The ancestral home (one of them)

This is the farm where my dad grew up, along with eight brothers and sisters. As far as I know, he was born in this white farmhouse.

The place is on Carroll County Road 700 South about 2 miles southwest of Cutler, Ind. Google Maps says it's 40.445904, -86.532164.

This aerial photo was taken in the late 1940s or early '50s and ran in one of the weekly Delphi, Ind., newspapers as part of a "where is this?" series. The view is from the southwest of the property. According to most recent satellite photos, the woods in the background is almost all farm fields now.

My dad lived here from his birth in 1910 until sometime in the 1930s when he moved to Delphi to serve as deputy county treasurer under his father who was appointed, then elected to the post.

I've never been in the farmhouse, but my uncle Joe - dad's older brother by 10 years - owned the farm directly south across the road from this one from my earliest recollection until he retired to Florida about 1965 or so. I can recall visiting Uncle Joe and Aunt Cassie at a time before they had an indoor toilet and when they still used an old crank-style telephone on a party line. (It occurs to me that "party line" may be an unfamiliar term for younger readers. It was a shared telephone line where each home had its own distinctive ring pattern: two longs and a short, or three shorts, etc.)

This subject comes to mind because the process of moving to Arkansas has me thinking about the fluid concept of "home." My father had maybe four homes - five if you count the nursing home where he died - in his 87 years. I've only been around 62 years and can count at least 10 places I've called home - more if you count college dorms and Air Force basic training - and the Arkansas house will make 11.

It's been probably seven years since I drove past the farm in this photo and it occurs to me that I may never see it again. So it goes. I've got the photo.