Which newspaper? I haven't seen this week's Monitor, so I am clueless.

In general, though, since we moved here in 1999, I have noticed quite a change in the town of Marietta, and NOT a change for the better. When we first moved here, downtown activities in Marietta seemed fairly successful--if activities (like Frontier Days, for example) were scheduled, they were publicized well in advance, were well-organized and were well-attended. Over the years, though, that seems to be less and less true.

Often, activities are not well-publicized, no one knows they are scheduled, no one shows up, and people are left scratching their heads and wondering 'what happened'? That happened with this year's Frontier Days Parade, which mostly was attended only by the participants (very few spectators) and was not publicized at all.

The two big exceptions seem to be the local motorcycle Toy Run, held to collect Christmas toys for deprived children, and the January 2006 county-wide Fire Department fund raiser--held to raise emergency assistance funds for all 14 of the county's volunteer fire departments during the horrible 2005-2006 wildfire season. These two events were well-publicized, well-attended and were very successful. They were, though, the exception to the rule. Well, the high school homecoming parade each fall is always a big success and so is the Youth Livestock Fair, but that is about it.

Oh, and I guess the recent 5-county emergency drill was VERY well-planned and VERY successful in Love County also.

If you are wanting to shop at a farmer's market, both Gainesville, Texas, to our south, and Ardmore, OK, to our north, usually have a thriving farmer's market, although Gainesville's hasn't been as good since the floods hit there in June and wiped out almost 100% of the local Cooke County farmers. If the Marietta Farmer's market was scheduled and no one showed up, it could be something similar--many of the local guys who grow corn, melon, beans, etc. have been wiped out this year by the rain and/or the Red River flooding that occurred in early July.

The recent election of the new mayor in Marietta is considered by many locals to be a great chance for a 'new beginning'. He has great ideas and lots of energy. I hope that his election is a turning-point for the town, and that future events like the Farmer's Market will be well-planned and successfully carried out.

Dawn

It was in the Monitor a couple weeks ago. According to the ad, it's supposed to be 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. every Friday & Saturday, July 13 through September 29.

Well, I went on Saturday, July 14, at around noon. I arrived to find a small lot with 2 blue canopies, a sign saying "farmers market today", and absolutely no people there.

From there I went to Ardmore and found another "farmers market" which consisted of a whopping 4 tables, and one of them was packing up and leaving.

You know, it's funny, but back in the city where I come from, farmers markets are a big deal. They block off an entire street, have live music, and are crowded with people all day long. All this despite the fact that no one in the city even has enough land to grow much of anything! I expected at least as much, if not more, from country folk. You have all this land, and yet no homegrown produce for sale.

citygonecountry,

You hit the nail on the head. That's exactly what I don't understand. What is the deal here in Oklahoma? Maybe I need to go to Tulsa sometime and hit their farmers markets yet somehow I would have expected smaller towns near the country to have bigger farmers markets than the cities do.

Hank

"You know, it's funny, but back in the city where I come from, farmers markets are a big deal. They block off an entire street, have live music, and are crowded with people all day long. All this despite the fact that no one in the city even has enough land to grow much of anything! I expected at least as much, if not more, from country folk. You have all this land, and yet no homegrown produce for sale."

Hank,

In smaller towns a lot more people grow their own veggies. I like Oklahoma just fine thank you.

randy

I bet they all drowned this summer. :)

I do think the weather has been a huge factor here, but I also have noticed every year that more and more people who sell at Farmer's Markets are NOT growing their own produce. Instead, they buy it from a larger farmer's market like the huge one in Dallas and transport it to the smaller market to resell it, or they get the produce from a wholesaler and resell it.

A while back, the only large grocery store in Marietta, which was a Winn Dixie, closed down and all we had was a couple of convenience stores for several months until Homeland bought or leased the location and reopened it as a grocery store. During that time a local feed store opened by a high school student added produce to their store. The family's dad or mom drove down to the Dallas Farmer's Market 2 or 3 times a week and hauled back produce from a wholesaler. For a while, it was profitable for them although it required constant travel to downtown Dallas. Once Homeland opened though, the family dropped their produce because they couldn't compete with Homeland's prices. Even during this 'grocery store crisis', there weren't enough local growers in the area to provide fresh produce for the feed store and for Donna's Market.

I don't know what it is like in other counties, but in Love County most of the farmers threw in the towel LONG ago. This used to be a HUGE pecan and peanut-growing area, and in the sandier soil areas, melons were a large crop also. Now there are almost no peanut farmers left and only a couple of melon farmers, and the melon farmers generally sell their melons right off of a truck parked on their own property. In the 9 years that we have been here, we have seen most all of the produce farmers sell their land to people who raise cattle or horses, or the families stop raising veggie crops and change to cattle or horse production OR they sell their land (subdivided into smaller plots of land) to people like us who want to live in the country. Many also have let their farmland revert to native grassland, which they cut and sell as hay or lease out to others who hay it or raise cattle on it. Farming as a paying occupation is pretty much dead here in Love County.

If I truly want real homegrown produce (in addition to what I grow myself), I generally have to travel to Dallas or Fort Worth, both of which have very large farmer's markets. At those markets, if you are careful, you can find produce actually grown on real farms by real farmers. Of course, there are also a lot of people trying to pass off as 'home-grown' some produce they have purchased from produce wholesalers.

I don't think small towns provide enough 'demand' to encourage market growers to try to provide a steady supply and that is sad.

The non-existent farmer's market in Marietta is typical of what happens here in Love County, though.....poor planning leads to a poor turnout which leads to the activity or event being cancelled due to a lack of interest. A lot of people have good intentions, but don't follow through very well.

My brother's company has a small nursery set up in town, with a place next to it to encourage farmers to bring in their produce to sell. There are covered carports and there is no charge to anyone who wants to bring their produce there to sell. My brother begged me to grow a large garden this summer and bring my extra vegetables in to sell as "organically grown produce", therefore demanding a higher price. I really thought about it, but as I had just moved to a new home, and had 20 years of plants to move from my old place, I just didn't have time to get all the new flower beds prepared to put my perennials in, plus start a new veggie garden spot and grow organic vegetables. I may give it a try next summer though. I'm really glad I didn't do it this year as I fear the garden would have drowned and been a huge waste of my time. :)

I know there is a demand for organically grown produce, and I could probably develop a large customer base even selling my produce there one day a week. But I really like my free time more than I like money. :) My brother also tries to get me to turn my greenhouse into growing annuals for him to sell at the nursery, but I'm not willing to give up the tropicals that I grow for myself to make room for annuals to sell. I grow my plants for my pleasure. My brother only sees plants as a way to make money. There is a huge difference in why we each grow plants. I may give the organic vegetable garden a try next summer, and see if it's worth the time I will have to devote in order to sell them at the farmer's market. But I really don't see it as something I would like to do, mainly because I'm not broke enough (yet) to need the extra money. If I were hurting for money, I am sure it would be more appealing to me.

One of the things we instituted at the Norman Farmers Market when I was on the board years ago was a "trust but verify" policy. Fruits and veggies homegrown were green labeled. Resale were white labeled. All vender's had to provide a list of what they thought they would be growing for the market that year and a location of the field where it was going to be grown.

A formal complaint could be lodged with the board if someone were using green labels instead of white. 2 members of the board would notify vendor, get their spin on the problem, then meet them that day on the property where these veggies or fruits were being grown to limit possible fraud on anyone's part. Repeat problems cost a vendor the ability to sale at our market. It was a pain in the rear for a while, but that cleaned up our market in a hurry.

Dawn is right. It is more difficult for smaller towns to have a successful market. They don't have the population base for one thing. Fewer customers, fewer vendors. Vendors will drive to where the customers are. Larger markets have more potential customers and more resources to adequately run, advertise, and police a market so it is a true representative of a farmers market should be.

randy

Someone said it - it's easier for the folks in the smaller towns to grow their own - cheaper, too! Even the Farmer's Markets are getting expensive to shop at. We have the huge one here in OKC, but I'll bet you they probably get a lot of their produce from Texas, too, Dawn.

I think the one in the city is more successful because it is actually IN the city where fewer people veggie garden. Like me, there is little sun in most of the central district for people to actually be successful at it. I know that the Farmer's Market here now has a downtown day, and they come to Kerr Park right downtown and I hear it is a HUGE success. Bring it to the people and they will come! People who work downtown have a harder time getting to the market during market hours.

The only food you can trust is that which you grow yourself!

Susan

Come visit ours in Muskogee (Saturdays & Wednesdays 8-12). I've not had a chance to go every weekend but the first time I went it was pouring rain & there were still several vendors. There were several last Sat with things ranging from fruits & veggies to flowers and tamales. Everything is guaranteed to be Oklahoma produced.

The farmers' market in Ada is in full boom now on Saturdays and Wednesdays too. Usually you have to get there before 9:00 to avoid the rush--a 10:00 start time sounds a little late. By 12:00 or 1:00, most vendors have sold out or are packing up. I don't have enough sun or space for okra, so I have to make it to the market for my okra fix! And of course, I have to get some Stratford peaches.

If I were in Marietta, I'd make day long food and fun excursion west to Jefferson County and some Terrel cantaloupes/watermelon. Next, lunch at the best catfish and calf fries joint on the face of the planet--Doug's Peach Orchard (going south toward Bowie, Texas). Cross the bridge and skirt the river, heading back east toward Muenster, TX, where you can pick up some fine German cheeses, meats, and sundries. It's a great loop with lots of possibilities for side trips (i.e. head further south into Texas to stop at Larry McMurtry's book store at Archer City, or skirt north toward Ringling, OK on one of the side roads to see some great bird watching country.).

Snowbishop,

I am glad to hear that the Ada farmer's market is doing so well. I just wish Ada was a little closer to Marietta!

We haven't been west to Jefferson County this year, and I am wondering if the Terral melons survived the heavy rains and the Red River flooding. I know that the large fields of melons usually grown in Love County did not survive. Too much water.

We make it over to Montague County at least twice a year....my dad was born in Spanish Fort (practically a ghost town now, sadly) just outside of Nocona. We usually head west from Gainesville, driving through Muenster, St. Jo, and sometimes Nocona and Bowie. If you haven't been there in a few years, you might be surprised by how many 'urban refugees' are moving to Montague County to get away from the DFW metroplex! They are not moving there in huge droves yet, just a slow, steady trickle.

St.Jo is one of my favorite small towns. It has a lof of lovely old homes---not fancy, just simple beautiful country homes, and I love the town square. I think St. Jo is going to explode in population one of these days, just as soon as someone else besides me discovers it!

We're going down to Fort Worth on Sunday to visit family and I intend to stop at the west-side Farmer's Market and get some Parker County peaches, and probably some other stuff as well.

Dawn

I considered the theory that more people in the country grow their own. But while driving along these country roads (as I do everyday) I have seen no evidence of that. Aside from my own garden, I haven't seen any gardens, anywhere. Just acres and acres of non-productive land.

The produce section at Walmart is always crowded, though, which tells me that folks around here are depending on someone else to grow their produce.

Having lived in Love County for 9 years now, I can tell you that there are a few gardeners around still, but not nearly as many as there used to be when we first moved here.

When we were looking for land to purchase in 1996-1997, there were still people who had really large gardens and sold their excess stuff right there out of the yard in front of the house. There are still a couple of them around....one place on Hwy 32 as you are headed to Kingston (may even be in Kingston, I can't remember) usually has black-eyed peas at this time of year. There's also a couple of melon growers on Hwy. 77 in Thackerville that often put up signs in front of their homes that they have melons for sale, but I haven't seen any signs this year so I bet the excess rain OR flooding got their fields.

In your part of the county, there used to be a couple of folks with big gardens in the area of Timms Road.

I suspect the repeated droughts of the 2000s, coupled with the fact that you CAN buy it cheaper at Wal-Mart has contributed to the fact that less and less people raise their own food.

However, if you garden organically, and are successful at it, you can (I think) raise your own organic fruits and veggies for about what you would pay for them in an upper-scale market like Whole Foods.

I know from personal experience that many (if not all) of the gardeners I have met here who raise fruits and/or veggies for their families tend to be old enough to be my parents--I am 48 and they tend to be in their 70s, 80s and 90s. They all share generously with their kids, grandkids and great-grandkids, so maybe the younger generations don't garden because they don't have to?

Over the years, I have met many neigbors who have backyard gardens and we have a fairly informal network. If one of them has excess corn, they call and say 'come pick it if you want it'. Some years everyone has a LOT of excess stuff to share but this year no one does.

This year if we had to live off of what we raised in the garden, I think we would be pretty hungry because it has been a really rough year.

Dawn