Ivar and Yvonne Skjulestad are the owners and managers of the Farm. Yvonne is educated as a kindergarden teacher and Ivar is a sivil engineer. They both have Agricultural school. They have run the farm since 1976 and wish to preserve it as an agricultural area within the rich and varied nature around the farm. On the property there are wild phesants, roes, foxes and badgers. Hares and moose can be seen ranging over as well. There is a unique birdlife at the farm and a particularly rich flora. The Nes river winds around half the estate, and the river banks is important to plants, animals and birds alike.
The owners main emphasis on the farm is, of course, to produce food. They cultivate the soil according to ecological principles which exclude the use of fertilizers and chemical pesticides.
The area where the farm is located has probably been inhabited since the Stone Age a couple of thousand years B.C. Flint fragments from this period have been found on the property. It is reasonable to believe that fields were cleared, and that a farm has been on the site since the Iron Age, possibly from the time of the birth of Christ. This can be deducted among other things from the name and the location of the farm. We can trace owners as far back as 1558.
In 1810 the farm was divided between three sons into: Øvre Berger (the original, upper part which still is a farm), Mellom-Berger (now holding companies like Veidekke, Dressmann, Biltilsynet and others), and finally, Nedre Berger (the lower part where you find ABB and Nesbru high school). Øvre Berger still stretched all the way to Slependen at the Oslo-fjord until 1903, and thus encompassed the major part of the Billingstad plain.
Since 1879 the farm has belonged to the family. Yvonne's great father Halvard Torgersen, bought it and married Fredrikke Wetlesen. Beside farming they ran a school for home economics from 1879 - 1917. The school received about 20 students every year for a ten months period, its purpose being "to educate interested adn talented prospective houswives, manageresses and maids for rural areas."
The practical and theoretical education consisted of the following subjects: houshold accounting, needlework, weaving, animal tending and dairy farming churning and cheese-making for their own needs, as well as poultry care and gardening. In addition came dietics, Norwegian, chemistry, physics, physiology, hygienics, child care, singing, and sports. It was indeed a many-sided and comprehensive education!
This school was a direct continuation of the one Fredikke's mother had run at Abildsø in the years 1865 - 1880. This is sought to be the first of its kind in Europe. Home Economics was even introduced in the ordinary schols of Asker as the first municipality in Norway by Fredrikke Torgersen in 1905.
In 1919 Halvard Torgersen and Fredrikke turned the farm over to their youngest son, Halvard Torgersen jr., who married Henriette Blakstad. Halvard Torgersen senior and his sons were very facinated by hunting. Together with his youngest son, he was also a pioneer in Asker. They held many leading positions in the central organizations of the district, and Halvard Torgersen senior even founded many of them. He also wrote Asker's first local history. They both occupied central posts in municipal politics and administration (such as major) for a number of years.