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BACK TO THE FARM
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Program 09-10-04-A |
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Bright young men and women used to graduate and head for Wall Street or a top corporate law firm. Today – more and more of them are heading back to the land. After all, which would you rather do – wear a suit and slave in a cubicle – or spend your days on your own land, growing food for yourselves and your neighbors. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, America's small farm renaissance. The lure of the pastoral life and the vision of a new agrarian culture.
SEGMENT 1:
Writer Michael Pollan ("The Omnivore's Dilemma" and "In Defense of Food") tells Steve Paulson that a lot of what's on supermarket shelves isn't food and that Americans have many options if they want to improve the quality of their diet. He recommends going organic, shopping at farmer's markets and using CSA's. He says healthy food may cost more up front, but it all evens out when you factor in the health care costs of eating junk. Also, We visit the Dane County Farmer's Market, just a
few blocks from our studios, and hear from the farmers who sell their crops there. And, Brad Kessler was a writer in New York City. He's still a writer, but now he lives on 75 acres in Vermont with a small herd of goats. His book "Goat Song: A Seasonal Life, A short History of Herding, and the Art of Making Cheese" talks about what it's like to live with the animals that feed you. Kessler tells Jim Fleming about his life, his goats, and making chevre.
SEGMENT 2:
We hear a bit more from the farmers of the Dane County Farmer's Market about what they've brought to market today. Also, writer and cartoonist Lynda Barry ("Ernie Pook's Comeek") is an outspoken left-wing intellectual with an urban sensibility who now lives off the grid in
rural Wisconsin. She tells Steve Paulson how that happened. Barry's latest graphic novel is called "What It Is."
SEGMENT 3:
Writer Michael Perry is the author of "Truck: A Love Story" and "Coop: A Year of Poultry, Pigs and Parenting." He talks with Anne Strainchamps about his life combining writing with the new "back to the land" movement, and how he reconciles aspects of animal husbandry like butchering with raising his small daughters.
CD copies are available at 1-800-747-7444. Ask for program number 09-10-04-A.
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| Brad Kessler, Goat Song: A Seasonal Life, A Short History of Herding, and the Art of Making Cheese (Scribner) | |
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Michael Perry, Coop: A Year of Poultry, Pigs, and Parenting (Harper) |
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| Lynda Barry, What It Is (Drawn and Quarterly) | |
| Michael Pollan, In Defense of Food (Penguin) |  |
- Michael Pollan's website
http://www.michaelpollan.com/ - Brad Kessler's website
http://authors.simonandschuster.com/Brad-Kessler/706707 - Lynda Barry's website (coming soon)
http://www.lyndabarry.net/
Ernie Pook's Comeek
http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/display.php?id=788 - Michael Perry's website
http://sneezingcow.com/
- - After Michael Pollan: “Puffy,” off of Bela Fleck and the Flecktones CD, “Little Worlds”. (Columbia Records)
- -After Brad Kessler: “Getting in the Cows,” by Charlie Maguire. On his CD “Long Way to Another Friend”. (Charlie Maguire and Mello-Jamin Music). CX 2583
- - After farm market visit #2: “Don’t Look for Me,” by Jeffrey Foucault. On “Putumayo Presents: American Folk.” (Putumayo World Music)
- - After Lynda Barry: “Off the Top,” from Bela Fleck and the Flecktones CD, “Little Worlds”. (Columbia Records)
- Close music: “Country Life”, by Dan Zanes and Donald Saaf, off the CD “Catch that Train!” by Dan Zanes and Friends. (festival five records)
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