8A the university daily kansan
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friday, may 7, 2004
Local orchard owners ready for start of Farmers' Market
Customers vendors loyal to small, personal environment
By Matt Rodriguez
mdrroguez@kansan.com
Kansan staff writer
The Wildhorse Orchard is a small orchard located just 22 miles north of Lawrence on K-16 highway. It has a handful of part-time employees. And Perry Walters, a retired dentist, and his wife, Laurie, a retired pharmacist, look after the whole operation.
They have always had about 35 fruit trees in their back yard. In 1981, they planted their first commercial tree, but they didn't get into the orchard business for the money.
"We started off as a farm market and pick-your-own farm," Walters said.
Twenty-three years later, The Wildhorse Orchard, named after the creek that flows through their land, has about 100 trees and provides about 260,000 apples to local communities.
A fraction of those apples will make it to this summer's Lawrence Farmers' Market, which starts tomorrow.
And even though the Walterses will not be selling their apples until July, when they're ripe, there will be plenty of farmers and vendors selling everything from tamales to tulips, in what Walters called a "unique environment."
The Walterses have been selling at the Farmers' Market since 1986. They wake up every Saturday about 4:45 a.m. and load their apples into their van.
They sell everything from
"There's an immediate integration between growers and customers that you seldom see in a supermarket."
Barbara Clark
Barbara Clark Lawrence Farmers' Market chairwoman
peaches to apple butter to apple cider, as well as the 16 different types of apples they offer — both sweet and sour.
"Not a lot of people know my name," Laurie said. "They know me as the 'apple lady.'"
Her customers have even approached her at her daughter's piano concerts, asking what her real name is just so they can stop calling her the apple lady.
The Farmers' Market has an environment not seen at a supermarket, said one customer who had been going there for almost 20 years.
Carey Maynard-Moody, Lawrence resident, hates the impersonal experience the supermarkets offer — so far removed from real food and real people, so she goes to the Farmers' Market.
"I've been waiting a year for my rubarb pie," she said
Maynard-Moody looks forward to seeing the vendors each year. The continuity is what makes it special to her.
"I love seeing people I recognize and people who recognize me," she said.
Maynard-Moody sees more and more people attending each year and said it's become "crowded in the best sense of the word."
The market has grown from what it was 25 years ago, said Barbara Clark, chairwoman for the
LAWRENCE FARMERS'
MARKET
This year's first Lawrence Farmers' Market will be tomorrow. It will occur three days a week until Nov. 13.
Saturday 6:30 a.m. to 10:30 a.m.
Hours
Tuesday 4 p.m. to 6:30 p.m.
Thursday 4 p.m. to 6:30 p.m.
After Sent 1 Saturday hours
After Sept.1, Saturday hours change to 7:30 a.m to 11:30 a.m.
Location 10th and Vermont streets' city parking lot
Location
Attractions
Flowers
Fresh fruits and vegetables
Baked goods
Nutritional information
Source: Emily Miller, director of marketing for the Farmers' Market
market's board.
"It's like a community within a community," she said.
community.
Results from a survey done by the board said 33 percent of the customers came for the community experience, said Emily Miller, director of marketing for the Farmers' Market.
Clark agreed with Maynard Moody, who said a big reason people go to the Market was because their money stayed close to the community.
"There's an immediate integration between growers and customers that you seldom see in a supermarket," Clark said.
Edited by Nikki Nugent
Early morning shoppers browsed stands offering a variety of produce, flowers and crafts at the downtown Lawrence Farmers' Market last summer. This year's Farmers' Market begins Saturday from 6:30 to 10:30 a.m.
Kansan file photo
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