Thiebaud Farmstead

Thiebaud Farmstead is a historic farmstead located outside of Vevay, Indiana.

History
Frederick and Harriet Thiebaud emigrated from Switzerland with their family, including eight children, in 1817 and became a part of the first group to settle in Switzerland County. Once there, they began cultivating vineyards. They were a part of the local community that established a successful vineyard and winery, producing up to 12,000 gallons per year.

Justi Thiebaud, the youngest son of Frederick and Harriet, took over the farmstead by 1847. With his wife, Mary, they built the farmstead's notable two-story house in the 1850s. The house overlooks the Ohio River and was designed in the Greek Revival style.

Around the 1850s, the Thiebaud farm were noted participants of the hay production in the area. Around the same time the house was being constructed, the Thiebauds also built a hay barn. That hay barn housed a hay press that was likely a model that would later become knows as the "Mormon Press," one of the most successful hay press styles of the era. The hay press was patented in 1843 by Samuel Hewitt, a local of Switzerland County. Powered by horses or mules, the three-story machine used a pulley system to turn a large iron screw and drop a wooden block into a hay filled box, resulting in large compressed hay bales. The hay press device saved valuable space in shipping and allowed for twice as much hay to be loaded for transport.

The counties bordering the Ohio River prospered from the 1840s to the 1870s thanks to a system of cultivating, pressing, and exporting hay, specifically Timothy hay, via waterways to satisfy the increasing needs of urban horse populations. The Thiebaud family was just one of many that took part in hay production and the Thiebaud farm was likely the site of a river landing that facilitated the loading and shipping of the 300 to 400 pound hay bales created in the farm's hay press. The hay press saw production peak around the 1870s. The Thiebaud farmstead was estimated to have produced six tons of hay in 1850, 39 tons in 1860, and 80 tons in 1870.

At one time, there were over 200 hay press machines in Switzerland County, now there are only four remaining.

Historic site and museum
In the early 2000s, the project to turn the farmstead into a living history and agriculture museum began. In 2004, the Thiebaud Farmstead was listed in the National Register of Historic Places.

This historic site is cared for and operated by the Switzerland County Historical Society. At the time that the Historical Society took proprietorship, many of the original buildings remained, however, the hay press was gone. In 2016, as part of a push to showcase local technology, they completed the reconstruction of the hay press in the original barn situated on the property with the help of carpenters and volunteers. The reconstruction was done by acquiring another barn with an intact hay press from another property nearby and relocating them to the Thiebaud farmstead.

In 2022, the Indiana Historical Bureau, Switzerland County Historical Society, and Switzerland County Tourism office erected a state historic marker commemorating the history of Swiss immigrants in the area and the contributions of the Thiebaud family in the 19th-century.