Stone walls in New England originated with colonial farmers needing to move stones from plow fields and wanting to create a fence at the same time, but construction accelerated and improved in the early 1800s with the importing of merino sheep from Spain.
Wool from the prodigious sheep stocked the industrial-revolution mills of New England and gave subsistence farmers a valuable commodity — but fences were needed to hem them in.
Stone walls in New England originated with colonial farmers needing to move stones from plow fields and wanting to create a fence at the same time, but construction accelerated and improved in the early 1800s with the importing of merino sheep from Spain.
Wool from the prodigious sheep stocked the industrial-revolution mills of New England and gave subsistence farmers a valuable commodity — but fences were needed to hem them in.…
