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Local residents are honoring Miami University's 200th birthday this fall by constructing corn mazes in shapes of famous Miami logos.
Though a time consuming task, Bryan Butterfield of Butterfield Farms and Leslie Krehbiel of Highland View Farms gave Miami a unique birthday present.
Though both farms took different steps to master the complex designs, the mazes were constructed for one main reason: to honor Miami University.
Butterfield said he worked with an engineering class at Miami that used a GPS-guided lawn mower to design the maze.
Senior Tom Burg had a huge hand in the project. He is an engineering management and engineering manufacturing double major who took part in the engineering class. Burg said the final project was to make a design for a corn maze and that the winning design would be made at Butterfield Farm.
With help from graduate student Xiaolei Mao, Burg was able to make their final project a reality. "The process was really interesting, the cutting took two to three days and it was actually easier in the evening," Burg said. "Bryan was really easy to work with, he's a really laid back guy."
Though Butterfield has no direct connection to the university, his farm's customers are often students.
"Something else that we'll do is to hide mailboxes in the maze," Butterfield said. "If you can find a mailbox and tell us what is inside you can get discounts on pumpkins."
Butterfield also said many sororities and clubs rent out the maze in the evenings and he hopes they will return this autumn. He added that his staff haunts the maze around Halloween, and offers hayrides and campfires.
There is no transportation offered from Miami's campus to the farm, but Butterfield said the farm is about a mile and half away and is easy to find. He said the farm is open 10 months a year and seven days a week from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. for the public and afterward for private events. It is $5 per person for the public and for a private party, the fee is around $7 a head.
About eight miles from Oxford on Stillwell-Beckett Road, Highland View Farm has its second annual maze.
Leslie Krehbiel said her corn maze depicts the Bicentennial logo. She said she enjoyed working on it even though the task was daunting.
"I have two sons, one graduated from Miami and one is a current junior," Krehbiel said. "I got my master's degree from Miami, and we have lived in the area for a long time. We just really wanted to honor the university. It was my son who actually came up with the idea to do the Bicentennial logo. Last year's (maze) was really simple, not really comparable to the size of this years."
Instead of using GPS and a Miami engineering class, Krehbiel said she turned to a guidebook to make the maze.
"Well, I basically bought a book, like Mazes 101, and looked at how to do it," Krehbiel said. "Then we flagged every 10 rows of the corn and drew the design on graph paper. We used a grid system and then took a lawnmower to it about every four days."
Krehbiel said she was pleasantly surprised by the turn out of the design and hopes many students will come enjoy the maze and the farm this fall.
Krehbiel said the maze opens Sept. 26 and will remain open until the end of October. The maze is open from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Saturdays and Sundays. The fee is $5 per person and free for children age 3 and under.
In addition, Krehbiel said Miami will receive 10 percent of her profits.
