Entries in Lancaster (1)

Friday
Sep302011

Harvests

Hands of burley tobaccos hang tightly packed in a tobacco barn during air curing.I’ve been here in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania on business the last couple of days, reveling in Autumn’s onset and the days of harvest.

Yesterday, mid-afternoon, driving back from a business confernece, Scott Stultz and I came upon a Mennonite tobacco farm along one of the backroads. We stopped, hopeful, that the tobacco farmer might consent to let me explore his barns to take pictures of the harvest.

Scott found and brought back two young men–the owner’s sons–and they consented to let me take pictures of their harvest. They were lean and wiry boys, good-looking in that way that comes from hard work, sunshine, a good heart.

They accompanied Scott and me through the barns, talking about this year’s crop, about how too much rain has made it tough this year.

They couldn’t do enough to help me. There was a muscular breeze so the tightly packed, butt-tied hanging hands of curing tobacco were flapping and slapping from their woody mid-rib veins, making it hard for me to capture detail. The older of the two Mennonite boys, Kenneth, suggested we walk uphill to bigger barn where they could close the doors to keep the wind down.

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