[187] Obion County Farm Joins Ranks of State's Century Farms Program

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: November 4, 2010
CONTACT: Caneta Hankins, Center for Historic Preservation, 615-898-2947


OBION COUNTY FARM JOINS RANKS OF STATE’S CENTURY FARMS PROGRAM

Burnett Farm Recognized for Agricultural Contributions

(MURFREESBORO)—The Burnett Farm, located in Obion County, has been designated as a Tennessee Century Farm, reports Caneta S. Hankins, director of the Century Farms Program at the Center for Historic Preservation at MTSU.
The Century Farms Program recognizes the contributions of Tennessee residents who have owned and kept family land in production continuously for at least 100 years.
The Burnett family has lived in Obion County since about 1868 when David Dillie Burnett is believed to have arrived in the area from Lynchburg, Va.
The family recounts that the Civil War Veteran built a log home “with a ‘dog trot’ and only ladders leading to the upstairs.” Here, he and his wife, Maggie Evelyn Carter, and their seven children lived, raising cotton, corn, beans, cattle and hogs. Burnett also donated land for what is now the Mt. Ararat Cumberland Presbyterian Church and for the Wells School.
David Henry and J. J. Burnett, sons of David and Maggie acquired about 350 acres in 1897, which provides the documentation for the current family farm. David H. Burnett and his brother owned the farm together until J. J. Burnett was shot and killed. Married twice, first to Archie Jane Robinson and then to Emma Mae Dare, David Henry fathered seven children. He expanded the farm to nearly 1,200 acres, which he rented out to sharecroppers who raised wheat, corn, beans and cotton. Burnett served two terms in the Tennessee General Assembly, was the mayor of Troy and a member of the Obion County Board of Education and taught school for 23 years.
Since 1941, Virginia Abbot Burnett, the widow of the founder’s grandson, David Crockett Burnett, has owned the farm. Of the 350 acres, about 100 is the original land of David Dillie Burnett. This property is in a joint estate with Mrs. Burnett and her twin daughters, Jane B. Murphey and Jan B. Rankin. Soon, Interstate 69 will be constructed close to the farm, which Mrs. Burnett says “will bring many changes.”
Since 1984, the Center for Historic Preservation at MTSU has been a leader in the important work of documenting Tennessee’s agricultural heritage and history through the Tennessee Century Farms Program. For more information about the Century Farms Program, please visit www.tncenturyfarms.org.The Center for Historic Preservation also may be contacted at Box 80, MTSU, Murfreesboro, Tenn., 37132 or 615-898-2947.

• ATTENTION, MEDIA: To interview the farm’s owner or request jpegs of the farm for editorial use, please contact the CHP at 615-898-2947.




Founded in 1911, Middle Tennessee State University is a Tennessee Board of Regents institution located in Murfreesboro and is the state’s largest public undergraduate institution. MTSU now boasts one of the nation’s first master’s degree programs in horse science, and the Council of Graduate Schools in Washington, D.C., acclaims MTSU’s Master of Science in Professional Science degree—the only one in Tennessee—as a model program. This fall, MTSU unveiled three new doctoral degrees in the sciences.