To market,to market...
Page 8 University Daily Kansan, July 1, 1982
Early morning shoppers and farmers selling their produce gather in the parking lot at the corners of Vermont and 10th Streets.
Early-bird marketers buy out farmers' goods
Cars swarmed around the parking lot like bees in a hive. Shoppers yelled greetings to friends and neighbors as they pinched bright red tomatoes and weighed sacks of notables.
Between two boots a young man strummed a mandolin while customers interrogated vendors.
"How much does your rubarb go for?" "Are these daisies for sale?" "I'll take four heads of lettuce, please," shoppers shouted over the hubbub of the market.
IT WAS 7:30 Saturday morning and the Farmers Market, 10th and Vermont, was already in full swing. Vendors had set up booths displaying produce that ranged from cherries to cherry pie; from asparagus to potted asparagus ferns, and from moccasins to Meinhardt Ranch buffalo meat.
"We've been selling since 6:30," said Laura
Winter. "I have been working for her
husband, Eddie, sell books and lettae
"And it isn't even supposed to open until 7:00."
Signs were flung everywhere, tempting the customers—"Ho-Made Honey," "New Crop 'Good Eatin' Cherries," and "Home-Grown Tender Broccoli."
AND THE PRICES were just as tempting. A pound of apples sold for 25 cents, a bunch of carrots for 25 cents, and a head of lettuce for 20 cents.
"Come try our bread," said bakers, who had set out free samples.
"We've been up all night baking bread," said one bleary-eved couple.
The vendors varied as much as their produce. there was 10-year-old Matthew Smith, Bonner Store, New York, and the others.
United Methodist Church sold produce to raise money for the World Hunger Mission. North Lawrence gardeners and farmers sold their produce "just for the fun of it."
Open vans and beds of pick-up trucks were converted to booths for the wares.
CHILDREN "OOHD' AND ahd a'd" over the stuffed white whale while eating the stuffing they loaded into their cars.
Anna Patterson, 101 Vermont, said she
shopped there because of the prices, the friendi-
nance, and the service.
"If you're a farmer, you can tell it's fresh," she said.
Justin Anderson stood by watching the activity, monitoring the market for the Dowdown city.
Anderson helped to organize the market in 1977.
"I thought it sounded like a good idea," Anderson said. "At the time there was a gas shortage and people would go out and run down fresh water." Then the farmers could come in and sell more."
THE MARKET WAS such an overwhelming access that it later moved from 8th and Vernon to the Ninth Avenue.
"We've sold out every week," he said.
One farmer from North Lawrence, Eugene Nenner, RL 4, said he was surprised at the news.
By 9 a.m., the first table had already folded and by 10:30 the Farmers Market was sold out. The market place reverted back to an everyday parking lot.
Marguerite Casparian, 1629 Barker, pays for her purchase from one of the vendors.
Edwin C. Sample, 2214 Westchester, weighed and packaged the vegetables from his stand.
BUFFALO MEAT FROM THE MEINHARDT RANCH PAXICO,KS.
Every Saturday Marian Meinhardt, Paxico, transforms her station wagon tailgate into a counter so that she can sell buffalo meat.
Photos by Susan Page Story by Kathleen J. Feist
The displays were located in the backs of cars as well as from tables and tailgates. This car belongs to Bill Hatke, 1113 N.Y.