transfer there the cows, hogs, sheep, poultry, etc., next autumn" and to build a house "sufficiently large for 8 or 10 Brothers and a priest, with a little chapel." The university's own modern history (Thomas Schlereth's, as the University Archives presents it) dates the purchase 1867 and the acreage 1,300; the diocesan account the Story of Granger section prints gives a farm community founded in 1870. This build's Spine and Businesses legs print the 1867/1870 conflict unreconciled; this entry adds the 1866 strand and the three acreages (1,500 resolved and described; 1,320 from Irwin; a little over 1,300 at the 1870 visit) and reconciles none of them.

What the farm was, the record describes better than any other farm on this ground. The Scholastic's visit of 1872 found "endless fields of rye and oats and wheat stretching nearly as far as the eye could see… the plains of corn, and near by the rich meadows of tame hay being mowed down by four or five machines," roads run along the main ditches, "miles and miles of fences," "large sheds and fine cattle-yards… arranged on the most approved plans," and a working community: "Brother Matthew presides over the community, which is composed of seven or eight Brothers. Some twenty hired men are constantly employed on the farm." A council of administration for the farm was organized in May 1871 (Brothers Francis de Sales, Matthew, Lawrence, and Maximus), and in October 1872 the congregation allowed "125,000 bricks to be transferred to St. Joseph's Farm" — the farm's buildings rising in brick. Its product, as the extracts compile it: "At times there are on the farm 150–200 fat cattle, 1500–2000 sheep, 75–200 hogs. About 25 horses. Farm produces 400 tons of hay, 20,000 bushels of roots, 4000 bushels of corn, 1000 bushels of potatoes, and 10–15,000 bushels of wheat. Nearly all of which except the potatoes and wheat is consumed by stock on the farm." And its second crop was fuel: "hundreds of acres of peat, which is manufactured into fuel for the use of the college. Some 800 tons are made there every year" — the marsh's turf, cut and dried, heating the university that the farm also fed, from the ground Chapman had priced as fit only for grazing and haying. Chapman's own one line on the place (1880) is the outside view: "Notre Dame University owns the largest farm in this township, most of which is marsh land, where they raise their beef and their milk supply for the University." The farm also ran a small pomology: the Scholastic records a specimen apple from "Mr. Letourneau" — "what can be done in the pomological line out at St. Joseph's Farm. The apple is 13½″ in circumference" — and the university's modern summary preserves the farm's breadth in a single sentence: it "produced everything for the University from peat for fireplaces to tobacco for faculty cigars." The parish that began among the farm's Catholic neighbors, and the chapel the 1870 plan promised, belong to the Religion section, which carries St. Pius X whole from this ground.

The farm's long twentieth century is documented at its ends. The extracts record the first retreat: it was "found more advantageous for some years to buy dressed beef in Chicago from P. D. Armour and Co. Hence number of cattle kept at present is less than formerly" — the township's beef economy meeting the Chicago packers inside the farm's own ledger. The university's farming, meanwhile, consolidated onto this ground: after the Notre Dame barn on South Quad burned on 13 October 1925 and the campus farms moved east of campus, "all farming activity was later moved to St. Joseph's Farm in Granger, Indiana," in the University Archives' account. The end is dated by the press: the farm "was active until 1995, as it became less viable and there were fewer men entering the seminary with farming skills" (South Bend Tribune, 18 March 1995, as the University Archives cites it). The ground's afterlife divides three ways, each carried by its owning leg: the parish and school ground (Religion and Schools); the data-center ground, whose succession the Businesses leg owns whole; and two survivals this section can measure itself — the St. Joseph Solar Farm, 210 acres at the northeast corner of Bittersweet and Cleveland roads, opened in March 2021 on "converted farmland that once belonged to Notre Dame," "land formerly farmed by the Brothers of Holy Cross to feed students at Notre Dame," in the university's and the utility's own words (their accounts print both the acreage and the fact; the campus's energy record is theirs, the land-use fact is this section's) — and the county parcel file's own testimony, November 2026: the plat named "St. Joe Farm Minor Sub" still stands on the farm's ground, its Lot 1 (34.9 acres) classed by the county as a working cash-grain/general farm and its Lot 2 (157.9 acres) as agricultural land. The farm that fed a university is gone; pieces of its ground are a solar field, a data-center campus, a parish — and, still, two parcels of farmland under its own name.

Sources:

1. University of Notre Dame Archives, Brother Aidan's Extracts 238, "Farms at Notre Dame" (archives.nd.edu/aidan/aidan238.htm): the Provincial Council resolution of 30 January 1867; the "Bought in 1866" description (1,500 acres, 450 cultivated); Sorin's Chronicles on the Irwin purchase (1,320 acres, 500–600 of turf, 1,000 tons taken out); the council of administration, 12 May 1871; the 125,000 bricks, 4 October 1872; the Scholastic visit of 14 July 1872 and the 1872 account (peat at 800 tons a year; Brother Matthew's community; twenty hired men); the stock and production figures; the Armour dressed-beef passage; the 1853 Harris Prairie lots resolution — the farm's own record as the Archives compile it, quoted in its words.
2. University of Notre Dame Archives, "Notre Dame Farms" (sites.nd.edu/ndarchives), presenting Thomas Schlereth, "The Notre Dame Farms, 1843–1940": the 1867 purchase of 1,300 acres; "peat for fireplaces to tobacco for faculty cigars"; the 1925 fire and the consolidation of all farming activity at St. Joseph's Farm; the farm active until 1995, citing the South Bend Tribune of 18 March 1995.
3. Chapman (1880), Harris Township chapter: the largest farm in the township, its beef and milk, in the words quoted — read first-hand as above.
4. University of Notre Dame (news.nd.edu, 6 May 2021) and Indiana Michigan Power (release of 6 May 2021): the St. Joseph Solar Farm — 210 acres at Bittersweet and Cleveland roads, ground broken July 2020, opened late March 2021, on converted farmland that once belonged to Notre Dame; the university's energy-program account (green.nd.edu): "land formerly owned and farmed by the Brothers of Holy Cross to feed students at Notre Dame."
5. St. Joseph County parcel file as pulled for this build (November 2026; the Neighborhoods leg's instrument): "St. Joe Farm Minor Sub" Lot 1 (34.9 acres, class 101) and Lot 2 (157.9 acres, class 100) — class glosses per the Indiana DLGF property class code list (50 IAC 26, Code List 1).
6. This build's Spine and Businesses legs: the 1867/1870 date conflict as printed there, and the Microsoft succession on the farm's ground (pointed to, not retold); the Religion section: the parish from the farm (pointed to).