BYERS - The field is fallow where the Gerstenberger boys tried to coax winter wheat to grow with moisture from the sky.

It's now almost a half-mile of prairie grass, a few thin strands of volunteer rye and a prickly pear cactus or two hugging close to the beige sandy loam.

"That soil, it'll blow," said Arlo Gerstenberger, one of two surviving brothers.

The Gerstenberger Brothers' place has been designated by state organizations as a Centennial Farm, honoring its 100th year.

The farm was scratched out in 1907 by Louis and Ethel Gerstenberger, Arlo's parents. They had six sons - Arlo, Murlin, Virgil, Alvin, Keith and Bob.

Arlo and Murlin are still living.

The family started farming across the road to the east in 1907, but moved to their present location about five miles out of Byers in 1929. They moved out of an adobe house and into a frame shell they later filled in.

"I remember when they were building it," Arlo said. "In evenings, our job was to pick up the nails the carpenters had dropped. We'd make quite an issue of straightening them on a railroad iron. That was the poor man's anvil.

"Daddy survived the (stock market)crash, the Dust Bowl and the Great Depression," Arlo said. "We survived all of them through hard work and determination."

Shake his hand to this day and they're still calloused from a life of hard work.

There used to be a windbreak of Chinese elms surrounding the house. The current drought has stressed and killed a lot of them - looks more like a hockey player's smile now.

Arlo, 82, and Murlin, 86, visited their farm Monday.

In their day, a good year was when there was a crop to harvest.

"You'd get one crop about every three years," Arlo said. "You'd give one to the drought and one to the hail. In 1939, we sat in a '29 Pontiac in a hailstorm that beat the roof right to the wooden stakes."

Dryland farming the wheat and field corn was such a crapshoot that it made their dairy herd all the more precious.

"We had 22 cows at the height of the operation," Arlo said. "Those cows were the bloodstream of the farm."

The family also raised a few head of beef cattle under the brand "chair open A," which looks like an upside down "4" over an inverted "V."

It was a simple life. Entertainment was provided by the family or friends who'd stop by.

"We had a farm hand that played guitar," Murlin said. "He played Skeeter on the Wall. I ain't heard it since."

When the brothers were milking cows, they'd pour feed into a dimpled trough in the concrete floor.

"Everything was measured in coffee cans," Arlo said.

And there were always plenty of empty coffee cans.

"Mom was a Swede. So she always had a pot of coffee on," Arlo said.

"She worked hard," Murlin said.

There's an outbuilding behind the farmhouse that the brothers call the Woolworth. That's because it was built from scrap lumber and shingles from an old Woolworth's store that was being remodeled.

"One of our brothers was a manager," Arlo said.

That building is where the family kept the "bucket calves" - the unweaned young ones that were bought on the cheap.

"You'd get a bucket of milk and stick your hand in it," Arlo said. "The calves would suck the milk off your fingers. Pretty soon, they learned to drink the milk from the bucket."

World War II changed a lot of things. Four brothers served.

In the '50s, the boys went to work off the farm. Arlo used the GI Bill to become a watchmaker.

"After he really retired, he bought old clocks and fixed them," said Arlo's wife, Harriet. "We probably have 50 clocks in our house."

They all keep time - their own. "You have to average them to get the time," Arlo quipped.

Both Arlo and Murlin have lived in Denver almost 60 years. Their father died in 1953 and brother Bob took over the farm. Arlo and Murlin went out on weekends to help.

"It was more like, 'Why'd you do this?' and 'Why'd you do that?' " Harriet said.

For the past 22 years, the wheat field has been in "commodity reserve reduction," meaning the government pays the family not to farm.

Murlin said he misses a big part of the farm - actually the heart and soul of it.

"I miss my folks," he said. "And I miss my brothers."

Centennial Farms

This year, 19 Colorado farms have been designated 2007 Centennial Farms. They will be honored Friday at the Colorado State Fair in Pueblo.

• Bauder Farm, 1907, Fleming, Logan County

• Collins Ranch, 1907, Kit Carson, Cheyenne

• Currier Georgia Mesa Ranch, 1906, Molina, Mesa

• DeLong Farm, 1889, Rocky Ford, Otero

• Engler Ranch, 1904, Ignacio, La Plata

• Gerstenberger Brothers Farm, 1907, Byers, Arapahoe

• Gourdin Ranch, 1902, Bon Carbo, Las Animas

• Helling Brothers Farm, 1907, Idalia, Yuma

• Hughes Homestead, 1907, Stratton, Kit Carson

• Klann Farms, 1906, Arriba, Lincoln

• Lanckriet Custom Farms, 1907, Julesburg, Sedgwick

• Lykkehoy Farm, 1907, Otis, Washington

• Matthies Farm, 1907, Burlington, Kit Carson

• Mikita Family Ranch, 1905, Calhan, El Paso

• Mountain View Ranch, 1907, Steamboat Springs, Routt

• Smelker Family Farm, 1907, Stratton, Kit Carson

• Souser Farm, 1907, Otis, Washington

• Stanko Ranch, 1907, Steamboat Springs, Routt

• Wilson Ranch, 1907, Wray, Yuma

Massarog@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-954-5271.

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