| Dear Friends, As the tributes to Wendell Berry pour in, I’d like to pay homage not as a poet or essayist, but as a farmer. I first met Wendell in the early 1980’s. Hal Hamilton introduced us. Hal had recently graduated from Cornell and moved to Henry County to learn from–and live by–Wendell’s ideas. He started a small dairy. I’d taken over my mother’s farm in the fall of 1981. In our arrangement she “kept” the tobacco crop and income, while my husband, infant daughter and I were to make a living on the rest–mainly beef cattle. We had absolutely no idea what we were getting into. In 1985, I started the Laura’s Lean Beef Company, and around the same time Hal started the Community Farm Alliance. At farm meetings, and with personal letters and advice, Wendell inspired and encouraged us both. Meanwhile, my mother stayed in the tobacco business. For generations, tobacco–the iconic Kentucky crop–remained viable in part because of the Depression-era co-op, which negotiated prices and restricted supply. Wendell’s father John helped found the co-op and Wendell’s brother John Berry Jr. was its president during mother’s time farming. They were friends. After the tobacco buy-out ended supply controls and price floors, John called a meeting of about 8 people to discuss the future of the co-op. One proposal was a vegetable co-op. The second was a biotechnology venture: genetically modified tobacco plants would be used to produce pharmaceutical proteins. At the meeting, Wendell asked a question of the genetic-engineering advocate. Being a bit of a science nerd, I nearly interrupted him–until a quick “keep quiet” side glance stopped me. Then, I understood that he was “playing dumb,” to shine a spotlight on the answer, which was that this would do very little, if anything, for small and mid-sized Kentucky farmers. Wendell had a wicked sense of humor! Out of this meeting, the Central Kentucky Growers Association Co-op came to life, with Zeldon Angel, a skillful farmer in the Mt. Folly neighborhood, its cornerstone for years. It is still in operation, with local farmworkers getting ready to pick pumpkins for Kroger’s for Halloween. The biotech company eventually went bankrupt. In 2005, I took a bad horseback riding fall and was laid up for several years. Wendell sent me a note, telling me, “don’t get back on that same horse.” I followed directions, humor intact. |
| We are still going, dedicated to our small rural town with renovated buildings and company headquarters for Mt. Folly Beef, Mt. Folly Pork, Regeneration Distillery, Boone’s Settlement Rye Whiskey, and Laura’s Mercantile, an online store for out-of-town customers. Wendell, we thank you! |