Welcome to Bakie Farm!

View east from Chardonnay Hill

My name is Stephen Roxburgh. My wife, Carolyn Coman, and I formed Bakie Farm Initiative, LLC, in May 2018 in order to purchase the Bakie Farm in Kingston, NH. We live a few miles down the road and have driven by the farm for years, always struck by how beautiful it is. When it came on the market last winter, we decided to go for it. We closed on the property on May 30th, a year ago today. Since then, working with our son-in-law, Andre Cantelmo, co-owner of Heron Pond Farm in South Hampton, we have begun the process of restoring the property and land. Last summer we planted the fields along Powwow River Road with forage oats that we tilled into the ground in the fall and then replanted with winter rye. You can see that starting to sprout if you drive by now, and you can expect the fields to turn from brown to green over the next month or so. Our good friend, Josh Jennings of Meadows Mirth Farm, got the greenhouse up and running and is working the midfield. You can see his gorgeous greens as you drive by. This fall we plan to install more greenhouses on the plateau. Meanwhile work continues on the buildings. We’re currently repainting the interior of the farmhouse, and hope to start painting the exterior later this summer and then move on to some of the other buildings. The most frequent question we get from passersby is will we keep what we call the Bakie Barn—the one on the road with “Bakie Farm” painted in 3’ black letters—as is. The answer is yes. We plan to patch, roof, and repaint with the sign exactly as it is. Last fall we were able to clear the brush from around the old blacksmith shop, replace all the windows, and paint the building. It is visible from the road and will give you some idea of what we plan to do with the other buildings as well. Another question that comes up is if we will be demolishing any of the old buildings. Absolutely not. We put considerable effort into stabilizing all of them in anticipation of this winter’s snowfall, which was modest, and all the buildings held up just fine. We’ll continue to maintain and improve them as resources become available and opportunity presents itself. We have plans for planting some gardens that will be accessible to the public on the western end of the farm, so come back to the site for news about those projects.

This website is very much a work in process, as you’ll see if you explore the various headings, . Thanks to the generosity of Betty Bakie Flanagan we have access to her family’s archival photographs, which you can peruse in the “Bakie Farm Then” section. We’ll be adding explanatory captions as we get more information. Our “Services” and “Products” sections offerings will be elaborated as our plans evolve. We will blog as the spirit moves us and as we make photographs and have any news that seem worth sharing. We hope you enjoy watching the farm grow over the next few months and years.