By JANE HOUIN
Ohio Correspondent

LUCAS, Ohio — This December, visitors to Malabar Farm State Park in Lucas, Ohio, will have the opportunity to celebrate the beauty of the holidays in old-fashioned style.

The farm’s annual Candlelight Christmas Tours will take place from Dec. 10-13 during special evening hours. The event will feature a variety of holiday decorations showcasing greenery, candles, bubble lights and many other items common in the 1940s.

There will also be six different Christmas trees on display that will each display a different theme. Each tree will be decorated by a different volunteer organization.

But in addition to the beautiful holiday decor, guests will also have the opportunity to delight their other senses as well. The annual Christmas celebration also features live caroling, freshly-baked cookies and hot wassail. And the Malabar Farm/Lehman’s Country Store will also be open for holiday shopping, where customers can treat themselves (and their family and friends) to a variety of unique Ohio products including all-natural beef and pork as well as fresh-made fudge.

And of course, no Christmas celebration could be complete without a visit from the “big man” himself: Santa’s Workshop will also be open for visitors with a chance for young and old to visit with the jolly old elf himself.

Malabar Farm is where Louis Bromfield, a Pulitzer prize-winning author and dedicated conservationist built a 32-room country home, where his family, friends, and neighbors could share the pleasure he took in life on the farm. He prided himself on resorting the rich fertility of the farmland and preserving the beauty of the woodlands, and he documented those experiences in his book Pleasant Valley.

An agricultural innovator, Bromfield helped pave the way for a new way of farming we now call sustainable agriculture, which is based on a whole-system approach focused on the long-term health of the land. The focus of these efforts was a management-intensive method of growing crops at a profit while concurrently minimizing negative environmental impacts, improving soil health, environmental biological diversity and controlling plants. The system focuses on long-term solutions to problems rather than the short-term treatment of the symptoms.

For example, the use of agricultural chemicals and similar inputs might be reduced, but not necessarily eliminated. As a result, the land develops diversity and resiliency that further reduces the need for agricultural chemicals.

To be truly sustainable, however, the farm system must be sustainable economically, ecologically and socially. That means that the farm must generate enough income to sufficiently support farm families and provide an economic base for the community; use farming methods modeled on nature to encourage energy flow, effective waterfall and mineral cycles and viable community dynamics; and promote the physical, spiritual, cultural and economic health of farm families and communities. The question with sustainable agriculture is not whether it is low-tech or high-tech, but rather is it uses appropriate technology.

In 1972, the state of Ohio accepted the deed on the farm from the Louis Bromfield Malabar Farm Foundation, which had owned and operated the farm for 14 years. For the next four years, the farm was operated jointly by the state’s departments of natural resources and agriculture before becoming one of Ohio’s state parks in 1976.

Today, the park is dedicated to perpetuating Bromfield’s farming philosophies, preserving the Big House and its many artifacts and providing a space where visitors can explore life on a farm and the beauty of nature.

The self-guided tour during the candlelight celebration will take guests through Malabar Farm’s “Big House,” perhaps most notably known for being the location of Humphrey Bogart’s wedding to Lauren Bacall.

Live entertainment and music are provided for the self-guided tour. Hours for the candlelight tour will be from 5-9 p.m. Thursday through Saturday and from 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Sunday. Admission is $5 for adults, $4.50 for seniors and $3 for children ages 6 through 17 with those under 6 receiving free admission.

Malabar Farm State Park is located at 4050 Bromfield Road just outside of Lucas in Richland County, Ohio. For more information about this and other special events offered at the park year-round, call the park office at 419-892-2784.