RUMOR CONFIRMED:
As Crane Farm approaches another turning point, word has begun circulating that Tyson and Doris Mertz are retiring October 31, 2026 and will not be renewing their lease with Somerset County.
The Mertzes have not owned the property, but for decades they have been Somerset County’s leaseholder, keeping the fields productive and the roadside stand open long after the Crane family retired and later sold the property.
For generations, residents traveling along Basking Ridge’s South Maple Avenue have stopped at Crane Farm for Jersey tomatoes, fresh lettuce, flowers, and seasonal produce. The modest roadside stand at 270 South Maple Avenue may look like a simple place to buy vegetables. However, it represents something increasingly rare: a surviving connection to the days when Basking Ridge was still a farming community.
The Crane Family Farm
Long before subdivisions transformed much of Bernards Township, farms, orchards and dairies shaped the local landscape. South Maple Avenue formed part of a largely rural corridor stretching from the village of Basking Ridge toward Lord Stirling’s former estate and the Great Swamp. Crane Farm is one of the few places where that agricultural past remains visible and active today.
The farm was never a sprawling agricultural estate, as its importance came from its continued use as a small, productive family farm close to the center of Basking Ridge. The tract includes a 19th-century house and the popular vegetable stand adjacent to the Lord Stirling Park riding stables.
Elmer William Crane was born in Basking Ridge on March 15, 1908, one of eight children of William Edwin Crane and Eva Luella McCollum Crane. His siblings were Anson Carl, Harold, Frederick, Irma, Jane, and Eva. As a young man, Elmer worked as a salesman before becoming a farmer in Bernards Township. He married Katherine Agnes “Kay” Lynch, and the couple had no known children. Elmer remained closely connected to Basking Ridge throughout his life and died on April 20, 1997, at the age of 89. Elmer ran the farm from 1931 until his retirement in 1993, along with his wife, Katherine “Kay” Crane, who later passed on July 21, 2000, at age 92.
Our Crane story on South Maple Avenue begins in 1911, when Eva Luella Crane acquired a nine-acre farm along the old road between Millington and Basking Ridge. Elmer Crane later recalled arriving at the farmhouse when he was only two years old, just as his father, Carl Edison Crane, began working the land along with Carl, the youngest of seven children (two sisters and four brothers). Carl was a pretty strong Bernards High School student as well, Bernards High School – Senior Class Vice President, Football Captain, and holder of the BHS Perfect Attendance Award.
Carl officially took ownership in 1929, but by 1933 young Elmer had taken command of the fields. While his father focused on grain, Elmer saw a future in vegetables, poultry, fruit, and anything else local families might carry home for supper.
By the 1940s, Crane Farm had become a familiar stop for fresh eggs, strawberries, honey and chickens sold directly from the property. In those days, tomatoes went for ten cents a pound and strawberries for fifteen cents a quart. The Cranes raised broilers, fryers, and roasting chickens, grew Christmas trees for a time, and eventually filled the fields with corn, beans, squash, peppers, eggplants, and flowers. Lots of flowers. Elmer planted about 18,000 gladiolas and 1,600 chrysanthemums in a single season, along with zinnias, marigolds, and asters. Generations of local teenagers worked in the fields or helped Katherine at the stand, making Crane Farm a summer workplace as well as a neighborhood gathering place.
Farming meant early mornings, long days, and constant battles with deer from the Great Swamp, raccoons at night, and hungry birds during the day. Still, Elmer never wished for another life. Elmer was a quiet man, known as a bit of a “kermugin,” and we’re not sure why he and Katherine never had children. He liked watching things grow and took pride in caring for them. By the 1970s, the farm could sell several thousand pounds of corn in a good week, yet it remained a family operation where nearly everything was planted, weeded, picked, graded, and sorted by hand. The Crane family held the property for nearly ninety years, but its real legacy was the tradition built there: fresh food, honest work and a roadside stand that became part of everyday life in Basking Ridge.
Cranes Retire & Pass the Tradition
The connection between the historic Crane family farm and the roadside stand residents know today centers on local farmer Tyson Mertz. Tyson first came to the property as a 15-year-old young man working alongside Elmer Crane. Under Elmer’s guidance, he learned the rhythms of the farm, from planting and cultivating to harvesting produce and preparing it for sale along South Maple Avenue.
As the Crane family stepped away from farming, Tyson Mertz and later his wife, Doris, took responsibility for continuing the operation in 1988. They did not purchase or inherit the property, nor were they related to the Cranes. Instead, they leased the land and carried forward what Tyson had learned directly from Elmer. “Elmer was always great to me,” said Tyson. “I really enjoyed working under his wing all those years…. and it’s now been almost 50 years.
Credit: MLHP 2026
Tyson started working on the farm the year before he graduated from Ridge High in 1980 at just 17 years old. Growing up nearby on Lake Road, Tyson tended the fields, while Doris would join later and help with the crops, operate the stand, and welcome generations of returning customers. Through the Mertzes, Crane Farm’s knowledge and traditions passed naturally from one farming family to another.
The stand is known for fresh vegetables, flowers, bedding plants, and seasonal fruit. Its heirloom tomatoes developed an especially loyal following, drawing customers seeking varieties rarely found in supermarkets. Lettuce, squash, zucchini, peppers, beans, basil, broccoli, cauliflower, and sunflowers were among the crops cultivated throughout the growing season.
Not everything sold at the stand is grown on the property. The Mertzes supplement their harvest with fruit, baked goods, artisan bread, and specialty foods from other farms and regional producers. This allows them to offer a wider selection while keeping the business rooted in New Jersey agriculture.
Preservation: The Farmland is Safe
The arrangement to preserve the farmland continued even after the land passed into public ownership, first to Bernards Township in 2001 and then to Somerset County in 2007. The Mertzes were interested at the time, but the asking price was over $1,000,000 and was a bit rich for the two at the time.
“You can’t buy a piece of property around here and pay for it by farming,” said Mertz, who will shutter the farm stand on South Maple Avenue this Sunday, at the close of his selling season, and return in the spring. “It worked out well in the end.”
Bernards Township secured a final offer of $515,000 and tied the deal to Green Acres funding, which later allowed them to sell the property to Somerset County. The sole bidder, Mertz, signed a five-year lease starting at $3,000 per year for the property, to be adjusted annually for inflation. The Crane Farm and farm stand is now the last farm stand within walking distance of Basking Ridge. There are two other stands in the township, one on Mountain Road and the English Farmstand in Liberty Corner. At the New Jersey Farm Bureau, field representative Ed Wengryn called the arrangement in Bernards “a very viable way for a working farmer to continue to have a profession.”
The Mertzes remain as leasing tenant farmers, preserving the fields, the roadside stand, and the personal connection that had begun years earlier between Tyson and Elmer Crane. In doing so, they became the bridge between two eras of Crane Farm. The renewable 5-year lease ends October 31, 2026, and the Mertzes are not planning to renew.
Public acquisition could have ended Crane Farm’s long agricultural history. Instead, preservation allowed the farmhouse, cultivated fields, and roadside stand to survive. Under Somerset County ownership, Tyson and Doris Mertz continued farming the property rather than seeing it converted into a conventional park or falling into the hands of developers; today, the land is preserved and farmed as open space.
More Than a Farm Stand
Crane Farm’s significance extends beyond the produce displayed beneath its roadside awning. It represents continuity. The Crane family name remains on the stand. The farmhouse associated with Elmer Crane still stands. Land once worked by the Crane family still produces vegetables, flowers, and other crops for the community.
Most of the farms that once surrounded Basking Ridge have disappeared or been transformed into neighborhoods, schools, parks, and commercial properties. Crane Farm survived because the land was preserved and because another local farmer remained willing to work it.
Today, the little stand on South Maple Avenue remains one of Basking Ridge’s most visible and meaningful agricultural landmarks. In this place, residents can still purchase a Jersey tomato from land that has been farmed for generations.
Help Mr. Local History Preserve Local Farmstand History
Tell us in the comments section at the end of this post why you go to the Crane farmstand…….
and visit the stand and send in a photo with you and your family for the album archive below.
The history of Crane Farm remains incomplete. The Mr. Local History Project is seeking photographs of the Crane family, the farmhouse, the early farm stand, and the surrounding property. We are also interested in hearing from anyone who remembers Elmer Crane, worked at the farm, or shopped there during its earlier years.
These photographs and firsthand memories can help document how the farm changed over time and preserve the story for future generations.
