Pictures from Serena & Mark's Past

Mark & Serena in Berkeley

We met in Berkeley, first on a street corner, then in a laundromat.

Mark as a Physics Student

Homesteading in Arkansas

We had 64 acres of Ozark Mtn. land in Madison County, Arkansas. Paid $11,000 for it. It had 1/4 mile frontage on a good county road about 10 miles south of Huntsville. The land was all hardwood forest. There was a small man-made pond and the land had a small creek running through the middle of it.

First we built a tent platform and set up a tent.
We bought the tent on sale. It had been in a train wreck and had been salvaged from underwater.
Then we bought a used trailer.
Towed it in with the pickup truck, with no plates. Got passed by a cop but he had something else on his mind. Backed the trailer in on the dirt road that we made. Had to cut down a few extra trees to make that work.
Trailer & Mark
Then we built a cabin.
Exterior view
Cabin, interior view

The cabin was 16' by 24'. We built it with no power tools. Later, we got phone and electricity. No plumbing though. Our biggest mistake: we put in used windows. Every one of them was different.