Yesterday was Labor Day, and we hope that you got to spend it with your family at the beach or having a bbq. There was a time when none of us got time off and a time when children were bound to sewing machines and we all toiled 12 hour days for little pay in manufacturing jobs or in agriculture. Thankfully, times have changed and working conditions have changed.
With that said, we want to give a huge shout out to the people that things haven’t changed much for. The guys and girls that are the backbone of agriculture. The people that are still working 10 hour days, six days a week. We aren’t talking about the John Givenses or the Tom Shepherd’s or the Alex Freckers or the Steve Sprinkles, we are talking about the Jose Cardiel’s and the Antonio Iniquez’s and the Alejandro Lopezes. Because, while the guys with their names on these farms work long hard hours, we aren’t celebrating “Owner’s Day” we are celebrating Labor Day and farm labor is tough. Super tough.
Small farm labor is tough and requires a special breed of human to do it successfully. The type of person that wakes up at first light with a smile, and works diligently under the hot sun while cracking jokes with his crew, and finally the type of person that will come in on a sunday just because they want to see all of the baby transplants get put into the ground. Every small farm owes its success to these guys.
So with that said, when you crack open your box this week. Give a laborer shout out to the guys and girls that put in the long hours in the fields to bring you the vegetables that we all appreciate. Because without their love and integrity, this thing called organic farming would be nowhere.
Happy laborers day!
Jason
Jose Cardiel is the back bone of the Farm Cart Organics market garden at Pacifica Graduate Institute. Aside from being a happy, incredible dude, he is a plant whisperer. Without his ceaseless labor, great spirit, and love of his work, the crops would fail.
Alejandro Lopez is the right hand man for Alcantar Organics and can be found on the tractor, harvesting, or weeding six and a half days a week. He’s always smiling and always hustling. Without him, and the crew of guys that he organizes each day, Alcantar Organics would be lost. Needless to say Jose Alcantar knows this, and makes killer lunches for his crew and bribes them with evening cervezas on the regular.
Long days in the sun, hand weeding, while cracking jokes and entertaining one another. There’s few places as enjoyable to work as with the field crew at Alcantar Organics.
Antonio Iniquez has been in the Caprinteria organic fields for over 30 years. He worked with my
Cauli-Lentil Taco ‘Meat’
