Fred Baldwin
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James Edwards
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Interviews
Interview with farmer James Edwards of Raleigh City Farm
Interview conducted by Jack Martinez on May 3, 2017 at 2:57 PM
Why urban farming?
I chose urban farming because of the site location, the visibility, It was also small enough scale that I could wrap my head around four season farming on a smaller, reduced third of an acre size, rather than going into renting five acres or a larger scale. This is a great starting point for me as a beginning farmer.
Did you start the Raleigh City Farm?
So no, I didn't start the farm, I came in after the farmers had struck a deal with “Hoppy Properties” and helped the organization get started in many different facets. I was basically--I built the stage for the wash station, I built the foundation for the water cisterns, I did a lot of construction--I built this shed, I did a lot of foundation work, I planted the pollinator habitat with my friend Chris Rumbley, planted the food forest. Ultimately, I got a lease on the plot while I was working at Old Milbourne Farm and then transitioned over to here to take over full time and plant the land. At the beginning, the organization was still trying to figure itself out, and I was just here to buffer that, and give it what it needed in many different facets from delivering food to restaurants with my truck, to planting pollinator habitat, planting food forest with kids, and then now doing the annuals.
What role does race play in urban farming, especially at this farm?
I don’t see it being a big role, or taking any major stance in what I do, I don’t even think about that being a real topic of conversation because I just don’t see how it-- I don’t really have a good answer for you, but I don’t see how race plays into what urban farming is, I think it connects all people rather than one race or the other. Any race, you know? Hispanic, Chinese, African-American, Any of that-you know? Growing touches all people, no matter what stage of your life, it’s always touching to see a plant grow, and to eat the fruits of your labor.
Interview with farmer Fred Baldwin of the IFFS Teaching Farm
Interview Conducted by Jack Martinez on April 18, 2017 at 4:37 pm
How does race come into play with the IFFS farm?
It's fair to say that the majority of our clients, the people we grow food for are people of color. in terms of being on the farm, we are unfortunately, despite our best efforts a fairly white farm. The vast majority of our volunteers are white. The African Americans we see, we don't see an awful lot of them, what is interesting is many that we do see out here, who come out either individually or with groups, many of them have grandparents who grew up on farms, and they've spent time as children on their grandparents farms, and they've got a connection with the land that a lot of white folks don't have. Then in terms of getting a whole lot of ethnic diversity, it's something that we work on pretty hard from our side and our volunteer base, but it still is predominantly a white population that helps us out on the farm.
Refugee farmers, tell us about that.
In fact they moved with us there, and are just beginning to work the land on the other side as well, and these are folks from Burma, refugees from Burma, Burma’s been in one civil war or another for the last 100 years or so. And, these folks are members of the Karen community, it is an ethnic minority. These folks tend predominately to be Catholic. The ethnic majority in Burma, and the leading, the leadership, the government is predominantly Buddhist. These folks are caught between a rock and a hard place, and they get the opportunity to leave Burma, many of which have spent nine years or so in refugee camps, primarily in Thailand, and they get the opportunity to come here, and they come to North Carolina and they come from what is culturally an agricultural background, it's an agrarian society. They predominantly have grown up on farms, and a farm of our size which Ida roughly ten acres in total would be an enormous farm to them, they have very small plots, they still work with oxen rather than tractors. They come here, and food comes from grocery stores, and they go to a grocery store, and frankly they've never been in a grocery store so they're not sure what to make of that, and they don't recognize any of the produce, many of them are vegetarians, and they don't understand why their chicken is already cut up and wrapped up in plastic, same with any other meats, they're used to getting it live, and butchering it themselves, so it's a difficult transition for them. Their children are going to grow up in a very different culture than them. We work in part with NC State, with caring communities, we give them access to land, and access to water, they provide their own seeds and tools but they come out here, and as individual families get the opportunity to have what amounts to a very large garden. Each of them do their own garden, and grow many of the same things, but they also grow primarily food which is culturally appropriate to them. It's things like water gourd and yard long beans, which if you think string beans that are a yard long, that's literally what we're talking about a lot of different greens which you wouldn't be familiar with. They love really spicy foods, so they grow some peppers that are just scorchingly hot, and even the kids eat them which is really pretty amazing, but I'm too much of a weenie for them. The other thing that is really interesting about the way they grow their produce is they are used to growing in areas that are really very small, so they trellis. Their... many of their crops to grow up as opposed to down and across the soil. Water gourds are a good example of that, they grow very much like water melons, and water melons take up an awful lot of space, so they grow these gourds up, and they build the trellises out of bamboo and the gourds are this big around, and they'll weigh upwards of fifteen or twenty pounds, so they build little tables for the gourds to sit on because they’re so heavy they'd pull the whole trellis down if it was just suspended from the trellis. So it really is an exercise in architecture, it's not just agriculture because they've got to build these trellises in such a way that they don't …
The recording was lost past this point, the rest of the interview is lost with it.
Interview conducted by Jack Martinez on May 3, 2017 at 2:57 PM
Why urban farming?
I chose urban farming because of the site location, the visibility, It was also small enough scale that I could wrap my head around four season farming on a smaller, reduced third of an acre size, rather than going into renting five acres or a larger scale. This is a great starting point for me as a beginning farmer.
Did you start the Raleigh City Farm?
So no, I didn't start the farm, I came in after the farmers had struck a deal with “Hoppy Properties” and helped the organization get started in many different facets. I was basically--I built the stage for the wash station, I built the foundation for the water cisterns, I did a lot of construction--I built this shed, I did a lot of foundation work, I planted the pollinator habitat with my friend Chris Rumbley, planted the food forest. Ultimately, I got a lease on the plot while I was working at Old Milbourne Farm and then transitioned over to here to take over full time and plant the land. At the beginning, the organization was still trying to figure itself out, and I was just here to buffer that, and give it what it needed in many different facets from delivering food to restaurants with my truck, to planting pollinator habitat, planting food forest with kids, and then now doing the annuals.
What role does race play in urban farming, especially at this farm?
I don’t see it being a big role, or taking any major stance in what I do, I don’t even think about that being a real topic of conversation because I just don’t see how it-- I don’t really have a good answer for you, but I don’t see how race plays into what urban farming is, I think it connects all people rather than one race or the other. Any race, you know? Hispanic, Chinese, African-American, Any of that-you know? Growing touches all people, no matter what stage of your life, it’s always touching to see a plant grow, and to eat the fruits of your labor.
Interview with farmer Fred Baldwin of the IFFS Teaching Farm
Interview Conducted by Jack Martinez on April 18, 2017 at 4:37 pm
How does race come into play with the IFFS farm?
It's fair to say that the majority of our clients, the people we grow food for are people of color. in terms of being on the farm, we are unfortunately, despite our best efforts a fairly white farm. The vast majority of our volunteers are white. The African Americans we see, we don't see an awful lot of them, what is interesting is many that we do see out here, who come out either individually or with groups, many of them have grandparents who grew up on farms, and they've spent time as children on their grandparents farms, and they've got a connection with the land that a lot of white folks don't have. Then in terms of getting a whole lot of ethnic diversity, it's something that we work on pretty hard from our side and our volunteer base, but it still is predominantly a white population that helps us out on the farm.
Refugee farmers, tell us about that.
In fact they moved with us there, and are just beginning to work the land on the other side as well, and these are folks from Burma, refugees from Burma, Burma’s been in one civil war or another for the last 100 years or so. And, these folks are members of the Karen community, it is an ethnic minority. These folks tend predominately to be Catholic. The ethnic majority in Burma, and the leading, the leadership, the government is predominantly Buddhist. These folks are caught between a rock and a hard place, and they get the opportunity to leave Burma, many of which have spent nine years or so in refugee camps, primarily in Thailand, and they get the opportunity to come here, and they come to North Carolina and they come from what is culturally an agricultural background, it's an agrarian society. They predominantly have grown up on farms, and a farm of our size which Ida roughly ten acres in total would be an enormous farm to them, they have very small plots, they still work with oxen rather than tractors. They come here, and food comes from grocery stores, and they go to a grocery store, and frankly they've never been in a grocery store so they're not sure what to make of that, and they don't recognize any of the produce, many of them are vegetarians, and they don't understand why their chicken is already cut up and wrapped up in plastic, same with any other meats, they're used to getting it live, and butchering it themselves, so it's a difficult transition for them. Their children are going to grow up in a very different culture than them. We work in part with NC State, with caring communities, we give them access to land, and access to water, they provide their own seeds and tools but they come out here, and as individual families get the opportunity to have what amounts to a very large garden. Each of them do their own garden, and grow many of the same things, but they also grow primarily food which is culturally appropriate to them. It's things like water gourd and yard long beans, which if you think string beans that are a yard long, that's literally what we're talking about a lot of different greens which you wouldn't be familiar with. They love really spicy foods, so they grow some peppers that are just scorchingly hot, and even the kids eat them which is really pretty amazing, but I'm too much of a weenie for them. The other thing that is really interesting about the way they grow their produce is they are used to growing in areas that are really very small, so they trellis. Their... many of their crops to grow up as opposed to down and across the soil. Water gourds are a good example of that, they grow very much like water melons, and water melons take up an awful lot of space, so they grow these gourds up, and they build the trellises out of bamboo and the gourds are this big around, and they'll weigh upwards of fifteen or twenty pounds, so they build little tables for the gourds to sit on because they’re so heavy they'd pull the whole trellis down if it was just suspended from the trellis. So it really is an exercise in architecture, it's not just agriculture because they've got to build these trellises in such a way that they don't …
The recording was lost past this point, the rest of the interview is lost with it.
