Dick Thompson is standing in his machine shed, microphone in hand, striding across the front of an impromptu auditorium of folding chairs occupied by some one hundred farmers, university people, and others among the agriculturally curious. With the portable speaker slung over his shoulder Dick can move around a lot, and he does, asking for […]

They are people of the land, accustomed to depending on it to sustain them. But it is clear when you pass Maichoa and Blong Lee’s home in inner-city Des Moines that they are struggling with their tiny allotment. The front-yard garden, even with its brave display of an American flag, speaks of meagerness. The Lees […]

Paul Willis likes comparing hogs to tomatoes. Given the choice, which would you rather eat: a fragrant, vine-ripened tomato, or a tasteless, perfectly formed hothouse facsimile? A taste comparison of a pork chop from one of Paul’s hogs with one from a hog raised in concrete confinement prompts him to dub the latter “hothouse hogs.” […]

Kent and Diane Whealy were granted a sacred trust in 1971 when Diane’s grandfather Ott, gave them seeds of two varieties of garden plants—a tomato and a morning glory—which his parents brought with them when they emigrated from Bavaria to the United States in the 1870s., Baptist John Grandpa Ott died that winter, and the […]