Planting ideas through images; the making of a documentary.

Monday, April 7, 2014

Seeds Cast On The Airwaves

"Dirty Work: The Story of Elsie's Farm" has been broadcast over twenty times on TPT, Twin Cities Public Television. Fourteen thousand people have seen it, to date.

It's going to air again on Thursday, May 1st, at 8 P.M. on the Minnesota Channel, which is Channel 2.2 in the Twin Cities. If you miss that one, it'll air again on next Tuesday May 27th 2014 at 8 AM, 2 PM, and 8 P.M.

Don Roberts was ahead of his time, and these days new CSA's are springing up like green shoots in April. The Farm to Table model, where restaurants source their food directly from farmers, which he participates in now as Otter Creek Growers, is also spreading all over the country.

I recommend a wonderful book I'm reading, "Gaining Ground" by Forrest Pritchard. It's the story of a young man who saved his family farm in the Blue Ridge Mountains by converting it to grass fed organic meat. A wonderful, funny, optimistic and detailed picture of the struggle that organic farmers have to restore their land, and get these healthy alternatives to the markets that will support their efforts, it'll make you think twice about supermarket meat.

Likewise, in the very last scene of "Dirty Work" Don is wrestling with a wheelbarrow. Replacing the worn out handles involves extra work that many folks wouldn't make, given how cheaply you can buy a new one. Don shakes him head, then laughs a little and mimes himself as Don Quixote, tilting at the windmills of our consumer culture. He's determined to make this old one suffice. Well, he did. With Don and Forrest and others who share a conscientious view of the world, everywhere, here's hope that good things will continue to happen!

1 comment:

  1. I've caught Dirty Work a couple of times, and again last night. Love it, inspired my husband and I to do a little more farming this year on our urban plot.

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