Photograph of Marion Lazelle and a Brown Fruit Farm Truck

Pictured here is a truck for the Brown Fruit Farm. Standing on the roadway behind the truck is Marion (Buddy) Lazelle. The driver inside the truck is unidentified.

The Brown Fruit Farm operated north of Worthington for nearly fifty years, from around 1912 to 1958. The farm grew and sold apples and apple products such as juice, candy and apple butter, as well as cherries, plums and honey. As of 1925, the farm encompassed 100 acres planted with 4000 fruit trees and was the largest fruit farm in central Ohio. Owned by Frame Brown and later his daughter Molly, it was renowned not only for the quality of its produce, but also for its innovative roadside marketing, including signs telling motorists how many miles they were from the farm.

Buddy Lazelle was in charge of the Apple House at the Brown Fruit Farm, where apples were sorted and packed for sale. Apples in storage were kept at the ideal temperature of 40 degrees, then sent by the crate on ramps with rollers to the Apple House, where they were sorted by size by the apple-grader machine. Workers on either side of the line removed blemished apples. Crates of sorted apples were then placed in the retail showroom at the front of the Apple House.