Sarah (Redman) Hankerson and her husband Doug, have owned the family farm where Sarah grew up since 1995.

The farm of Doug and Sarah Hankerson, located north of Wells, is one of two farms in Faribault County to be designated as Century Farms in 2024.

That means they have been in the ownership of the same family for at least 100 years.

Actually the Hankerson’s farm was first purchased on Jan. 2, 1902, by Sarah Hankerson’s grandfather, Edward Redman.

That means it has been in the family for 122 years. The Hankersons could have applied for the Century Farm award two decades ago, but they just never did, Sarah Hankerson says.

“But this year we decided to do it,” Sarah says. “And it was because it was a special year for our family.”

Sarah’s mother, Marion Redman, turns 100 years old in 2024.

“We thought it would be nice to get the designation, and have her be at the Faribault County Fair when they awarded it to the family,” she explains. “She lives in an assisted living facility, but she was at the fair and received the award.”

The Redman family came to the U.S. from Prussia and their name was spelled differently and was Americanized to Redman. They settled in the central part of Wisconsin.

In 1902 Edward Redman came to Faribault County and purchased the current home site and 158 acres. He bought it from William and Minnie Dornfeldt for $19 per acre.

“It was a funny T-shaped piece of land,” Sarah says. “So in 1914 he bought another adjoining 40 acres from August Urban to help fill it out.”

In 1991 another 40 acres was purchased from Bill and Dianne Rauenhorst to finally square it off.

“There is a two-acre piece that we do not own,” Sarah says. “That is because in 1874 those two acres were gifted to Zion Evangelical Church for their church and cemetery by the original owners of this land, Ferdinand and Wilhelmina Voigt.”

While the church was moved a few miles away years ago, the cemetery remains on the property,

Edward Redman died in 1933 and the farm ownership went to his widow, Anna, and the couple’s five children – Harry, Sylvia, Ben, Ed and John.

John Redman was Sarah Hankerson’s father.

“My father was the youngest of the five,” Sarah says. “He was around 15 at the time and in eighth grade. He never went on to high school, just worked on the farm.”

Eventually John Redman took over the farm in March of 1951, with his mother, Anna, and sister, Sylvia, living in the farm house with him. The other brothers all left and moved on to other things. Ben Redman bought the farm just to the east of the home place.

In 1957 John Redman married Marion and John’s mother, Anna, moved to Ben’s farm and his sister, Sylvia, moved to town.

John and Marion had three daughters, Paulette, Sarah and Mary and one son, Lee.

Sarah married Doug Hankerson and Doug began helping work on the farm. He had grown up on a farm near Waldorf first, then on a farm by New Richland.

Doug’s father had bad luck with the farm in the 1980s, as did many farmers in those years.

“Sarah and I moved into this farm house in 1987,” Doug relates. “John and Marion moved out to what had been his brother Ben’s farm.”

By February of 1995, Doug and Sarah had purchased the farm from her parents.

“The plan had once been that I would farm with my brother-in-law, Dean, Sarah’s sister’s husband,” Doug relates. “But after a couple of years, Dean decided farming just was not for him.”

Dean then became a minister, Sarah relates.

Like all farms, the Redman/Hankerson farm has changed over the years, but maybe not as much as some others have.

The farm is now 600 acres with 585 of them tillable. Doug and Sarah’s son, Brett, farms with his father, but also rents some of those acres he farms himself. Brett now lives in uncle Ben’s house, just a bit east of the house where he grew up.

The farm had chickens, pigs, cows and horses in the early days.

“My mother, Marion, grew up in Duluth and then lived in St. Paul,” Sarah explains. “She was a true city girl. When she came to the farm she was given the chore of tending to the chickens, but she would not do it. So they got rid of all the chickens.”

John Redman had dairy cows, brown Swiss, and the barn was full. He also raised pigs, and several buildings on the farm were for the hog operation. He sold off the cows in 1968 and went just with pigs.

Doug continued with the hog operation, and turned the dairy barn into a hog barn, basically digging out the floor and putting in slats. They did farrowing and finishing.

“It was a pretty small operation compared to the ones today,” Doug says. “We quit doing it a while ago. But we did run hogs for 20 years.”

Other changes have been the addition of more grain bins, putting a roof on the barn, getting rid of some older small buildings, a new dryer and grain leg and of course, continuing improvements on the house, from a new deck to siding to remodeling inside.

Crops have changed over the years, as well.

“John did corn, alfalfa and oats because he had the cows,” Doug explains. “We do corn and soybeans these days, like everyone else. It is difficult to find that third crop. But we did grow peas for about 15 years.”

Doug and Sarah met in college, but they relate that they actually knew of each other before then.

“Doug and his family actually lived down the road a bit when we were kids,” Sarah relates. “In fact, his father worked for my father on the farm for a while. And his aunt, his mother’s sister, was my favorite babysitter.”

The Hankersons have another son, Jay, who lives in the Netherlands. Jay and his wife, Sara, have one child, a girl named Sabrina.

“It means we have made a few trips to the Netherlands,” Doug says. “And it is a pretty long flight.”

But well worth it, he adds.