The Rubencame-Woodward Farm

The Rubencame-Woodward House

Very often on this blog, the sites we look at are hidden away on some back road or lightly-populated corner of the hundred, or tucked neatly into the middle of a mid-century, suburban neighborhood. That's mostly because, and I can't stress this enough, I have no control over where they are! However, the farm we'll investigate in this post was located near what's probably (I don't have the exact traffic statistics) the most heavily travelled area in Mill Creek Hundred -- the Kirkwood Highway/Limestone Road intersection. This area is pretty much the epitome of 20th Century commercial suburban sprawl, so much so that's it's almost weird to think of it as having a rural, agricultural past -- but it does. And though they've been gone for more than four and six decades respectively, I'm sure some of you can still recall the house and barn that stood along Limestone Road.

The farm anchored by the house seen above was under the ownership of only one family for more than 150 years (although it might not seem like it from the title of the post), but its history prior to that is rich as well. It gets confusing at times, but does come in contact with some interesting stories and people. I'll do what I can to shed some light on it, without getting too far off track or mired in irrelevant details (admittedly, always a struggle). Much like the nearby and recently featured Reynolds-Brown-Murray Farm (with which it does have a later connection), the acreage of this farm also changed a few times over the years, although not as many times as it might seem.

The earliest deed I have for what would become the Rubencame-Woodward farm is for a sale in 1757 from Duncan Drummond to William Johnson. However, within it, this deed documents another 70+ years of history and sales. The first was dated July 12, 1685, when William Penn's agents granted 110 acres to Aaron Johnson Vandenburg, "near a certain creek known by the name Rum Creek now called Mill Creek". (I think the name may have come from another early area landowner, Charles Rumsey.) In his 1701 will, Vandenburg ultimately left his estate to Rev. Erik Bjorck (spelled differently, but has to be him) and Old Swedes Church. Rev. Bjorck and Vandenburg's widow sold the farm in 1714 to James Robinson, who owned several other tracts in MCH totaling almost 1000 acres. He also built the first mill in what would later become Milltown.