Rest in Peace Wendell Berry
One of the Most Influential Advocates for Small Scale Farming
Wendell Berry, Photo by The Berry Center
This newsletter is a little different. On August 31, Wendell Berry, one of the most influential advocates for small farms and agrarian living passed away at his home in Kentucky at age 92. I want to share how his writing on sustainable agriculture led me and many others to farming and living a life centered around the natural world. He talked the talk and walked the walk. Since 1965, he worked on his farm in Kentucky using draft horses! The only farmers that I know that still use horses are Amish. He was a prolific writer of prose (both fiction and nonfiction) and poetry. In 2012, President Obama awarded Berry the National Humanities Medal.
Following my interest in environmental conservation, I started reading his work in high school. I didn’t understand everything he wrote about, and I don’t agree with everything he said, but what he said about supporting small-scale farming and rejecting consumerism made sense to me. What I really learned from Berry was that the best way to live sustainably may be to start a farm, something a young person from the suburbs like me didn’t think was possible. I'm trying to live sustainably by growing vegetables for my community, and like Wendell Berry I plan to do so for a long time. That said, my farm is technically in the suburbs, so not quite the rural lifestyle, but close enough.
News about his passing (no paywall)
RIP Wendell Berry. May his work live on forever.
RIP Dolly Parton, Tim Curry, and Gloria Steinem too.