"At first, it was pretty sad when my mother left," she said, referring to Erik's grandmother's sale of the main Fay Farm house. Jo Ann now lives just out of view of the property, about a five-minute walk down the road. Fay Farm changed hands within the family in the mid-'80s, and the Fay/Johnson clan officially let it go in the early 2000s. In Erik's youth, when his grandparents owned the property, he and his immediate family lived in a smaller house a stone's throw away. Upstairs, six large bedrooms take up most of the space. Other vintage details include a servants' staircase, a massive ice shed and an indoor privy in what's now an attached garage. The "seed room" is an airtight space that the Fays once used to keep their crops safe from vermin. The somewhat labyrinthine downstairs features a sizable modern kitchen, a suite of three adjacent living spaces, a bedroom and a full bathroom. The kitchen at the Fay family farmhouse in Jericho.With close to a dozen rooms and 4,200 square feet of livable space, the house offered plenty of nooks and crannies for hiding spots. She and Erik both noted that hide-and-seek was a family pastime across the generations. Some of her favorite memories include playing softball in the yard and riding horses to visit neighbors. "We had a big family - there were nine kids," said Erik's mother, Jo Ann Johnson (née Fay), 71, recalling her life in the house. In 1976, when the rest of the country was celebrating its bicentennial, the Fays were celebrating their centennial in the house. The house was built almost entirely of wood cut on the Fay property. Since the Johnsons aren't farmers, that suits them fine. Today, its acreage is a fraction of the original lot, extending just a short way around the house and adjacent barns. ![]() He was referring to the land within a one-square-mile radius of 254 Barber Farm Road. was once part of the Fay Farm," said Erik Johnson, 46, gazing at the verdant view from his front yard. Yet a Jericho brood recently did just that, buying a stout farmhouse that their ancestors occupied from the 1870s to the early 2000s. Most 19th-century homes have changed hands many times over the years once an estate is out of the family, the descendants rarely have a chance to reclaim their erstwhile property. The 200-year-old Fay family farmhouse in Jericho.
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