Scott Farm Orchard

About Us:

The Scott Farm, listed on the National Register of Historic Places, has been in active cultivation since 1791. This 571 acre farm has been owned since 1995 by The Landmark Trust USA, a non-profit organization whose mission is to rescue important but neglected historic properties and bring them back to life. At Scott Farm this has meant revitalizing the entire farm operation from orchard to farmhouses to barns.

For much of the 19th century Scott Farm was an all-purpose farm with a variety of animals and crops. The earliest remaining buildings on the farm were built by Rufus Scott who purchased the farm in 1845. The original orchard was planted in 1911 by the Holbrook family who purchased the Scott Farm shortly after their purchase in 1903 of Rudyard Kipling’s Naulakha which adjoins the farm to the south. (This National Historic Landmark property is now also owned by The Landmark Trust USA.)

The Holbrooks were innovative orchardists and Scott Farm was one of the first to use refrigeration and mail order sales. Scott Farm apples were shipped to most states and several countries. The farm even received a US patent for the design of a special shipping crate. When the Academy-award winning movie, The Cider House Rules, was filmed at Scott Farm in 1998, some sets were built according to photographs of the farm and barns found in the farm’s mail order brochure in the 1930s.

The farm’s present orchardist, Ezekiel Goodband, has had a lifelong passion for apples. His search for old varieties has taken him to abandoned orchards throughout New England and as far as Kazakhstan, the birthplace of apples. The orchard now contains 90 heirloom and unusual apple varieties. The range of color, flavor, and texture is wide indeed with something to appeal to all tastes. Scott Farm also grows gooseberries, medlars, quince, raspberries, blueberries, grapes, pears, plums, and peaches.

Our orchard products are certified 'ecologically grown'. We have worked with both the University of Vermont and the University of Massachusetts to develop pest controls such as pheromone traps and visual lures.