Hall Gibson wasn't born a farmer. It wasn't until the 1970s, after retiring from a civil service career in Washington, D.C., that he first picked up a hoe. Hall was drawn to the fields by his passion for Ryder Farm-which had been in his wife Kay's family for more than two hundred years-and the challenge of saving it.

Home to aged Sycamore trees that buttress the family's history as well as its centuries-old structures, homesteads such as Ryder Farm were once common in this part of New York's Putnam County, just over the Westchester border. But, in what has become a popular scenario for many farms caught in the undertow of suburban sprawl's expanding wave, the landscape of the area has shifted underfoot. Many of the family plots have metamorphosed from working dairy farms, once the backbone of the local economy, to tawny equestrian riding clubs. As development has increased, economic pressure has threatened to force the sale of Ryder Farm. Heartbroken at the prospect of losing it, Hall set about restructuring the farm to become economically viable and serve as a model for successful farming in a suburban setting.

Innovation has been a common thread throughout Hall's life. In the 1950s and 60s, Hall helped to promote neighborhood conservation in Alexandria, VA, by staving off corporate development of residential communities and providing an alternative plan for highway planning. At the core of his beliefs about farming is a concept Hall calls L.I.F.E. (Local Initiatives in Food and Environment), a philosophy of decentralized agriculture that seeks to grow food where people live-in the suburbs-rather then transporting it great distances at the expense of flavor, quality, and the environment.

Hall puts this theory into practice by providing delicious, organic produce to area residents through his one hundred member CSA. He has also received federal grant money for his development of experimental farming practices and machinery that, as he describes them, "conform with nature, rather then work against it." His systems limit the need for chemical and petroleum use on the farm, promote soil conservation, and require limited capital investment so that many more growers can afford to farm on a small scale.

Hall looks forward to sharing his ideas for these innovative systems as well as his hopes for the future of what he calls "ecological farming" at Terra Madre.
Ryder Farm - Brewster, NY
www.ryderfarmcsa.org
-Sherri Brooks Vinton, Slow Food New York City

 

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