Monday, June 23, 1851: I rode down near the Shaker Mill and bargained with the sister and husband of John Coslow for said boy that is to my house to work for me four months at four dollars and fifty cents per month, and from there I called up to the Shaker village to try to sell turnip seed and tried to bargain carrots and turnips but could not bargain them and then I called to Doctor Dwight Right’s and reckoned with him for four visits to doctor my wife at 75 cents per visit, and I had paid him one and a half bushel turnips at 25 cts per bushel and I now paid him two dollars and sixty two cts in cash and took a receit in full.
Thursday: I rode to Lebanon and carried the Irish shoe maker one bushel of potatoes and he agreed to pay in his work 63 cts.
Friday: I and the boy plastered my carrots, and nearly four o’clock I started for Smith’s plaster mill and paid him one dollar and 50 cents for four hundred pounds of plaster, and on the way home I called to F. Everett’s and paid in cash one dollar for a new scythe and I paid 12 cents for John Coslow a straw hat and I got home at sun down and tonight Geo P. and his two sisters returned home from Windsor on a visit to Mr. Winslow and Geo P. paid 16 cents for me a faucet in Pittsfield for the water works.
Monday: This forenoon we five of us mowed clover above the crib and some in the meadow south of the barn, the Irish boy spread hay and in the afternoon we all hoed potatoes and beans on my Rodgers farm. Our hired help all three worked for us today, that is J. Bassett, A. Celinbaum, and John Coslo.
Thursday: This forenoon we five of us mowed clover and the Irish boy weeded in the garden and this afternoon we all six of us hoed potatoes and plastered them.
Friday, July 4: Quite rainy. I took my one horse wagon and carried Old Mr. Perkins a pig, price agreed two dollars and 50 cents and he agreed to pay in work in haying, and I returned the same 12 bricks that John F. borrowed to John Russell’s and did not want them. The Irish boy J. Coslow helped Geo P. a spell plaster corn and carrots and then went to Independence. I gave him 18 cts and Geo P. gave him 12 cts. Towards night my two sons rode to Lebanon and the horse got frightened at the Gerrytipe Carriage and turned short round and broke the axletree.
Saturday: I am unwell, I did a few chores. Today my two sons and J. Coslow hilled corn on the widow Wylie’s land, and raked clover hay to home.