Agraria_Journal_WINTER_2022

12 AGRARIA JOURNAL 2022 the early 1860s and enslaved from birth by Moses Carver in Diamond, Missouri. During the American Civil War, baby George and his mother and sister were kidnapped by slave raiders; when the infant Carver was found, he was alone. He was returned to Moses Carver, who raised the boy until George left the farm to pursue education. At a young age, Carver took a keen interest in plants and experimented with natural pesticides, fungicides, and soil conditioners. He became known as “the plant doctor” to local farmers due to his ability to discern how to improve the health of their gardens, fields, and orchards. After completing high school, Carver obtained a bachelor’s degree in agriculture from what is now Iowa State University, in 1894. There, he gained a reputation as an excellent botanist and is documented as the first African American to earn a bachelor’s degree in the United States. In 1896, he also received a master’s degree in agriculture. After graduation, he accepted a teaching position at the Tuskegee Normal and Industrial Institute in Alabama, where he remained for the rest of his life. Booker T. Washington, the school’s founder, provided Carver the highest faculty salary and two rooms as part of his compensation — one for him and the other for his plants. The George Washington Carver National Park in Tuskegee details his life and scientific career spent teaching farmers how to restore the vibrancy of southern soils depleted by centuries of monocropping cotton and tobacco. How ironic that a descendant of enslaved Africans, who introduced peanuts to North America beginning in the 1700s, would save Southern agriculture by demonstrating that peanuts could restore the vitality of nitrogen-depleted soils. He was the consummate land steward, promoting crop rotation to assure soil sustainability. With funding from a Tuskegee donor, Carver bought a mobile classroom, the Jesup Wagon, and traveled the state of Alabama teaching. The first summer in, 1906, he reached 2,000 people a month, providing information and recipes that required few resources but would improve their living conditions. After his book, How to Grow the Peanut and 105 Ways of Preparing it for Human Consumption was published, in 1916, uses for peanuts took off; to protect African American peanut farmers Carver traveled to Washington, D.C., and successfully lobbied Congress to pass a tariff on foreign peanuts. His success in Washington elevated him to celebrity status; he even met with Mahatma Gandhi to discuss nutrition in developing nations. Honoring Carver’s commitment and sustaining his legacy, Agraria has launched the George Washington Carver Farm, a new grow space dedicated to research, education, land access, and social justice. As models of authentic agrarianism , those who nurture this land feed themselves and share the produce of their labor with their families, fellow “To those who have not yet learned the secret of true happiness, begin now to study the little things in your own door yard.” ~George Washington Carver RF fellowship MEGAN BACHMAN Agraria partners with Central State University on a range of significant programs and initiatives. Pictured here are participants in this fall’s Black Farming Conference, which explored regenerative agricultural techniques and offered knowledge-sharing and networking opportunities for Black farmers. AMY HARPER Emerging farmers in this year’s Regenerative Farmer Fellowship (RFF) program worked in the hoop house to nurture seeds destined for planting in Agraria’s new George Washington Carver Farm grow spaces.