Interview with Emmett Dunbar ‘94
Email Correspondence
Fall 2014
Interviewer: Mekala Bertocci ‘14, Real Food Intern
If you could tell me a little bit about the Farm Club; what was the nature of the club?
- The Farm Club was the first Co-op on campus as far as I know. When I was involved from
1991 to 1994 it was in Farm House on the hill. This is now faculty housing I think. Students
who had the most interest and held organizational positions in the club lived there. We held
weekly vegetarian potluck dinners (Thursdays) open to all. These were attended well with 12 to
24 students from HWS and the occasional Professor or off campus guest. We had a topic of
discussion for each week. This was important because of the political, environmental and social
impacts related to the consciousness about food production, distribution and consumption. It was
also important to learn how to cook good tasting food that others can enjoy. It was a ton of fun
too!
We also maintained a composting program with all the other co-ops on campus. At that time I
think there were 8. We used 5gal buckets. Each co-op kitchen had a bucket that we collected
once a week and replaced with an empty bucket. There was a pickup truck that we used for this
and other farming/ gardening activities. The compost was brought to our composting bins that we
built/ maintained off campus at our vegetable garden plot. They were constructed of recycled
pallets and were side by side (3 to 6 of them). Once one filled we started in on the other. By the
time the 3rd or 4th was full the first was ready for using in the garden.
Was there a garden?
- Yes. There were three at that time. We had the largest one off campus as mentioned above. It
was an acre of plowed farmland that belonged to a dairy/ corn farmer. He donated it to us and
plowed it each spring. We cover cropped 1/3 of an acre. Grew winter squash and sunflowers on
1/3 and mixed vegetables on the other 1/3rd. Back at Farm House we had 2 small plots. 20'x 20.'
One was for culinary herbs and the other for cut flowers.
What kind of activities/events did you participate in as a club?
- We worked together with shared responsibilities. We had a budget to make and keep on track;
the basic maintenance of the pickup truck and all garden tools or things with moving parts. We
cleaned, decorated, and improved Farm House. We shopped, baked, canned, cooked and shared
all the kitchen chores equally. We had a difficult schedule of garden work. It was a challenge to
get all members to do the hard work of food production. Building beds, planting, transplanting,
weeding, pruning, harvesting and distributing. Any extra harvest went to other co-ops and the
food shelf in Geneva. The folks who did not pull their wait were asked to leave the Club.
Any other experiences you had with food and farming on campus, academic or otherwise.
- Prof. Doc Heaton was amazing! He and Prof. Richard Mason were the faculty advisors of the
club. At that time they taught a course on world hunger. It was a requirement for joining the
Club. Doc passed away about two years after his retirement fro HWS. When he retired he was
the Chair of the Religious Studies Dept.
Before our time the Farm Club grew a lot of grains and had them milled at a mill in Geneva.
They donated all the flour to the homeless shelters and food insecure. That is why we began to
get extra produce to the food shelf and churches.