Joseph Adams finished building the lovely brick home across the
street from the cache in 1891. Joseph made the bricks for the house
himself, using local clay. The house is one of only three buildings
in Layton listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
Joseph and his wife Belle raised 14 children, bees and peacocks on
about 80 acres of land. But 80 acres doesn’t go far with so many
descendants, and today the Adams estate consists of the house,
about 5 acres of land and…well, the peacocks.
The peacocks are especially fun to watch in the spring, when the
males fan their tails in hopes of impressing the womenfolk and cry
their lonely love songs all through the night (much to the dismay
of the neighbors!) In summer and fall, you might see the peacocks
hunting bugs with the more ordinary ducks and geese, or perched on
the fence or on top of old farm equipment in the pasture. When the
leaves are off the trees in the winter, the peacocks are most
visible in the early morning, roosting in the tops of the big trees
to the east of the house. The males look like big dark balls with
long tails hanging down, and the white feathers of the females make
them quite easy to pick out among the branches.