Charlie Brown isn’t the only one in the pumpkin patch.  Ellen and I headed to the pumpkin patch at the Weston Red Barn Farm.  Kids aren’t the only ones that enjoy exploring the many choices of pumpkins.

One of our favorite pumpkin patches is the Weston Red Barn Farm in Weston, Missouri.

The city of Weston has quite a history.  The Lewis and Clark Expedition camped in Weston Missouri.  Lewis and Clark reported that the area was beautiful with fertile soil and a diverse landscape full of plant and animal life. Lewis and Clark wrote glowing reports of the area and prompted fur-trading companies to send traders and trappers.  A marker located at the end of Main Street, near the Weston Depot, commemorates their campsite. The Depot, built in 1922, is now home to Weston City Hall and is located in what was once the Missouri River channel.  Lewis and Clark reported that the area was beautiful with fertile soil and a diverse landscape full of plant and animal life. Lewis and Clark wrote glowing reports of the area and prompted fur-trading companies to send traders and trappers. Weston was the oldest settlement in the Platte Purchase of 1836 and was therefore also the farthest western settlement (thus, “West Town”) in the United States until the admission of Texas as a state in 1845.

William Buffalo Bill Cody was at one time a resident of Weston, and the town was a major “jumping off” point for the Santa Fe Trail, theOregon Trail and the California Gold Rush.

Weston’s heyday was between its founding in 1837 and 1860. A bustling town for people heading west, it was the last place wagon trains could stock up before they crossed the Missouri River and entered wilderness. The steamboats unloaded supplies for Fort Leavenworth and supplies for Westward travelers, and then loaded back up with Weston products of tobacco, hemp ropes, hides, and later lumber, whiskey, and fruit as they headed home.  In 1850 over 265 steamboats a year docked at the Port of Weston.

The Weston Red Barn Farm is located 16300 Wilkerson Road
Weston, Missouri 64098.  The Weston Red Barn Farm is like visiting a turn of the century working farm.  But in addition to being an actual farm it is also a popular pumpkin patch, bonfire/hayride event place, school tour stop,  and even wedding and reception locale.  There is a country store where they sell locally produced products.

Wagon load of pumpkins