Ruth Seidel and Molly Brown at the Brown Fruit Farm

Pictured here (left to right) are Ruth Seidel and Molly Brown standing at the entrance to the Brown Fruit Farm.

The Brown Fruit Farm operated north of Worthington for nearly fifty years, from around 1912 to 1956. The farm sold grew and sold apples and apple products such as juice, candy and apple butter, as well as cherries, plums and honey. As of 1925, the farm encompassed 100 acres planted with 4000 fruit trees and was the largest fruit farm in central Ohio. Owned by Frame Brown and later his daughter Molly Brown, it was renowned not only for the quality of its produce, but also for its innovative roadside marketing, including signs telling motorists how many miles they were from the farm.

Molly Brown Caren Fisher was raised on the fruit farm. After going to college, first at Trinity College in Washington D.C. and then at The Ohio State University, she returned to run the farm following the death of her parents Frame and Marie in 1936. She welcomed cooperation with The Ohio State University, with professors bringing their classes to the farm to study their methods. The farm closed in 1958 following several years of early spring freezes that diminished the farm’s profitability. OSU’s Agricultural Center two miles north of London, Ohio, is named after her.

Ruth Seidel started working on the farm as a part-time picker and returned to work in the office there after college.