The Honor System

Scott and I drove down to Rockford, IL yesterday.  It's about an hour drive from Madison.  Scott was actually born and raised in that area.

We took Highway 51 out of Stoughton to I-39.  There is some pretty countryside along Hwy 51.  As Scott and I were cruising through the country, we saw an old farmhouse with several trailers set up in the front yard filled with pumpkins for sale.  Here is one of the trailers:  

Here is another:

And another:

In addition to pumpkins, they had a huge assortment of gourds.  (I guess a pumpkin is technically a gourd, isn't it?  Or is it technically a squash?)

That's a lot of gourds. 

They also had little decorative gourds.  

And how is this for a whole lot of squashes?  (Did I used the correct plural there, or is the plural of squash....squash?)

As you can see in the picture above, the pricing of the squash is posted on the sign attached to the trailer.  I wish I would have gotten a close up.  The sign had pictures of the various kinds of squash and then the price for each variety.  Here is how the pumpkins were priced.

The various sizes of pumpkins were displayed on the bench with signs attached to each one with the price of the corresponding size.  The small ones were $1.00, the next size was $2.00, and so on up to $5.00.  So, if you picked a pumpkin off one of the trailers, you compared it to these pumpkins on the bench to determine its size and, therefore, its price.  Unless you wanted what was described via signage as "huge heavy pumpkins".  Those were displayed on the porch of the old farmhouse and were $10.00 each.

No one from the farmhouse came around while we were there.  We got to wondering how one pays for their purchase.  Then we saw this sign.

Not sure if you can read the sign or not, but the bottom line reads "P.S. - money in the pumpkin mailbox please"  Here is the pumpkin mailbox on the corner of the trailer.

Side view of the pumpkin mailbox:

And, sure enough, when you open the pumpkin mailbox there is a little basket inside in which to put your money to pay for your goods.

The honor system. 

How often do you see the honor system in action in this day and age?  Personally, I rarely see it.  It appeared the people who own the farm are simple, down-to-earth people, trustin' folks to do the right thing and pay for what they take.  I found that kind of simplicity and trust downright refreshing.