Students, parents, alumni, faculty, staff, friends, and community members flocked to the Hampshire College Farm on Saturday for the annual Fall Festival during Family and Friends Weekend. It was a perfect fall day to enjoy great music, delicious food, and the company of friends at the Farm!
Crowds streamed down from campus toward the Farm all afternoon, led by the sounds of blues phenom Eli Catlin and Alumni Americana tunes from Ephemeral Stringband. Visitors meandered through a vibrant artisan market with local pottery, organic screenprinted clothing, farm illustrations, turned wooden bowls, alumni spun wool, and beautiful batiks as well as current students displaying leather and glass creations. Kids of all ages enjoyed art activities sponsored by various student groups: Mixed Nuts Co-op offered screenprinting of their original logo from the 70s, Wool People taught knitting lessons, and the Guerrilla Arts Brigade organized pumpkin painting and a “seed of life” drawing.
There were many opportunities for new visitors to learn about the Hampshire College Farm during the Festival including a farm tour with CSA Manager Nancy Hanson and Livestock Manager Pete Solis, and a chicken workshop led by Professor Cindy Gill that included egg candling, a tour of Hampshire’s 300 hen operation, discussion about breeds and chicken behavior, and tips on raising backyard birds. Free wagon rides looped through the farm’s vegetable fields where riders saw bountiful brassica plantings and enjoyed commentary from Assistant Vegetable Grower Jason Dragon. Festival-goers also enjoyed learning facts about Hampshire’s Farm by playing a a trivia game with question stations peppered around the farmyard. Players with perfect scores were rewarded with pumpkin prizes!
Aside from the fun had by all, the Festival was a great opportunity for friends of the Farm to participate in the Farm’s Strategic Planning process through a visioning activity. We asked, “What does the Farm mean to you?” and you told us:
Inside Thorpe Barn, visitors were encouraged to answer the following questions:
“My favorite memory of the Farm is…”
“I’ve spent time on the Farm as part of…(ex: class, work, research)
“When you think about the Farm, what comes to mind?”
“What activities would your ideal day on the farm involve?”
“What components of the Food, Farm, and Sustainability program would you like to see grow in the coming years?”
“What opportunities do you see for the Farm to involve the campus and the broader community in Food, Farm, and Sustainability programs?”
“What questions do you have about the farm?”
View the responses:
What about you? Leave your answers to these questions as a comment here, or email farm(at)hampshire.edu! The results from the visioning activity at the Fall Festival will inform a Farm survey that will be distributed to the Hampshire community in the upcoming months as part of the Strategic Planning Process. Stay tuned for more updates and consider joining the Food, Farm, and Sustainability Mailing List to stay informed.
