Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Sustainable Community In Literature And Lancaster County: Finding A Way Forward On Small Farms, Christine Bye

Honors Projects and Presentations: Undergraduate

"There are very few things that will motivate a thirteen-year-old child who has grown up comfortably and surrounded by supermarkets to pick green beans and to pick them joyfully. Dusty bean plants covered in yellow beetle larvae and located beneath a glaring sun do not exactly inspire an adolescent (or any sane person, really) to caper and sing. Neither do interestingly mottled rashes on the forearms - which appear after extensive rummaging through bean leaves - encourage the picker to return readily to the task. When my parents bought the family farm from my grandparents, they had some idea (as …