Elizabeth Brooks Fuller (1896-1979), a Deerfield, Massachusetts-based painter and member of the town's famous Fuller family of artists, chose subjects for her paintings from her immediate surroundings. Here, she is depicting one of the most common sights of the Deerfield of her day, the spring planting of potatoes. Potatoes were one of the most widely planted of the town's crops. One of the town's farmers is driving the horse-drawn potato setter while another drops seed potatoes into a trench at six-inch intervals from a bag held between his legs. The wagon holds more seed potatoes stored from the previous season's crops.