While I was outside one afternoon tending to a stubborn patch of grass that never seems to grow quite right, I stumbled upon something I never could’ve expected.
We live in a home that was built way back in 1799, and it has a bit of a colorful past—it used to be both a tavern and a doctor’s office, the kind of place where you could get a whiskey and a leech treatment all in one visit. That kind of history alone makes the yard feel special, but nothing prepared me for what I unearthed that day. As I pushed my shovel into the soil, I suddenly hit something solid. I took another scoop, and this time I saw the edge of what looked like brick or maybe stone. Intrigued, I cleared a little more dirt and saw the top of a granite post poking out of the earth, standing there like it had been waiting for someone to notice it for hundreds of years. My first thought, as dark as it sounds, was that maybe I had stumbled upon a grave marker.
But after brushing away more dirt, I noticed something strange—there was a hole through the top of the post, which made it look like it once held a ring. That was when it dawned on me: it wasn’t a grave at all, it was a hitching post, the kind used in the late 1700s for tying up horses. It made perfect sense once I thought about it. If this house used to be a tavern, people would have arrived on horseback, tied up their animals outside, and gone inside for a drink or to see the doctor.
Right around the post, I also noticed a circular stone pattern forming what looked like a shallow basin. At first, I thought it might be a drainage system, but then I realized it was likely a trough where horses could drink water while their owners took a break inside. As I kept digging, I found some old rusty metal bits—maybe remnants of the original ring hardware or even supports for the trough itself. And underneath those pieces were carefully arranged bricks and tightly packed stones, all forming the original base of the structure. It was clearly built to last, and last it did. The entire structure felt so solid, so carefully put together, like it had just been waiting under the surface for someone to bring it back into the light. The deeper I dug, the more amazed I became. I started to picture the scene from centuries ago—a man in breeches dismounting from his horse, tying it to the post, brushing it down with care, then walking inside to grab a drink or maybe talk to the local doctor about a lingering ache.
That post was just a routine part of life back then, nothing special to the people who used it daily. And now, centuries later, I was mowing around it like it was just another lawn ornament. But this is no ordinary garden fixture, and I’ve decided it’s staying just the way it is. There will be no conversion into a quirky birdbath or garden art project. We’re preserving this incredible piece of history. I plan to clean it up, clear out the area around it, maybe even install a small stone path leading to it, and add a little plaque to honor its purpose and legacy. Most people might find old nails, broken glass, or beer bottle caps when they dig around in their backyard. But I discovered a hitching post and water trough from the 1790s—an actual piece of American history hidden just beneath the surface of our lawn all these years. It’s a reminder that sometimes the past isn’t as far away as we think, and that even something as routine as mowing the lawn can become a journey into another time.
