Annie Ager

Partial Transcript: I am Annie Clark Ager. I grew up here on this farm. My grandparents came here in 1916 and then my mother lived here, and my mother and father were married and then they had eight children and we all lived and worked on the farm, and had people that worked on the farm too. So now we’re still here and we’re very glad that we can keep the land and remain on the farm.

Partial Transcript: Well, we were very fortunate. Because we had great people that worked in the barn over there. We had the guys who milked; they were great characters. John Suttles, he was there about thirty years, and they lived up the hill. And Manny Ironfork; we had a lot of help. But we could come down and watch them milking and could see how the milking system worked. We also had pigs at the house and chickens and so we kind of grew up with all those things just being part of life. Just what you did.

Partial Transcript: We thought we worked way too much, I’m not sure we did. The idea was you worked in the mornings and in the afternoon you could play or go to…we had a wonderful swimming pool we could go to over in Gerton. We were quite sure it always rained in the afternoon, so you couldn’t play. There were a lot of things we had to do…feed the dogs, feed the horses, shuck corn. I remember shucking corn by the hour…it was coooold. You know, I’m sure it didn’t hurt me.

Partial Transcript: Well, we had every Christmas, we had on Christmas Eve we all got together and had lunch and Santa Claus came and then we had presents for all of us and all the other people on the farm. We also had…we all did, kinda work together…we would get hay and help; they did the milking; we were just children, but we would all work together, we felt like we were a part of it. We had our own pigs for ourselves. We had beef cows, they were up on the mountain; we would help drive them up the mountain. I remember helping Bernie and Clifford get up hay one day, just me and Bernie and Clifford. They were very doubtful, but we did it, we got it all up.

Partial Transcript: Well, I think probably the things I learned from my mother and father…my father was very devoted to the farm and really wanted it to have it make money, which was important, that doesn’t always happen on farms. He’d be very proud now, of my son, making it work. And my mother’s idea was that it wasn’t really ours. That we needed to take care of it for all things. And that the people were more important than what you were doing. So that’s always a good thing to remember, too.

Partial Transcript: I think that my family really had…I remember my mother talking about these mountain streams, because some of them weren’t clean, and we weren’t supposed to drink out of the streams; that was important as a child. Because you didn’t always know what was above there. But as my mother said, a mountain stream would clean itself every 25 feet, if you let it. And so, that was…we didn’t, I found it hard to take the animals out of the creeks, just because what if it freezes, what if you don’t have any water, then what are you going to do? Well, the thing is that you can get around those little things. I found it hard to get the animals out of the creeks, because they loved the creeks, they loved going into the creeks! Play in the creeks. But it does make a big difference. But that was just kind of a cultural thing, we all had to get over. But my mother’s idea was that you had to take care of it, because it wasn’t yours.

Partial Transcript: I think you know, we all learned together on that. The federation, the Farmers Federation that my grandfather started, and then my father worked in the Federation a long time. One of the things they talked about was soil erosion, which was a problem, which we all knew. Even in those days, using fertilizers to improve your soil. They would have a lot of entertainment, and they did it in all the public high schools. And every summer there was a picnic in every public high school and after the entertainment there was a group of men, they would come up and they had a clabbard – what do you call it – one of those things with a sign board on them and it says, one saying “fertilizer” one saying “insurance” one saying “soil…importance of soil” – and the big thing was for people not to walk out on each one of their talks. That made a good education for all of us. And “AI” – artificial insemination for dairy cows, we didn’t have to have a bull, which made a big difference. Also for beef cows, and also the genetically increasing the milk production by using good bulls, all of that was coming into, people were learning.

Also they had a freezer locker plant, where you could take your meat and freeze it and keep it in a bin there. That was before the days of home freezers. And they had they developed poultry barns. We also heard all that information.

Partial Transcript: He just got interested in the farmers around here. When he first came, and then he realized that the very average income was about $86 a year. Most farmers, the land was pretty depleted, so it was hard to make a living. There was no place to sell anything. So his idea was to develop a cooperative. There was a big cooperative movement in the 20’s. As you know, that was a big time for cooperatives. So he thought they could all buy feed together, and that would make a big difference. His first project was to send chickens to NYC, cause he knew a lot of people there. So he thought the mountain people could bring chickens, and he’d send them to NY and sell them for a better price than you could get down here. But of course, they all brought their worst old roosters and old hens and it wasn’t a successful trip; that was not good. But then they worked on some different plans and did better, so

Partial Transcript: The Farmers Federation developed a hatchery. They worked on artificial insemination for dairy cows. They had a freezer locker plant. They had a farm training program, down on the river. The building that is now where Ananda’s is, was the old Federation building. It’s named after an artist, I think. Anyway, they had a big building in downtown Asheville. And they brought…they had a warehouse in every county; they had one in Fletcher, one in every county, Clay County. And they’d buy feed in large bulk, and the Federation by the 50’s, by 55 it wasn’t doing as well, and they wanted to merge with Southern States, but the reason was people were, also with the encouragement of the people around here, they were bringing in Ecusta, Owen, Enka Plant…all those plants were coming and people were working there. And still this area has people work in the plant and then have 25 cows. They all have a little farm. They kept their farms on the side.

Partial Transcript: Well, I think that for farms in a way, the industrialized farming, you can see why you did that. It would be a lot easier; you know how much you’re going to raise. You put it into a pattern; how much you’re going to raise is how much you’re going to make. It’s really hard to do that with farms, because farming is just sort of not that kind of an industry. But this area, the way it’s grown, we have a much easier way of selling to people directly. Direct sales, is… can make money. But now that’s not going to be true for everybody, or like milk, it’s much more a controlled substance. So that’s why that’s been harder for milk, although you can make things, like cheese. There are friends over in Polk County, they bought a dairy and they make cheese and yogurt and sell it that way. They’re able to direct market that way. But that probably is for this area, the way for a farmer to be successful, is to do direct marketing.

Because as all things are, you can grow anything, but if you got to sell it. And we don’t have the markets that we used to have, that would buy…even for apples, so we had a bigger market for apples in the past…Gerber was here and the Seneca Plant, but it’s now cheaper to buy apples from China for them or to buy apple juice, then it is for them to buy it here. And you know, that changes everything.

Partial Transcript: There are a few things we fail on – I was going to tell you – like feed. Feed is very expensive for pigs, and chickens. But the ground is organic and the hay is organic for the cows. Everything is organic for the cows. Totally organic. We just felt like it was healthier. You know, again, I can see why they use all the pesticides and fungicides, because it’s easier, it makes it…but we talked about Wilma Dykeman before. She realized that too. Her husband was Jim Stokeley from Stokeley Van Camp, and she realized it can be a problem using all the poisons. I’m not totally organic committed, but I do think it can be…it’s better for you, just better.
My mother was very good on that too. We did that in the garden. We always had to rake the soil back up the hill, that was a bother. We had to rake all the beds. You had to hoe up the hill; “don’t hoe down the hill.” She had a lot of ideas like that. Which were probably the good ideas. She was right.

Partial Transcript: That was… my parents passed away…my father spent a lot of time, my father was in the Congress in the eighties and that was a big time for the environmental movement for preserving land. So he did. They preserved Panther Town, at that time. And they did a lot of other…so we had that on our minds as being a thing you could do. And also the Southern Appalachian was here, the Southern Appalachian had been developed and the Roan Mountain Conservancy, so there were possibilities. So when my parents passed away, what we inherited was the land. And we did do a plan, my brothers, and we did do a plan of the whole farm. It’s the size of the city of Greenville, so you know we had 60 houses down here, and we had a thing like the Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill has a place with cows, Belted Galloways out in the yard. And then we had houses on the mountain and we looked at it and we all decided that we didn’t want to do it. So, that was probably good that we did that. Look at what the possibilities were.
And at that point we had great advice from the Southern Appalachian Conservancy and great advice from the North Carolina Land and Water Commission, we have a great friend, Mike Leonard, from Winston Salem, they all helped us to do various kinds of easements. We have a farmland easement; we have a scenic highway easement; we have forest land easement, with lots of friends. It took a long time. My family was very patient. It took about 8 -10 years, a long time. All separate pieces, but we somehow got all that put together. It was good though.

Partial Transcript: Well, just because we were really attached to the land. And probably that’s because we were here. We were walking on it, riding on it, being part of it. Uh, once we looked at what they might do, we were all sort of like, “I don’t think so.” Just like the mountain, they had houses, little condominiums up on top of the mountain. And we were all…couldn’t do it…just wasn’t in us. So…..

Partial Transcript: Everybody’s been very supportive of this and also we do have a business here. So the community has been very supportive, about buying, supporting that. It’s good to have the land, but you do need people to come around to buy whatever you’re selling. Also, there’s other people who’ve gotten interested in doing this. We did do a scenic highway. We declared Highway 74 a scenic highway. We worked hard on that with other neighbors, because we realized that might… it just controls billboards. There’s ways to get easements off the scenic highway and everybody was realizing that we were going to lose it. Even the people who wanted to do hunting, people who want to hike. It’s pretty important. I think everybody was realizing it.

Partial Transcript: I think people want a product that is healthier. And they think it’s interesting to see how it’s grown. And there it is; there’s little babies and there’s mamas. It does help. We do, I teach riding lessons a bit. People like to ride. We lead people on ponies. People have a fun experience. Hopefully. And try to make it as real as possible. You don’t want to make it not real. But I’m afraid that was another fault of our family. We all thought we had to be real all the time, so that’s good. But, I think it’s the way to go for now, for us, and that could change; it could be different. The next generation is… my niece is growing vegetables and has a successful sales on that. That’s worked out well for her. Everybody has to find their place.

Partial Transcript: Here at the farm store they have beef, pork, chicken. They make sausages, they make beef sticks. They have value added products. Then we also sell for other people. We sell cheeses from the local area, Looking Glass Creamery, and there’s a couple of other creameries that we sell for. So we try to sell products, again, that are locally made. Jam, Amondas Jam

Partial Transcript: Having been on this land, and what our family’s taught us. It does give us a sense of continuity. I feel that if you sell something, then it’s gone. You can always go back, but it’s not going to be the same. It’s not the same. Now…and it’s not always possible. It certainly not always possible. I always think, people come to our house and they say, “Oh, it smells just like my grandmother’s house.” Well, it probably does, it might very well. But I think it’s a gift that you can do that. We’re very fortunate that we can do that. Not everybody can do it. But that we’ve developed these instruments for conservation that are very important, that everyone can support. It’s very important. Like the Eco-thing in Henderson County for the apples. That was a very important thing too, Realizing, we had the apples…my father, he loved the apples, we sell apples – we still do. But he worked hard every year pruning. Win an election, lose an election, he’d be out there the next day pruning. Because it was that time of year.

Realizing the importance of work. How work does…that you have to do it and it’s good for us, in a sense.