|
Best Bets: Revolutionary War Adventure Summer 2006 Options Help Save the Farm |
|||||||||||||||
| July 31, 2006 7:04 AM | |||||||||||||||
|
We have quite a few raspberries
today and TONS of zinnias, so enjoy a cool summer day and pick to your
heart's content. The general store is open from 9 AM to
4PM. Let me re-state, quickly, where we think we are on the conditional use permit by admitting, first of all, that we have no idea--at all--what Dennis Hansberger is going to do. I believe he prides himself on attempting to be fair, and judicious, right up until the last minute. We know that he knows the region values Riley's Farm, that his constituents value Riley's Farm, and--certainly--that educators value Riley's Farm. Unfortunately, he appears to believe--at least partially--the notion that we are a nuisance in a neighborhood that he falsely thinks to be primarily residential. I begged him the other day on the phone, "Dennis, please look at the top cover of the application." That page indicates what his own staff has concluded about our neighbors--that we are surrounded by "un-permitted hayride and school tour businesses." I don't believe we would be a noise impact on even a purely residential neighborhood, since we are the acoustic equivalent of an elementary school at recess, but the ironic thing is that we are surrounded by people IN BUSINESS masquerading as residents protecting their peace. If any of you are reading this today, if you can encourage him and his staff to remember the fact that we are surrounded by businesses just like ours, it may help our cause. Please call him with that message at (909) 387-4855. Some of the people who believed our feuding relatives in the town of Oak Glen are beginning to come over to our side, so pray that enough of them keep an open mind to actually come over here and see what we do. |
|||||||||||||||
| July 30, 2006 6:21 AM | |||||||||||||||
|
We had a great day of berry picking
yesterday. People were coming back from the patch with full
GALLONS of raspberries. The Zinnia and flower
patch looks surreal in its display of color, and the pumpkin crop, rolling
up clear to the mountain ridge, is a festive deep green right now as well.
The farm was full of musicians yesterday, for a title company's summer picnic and an Evening in the Colonies, and the general store was booming. Thankfully, it was cool and a little misty all day. Some people worry that our business will go down because of the controversy, but it appears to have worked just the opposite effect. We have increased our sales 40% every year for the last three years, and our fall pre-sales are up 90%. I believe this is important for agritourism because our region needs successful examples of people who use the land profitably, without subdividing and building homes. A lot of the old time farm retailers don't quite understand the need to make a reasonable return, because they own the land individually. When they turn the land over to their children--if they can survive the farm-destroying estate tax--the equation will be different. Suppose twin sons inherit a farm. One of the twins, Jack, wants to keep farming, the other, Mack, doesn't, and can't--practically--because there is only one home on the farm and the prevailing zoning doesn't allow for another. The farm is worth $1.5 million on the open market. Unless Jack can pay Mack a reasonable lease, Mack is going to think, "what do I get for my $750,000 inheritance?" If Jack can manage to pay Mack $37,500 a year (5% of Mack's market value), they might have some family peace, but if he can't, Mack is going to be asking Jack to subdivide or sell. A reasonably strong market lease--a lease that competes with more conventional uses of the property--is critical to keeping a farm going, because if a farm can't compete on the open market, the non-farming owners are going to think, "why should I be subsidizing my sibling's lifestyle; he gets all the sunshine; I get all the bills." On the other hand, suppose Jack and Mack get a little creative and they build a farm stay village in the middle of their tomato farm, complete with cooking vacations, wine making classes, barn dances, and (gasp!) even a little living history. Suppose the farm now pays a $100,000 a year lease payment to the brother's partnership. The farm stays in production, Mack has a little to show for his inheritance, city people have a farm to visit, Jack stays farming, and everybody's happy. Except for the old codger down the road who says, "it's all just about money." |
|||||||||||||||
| July 29, 2006 8:27 AM | |||||||||||||||
|
It's cool and a little overcast out
there, a nice break from the heat of last weekend, and it's a PERFECT day
to pick raspberries, so come on up and tool around the farm, see all the
new flower plantings, and pumpkin plantings and apple plantings.
The people who want us shut down have actually
told county officials we aren't interested in agriculture anymore.
Come up and see for yourself! With respect to our future, I believe it really will come down to Oak Glen now, because the County Board of Supervisors recognizes, to a person, our value to the region, and our importance to the students and teachers of Southern California. We want to thank all of you who have traveled so far to speak in our behalf and the thousands of you who have written the county letters. It's really up to you, now, Oak Glen. We know we won't please all of you, even though we have tried. It's really in the corner of what I would call Oak Glen's "reasonable folk," the people who are so prudent in their judgment they don't like weighing in on either side. I would ask those of you in that crowd to remember a few things: 1) We aren't asking you to shut anyone down; our opponents are asking you to help shut us down. 2) If we thought, for one minute, we were really a nuisance in a neighborhood of businesses just like us, who see hundreds of visitors per day, we would have shut our doors, voluntarily, by now . 3) This notion that we are a "military theme park" shooting "thousands of rounds a day," is a very useful lie crafted for the purposes of gaining your sympathy. We fire six feeble rounds a day that are far less noisy than a truck driving by on the highway. 4) Our opponents have objected, literally, to every business category that has a chance of making this farm profitable and they simultaneously claim they are "not trying to shut us down." Now that we have controlled shooting, (and have for the last few years) they are objecting to the presence of the students themselves and the twenty year tradition of square dancing in our barn. Reasonable citizens of Oak Glen: A few very angry, bitter business competitors are trying to hound us out of business by pretending to be the voice of the community. We need to hear from you! If you want to see more apple trees on these hills, please, join the growing ranks of the reasonable Oak Glen citizens who have already done so. |
|||||||||||||||
| July 28, 2006 11:48 AM | |||||||||||||||
 Heah,
everybody, it's raspberry time!
They are coming in big time, according to Jeff Hammond, who is our farm architect, but who is so excited about the crop, he wants to take a week off and hit the farmer's markets with them. Come on up and pick 'em. We're open Monday through Saturday 9 AM to 4 PM and the lunch grill will be open as well, along with the country store. We still have tickets for an Evening in the Colonies with Patrick Henry, so come on up, pick some berries, and let's celebrate an era that believed in liberty. (What would it be like!)
|
|||||||||||||||
| July 28, 2006 6:40 AM | |||||||||||||||
|
Scott and I attended the Oak Glen
Fire Safe Council last night, since a big part of the proposed new fire
breaks will be over on our Mile High Farm; the new thinking in fire
breaks is to "feather" them in along the hillsides and across the valleys,
which is another way of saying they will be sort of serpentine, irregular,
with fuzzy edges to mimic nature. I asked the presenter if
that was an aesthetic impulse or a fire-fighting impulse, or, in other
words, did a "feathered" fire break make it easier to fight fire.
He couldn't quite confirm that and concluded, with a little hesitation,
that it was predominantly aesthetic. I made the
observation that some of the prettiest streets in Southern
California--Victoria Avenue in Riverside for example--are linear, not
"feathered," and that we would probably want to have them cut us straight
fire breaks and we would line them with apple trees, since well cultivated
apple orchards retard fire progress. He said that would
be great--so I count this a victory for "linear" thinking as opposed to
"feathered" thinking, and, to be frank, the fire guy seemed a little
relieved. I mean, how are you supposed to provide both a
cost-efficient fire break and a feathered fire break at the same time? We talked to Darla at Law's for quite a long time and she was a wealth of information about the Law family and a particular member of the family. She said she missed seeing our "beautiful children" for breakfast and not to stay away from the restaurant on account of the Little Cranky One, because Law's Restaurant has said, publicly, they have nothing to do with the recall Hansberger campaign. (I still don't know why anyone thinks Hansberger has any particular affection for us. He's got a bunch of spoiled, screaming Oak Glen brats on his hands; I think Hansberger will support us, but a lot of it will depend on getting him to see that our pious sounding neighbors who are claiming residential status are really doing business whenever it suits them.) My problem, I guess, is that I am a linear thinker and a straight shooter, not a "feathered" thinker. The interesting thing about a public forum--any public forum--is that people who tell you one thing to your face are either too scared to say it to the group, or you find out their allegiance is really to another group in the community. You also find out, thankfully, that some people who won't say a word of support to you in person, will make their support public. Ah well... |
|||||||||||||||
| July 27, 2006 3:38 PM | |||||||||||||||
|
I had a good talk with Stan Harris
this morning. He was unaware that the county fire
department had characterized our project a success, from the perspective
of fire prevention and he told me, as a result of that knowledge, he had
no problem with what we were trying to do. Chalk one up
to "pray for peace" Freeman House for encouraging me to call Stan. ---- By the way, imagine this scene: There's a guy on the ground
getting kicked in the gut. He can barely breath.
Blood is pouring out of his nose. He keeps yelling out
loud, "they're killing me! Help!" |
|||||||||||||||
| July 27, 2006 6:10 AM | |||||||||||||||
|
Our opponents like to claim they
aren't trying to shut us down, but imagine the following conversation: Complainer: We aren't trying to shut you down. We just want you to put an end to your most successful programs and commit to a land review application that will cost you hundreds of thousands of dollars to complete without any guarantee it will be approved. Us: Hmm. You see hundreds of school children per day and you don't have any land use permits. Will you submit to the same process? Complainer: No. That's completely different. That's just harassment for complaining about you. We want you to consider us non-commercial residents when we have a problem with you, but established Oak Glen businesses when our land use annoys you. Thad Riley claims, in public,
that he has a problem with our Revolutionary War adventure, but our case
file includes his opposition to our dinner programs for seniors.
The Swansons have complimented us on keeping our overnight groups quiet,
but now they have moved on to complaining about square dance calling in
the barn. This is really death by complaint.
"We aren't shutting you down all at once; we want to do it piece by
piece." Try having your family give me a little less material, Tim. --------------------------------------------------------
United Press International, quoting
Dennis Riley in the Los Angeles Times: "We're all for farming and
gardening and teaching kids, but we don't want to abuse that by having too
many people in at any one time," Dennis Riley told the Times. "He took it
too far... It sounds like a bloody war over there." |
|||||||||||||||
| July 26, 2006 11:20 PM | |||||||||||||||
|
The opponents of Riley's Farm have
consistently mischaracterized us as a nuisance--as a full scale daily
battle re-enactment. The perpetuation of this lie has been their primary strategy since the very beginning and although it hasn't stopped our application dead in its tracks, it has required us to engage in constant re-education. As one of the teachers at the Board of Supervisors meeting observed, the "battle" "re-enactment" portion of our Revolutionary War adventure is very brief, about fifteen minutes per day, and it doesn't include loud, unregulated gun fire. There are about three shots in the afternoon and three shots in the morning, and the cars passing by on Oak Glen road are literally louder than this simple musket fire demonstration because we control the powder loads and their distance from the property line. Most of the photographers who come out to cover the story are disappointed and a little confused. "That's it?" they say. If you were, in fact, to purchase a ticket for the Revolutionary War Adventure thinking it a conventional battle re-enactment, you might ask for your money back, because there is very little musket fire. The entire event is a carefully scripted, carefully researched exercise in historic living history theater, with first person characters and our version of an 18th century village farmstead. It is designed to educate students and excite them about the prospect of learning their history. The urge to call it a nuisance, as near as I can tell, flows from a number of possible sources: 1. Competitive business interest and the urge to thwart a competitor. 2. Well intentioned ignorance. (Neighbors who sympathize with a condition that has been exaggerated.) 3. Fear that black powder usage is a fire danger. (The fire department has already indicated that black powder weapons, fired on green lawn or non-combustible surface, without paper down the barrel are NOT a fire hazard.) 4. A political objection to firearms, even those used in historical education. 5. The failure to comprehend or acknowledge degrees of impact, (lumping today's school tours in with the major battle re-enactments of the past.) 6. Source confusion: mistaking routine varmint shooting in farm country for our living history program. (In one case, Dennis Riley mistook the popping of wedding balloons for evening gun fire.) 7. Fear that approval for black powder demonstrations will mean approval everywhere. (Containing musket fire noise impacts will always require a reasonable amount of distance; it is extremely unlikely that those impacts could be contained on a smaller parcel.) Land use issues are complex and full of nuance, but if you don't like your neighbors, it is easier to demagogue the issue than acknowledge the care your neighbor has taken to be neighborly--especially if your own sales are going downhill. The bottom line is this:
neighbors who insist on obscuring the record will ultimately be
acknowledged as untrustworthy witnesses and, ultimately, as nuisance cases
themselves--like the boy who cried wolf, on this case, "bang"
too many times. |
|||||||||||||||
| July 25, 2006 5:50 PM | |||||||||||||||
|
The County Board of Supervisors, in
its wisdom, has decided--after a conditional use application that has
already cost us more than $164,000, after a planning process that already
has the recommendation of the planning staff and the planning commission,
after a hearing that included the testimonies of educators who drove from
all over Southern California--that we need to wait until August 22nd and
have some more talks about the project. The board of supervisors, unfortunately, is listening to a small cross-section of the Oak Glen community who can only be called certified quacks. Cheryl Swanson, for example, called me a few weeks ago to offer her praise for keeping our overnight programs very quiet, and then she takes exception to barn square dances that have been held on this farm far longer than her residence in Oak Glen. (She sent her husband, Rick, to do the complaining.) Thad Riley, a deputy sheriff and disgruntled relative, who once disrupted one of our barn dances by trespassing on our property and shouting at our customers, was also asked to be given credibility even though he lives, without complaint, next to his brother's facility that performs illegal amplified outdoor weddings and illegal school tours. Yvette Birdsall, who operates a business that has no permits, lectures us about fire safety and septic capacity. Alison Law sports a few scrawny dwarf trees out in front of her steel shed sales facility and lectures us about the agricultural nature of Oak Glen. Tim Riley, an employee-operator of another illegal business with as many as 200 guests on 3 acres, lectures us about 1200 guests on 760 acres. These are the people who want to do a "little more talking." Life in the valley of the "perpetually unhappy campers." Please call Dennis Hansberger (909) 387-4855 and tell him there are more of you than there are of them. |
|||||||||||||||
| July 24, 2006 8:18 PM | |||||||||||||||
| Well, today, I finished reviewing our paper work for the big meeting tomorrow. I want to thank all of you who have been contributing, attending meetings, and praying for us. Tomorrow we will know whether American Living History is still safe in Oak Glen and we will know--in this community--whether it is possible to reach a middle ground and an honorable compromise on land use issues. I truly hope so. Pray! | |||||||||||||||
| July 23, 2006 9:41 PM | |||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||
| July 22, 2006 4:34 PM | |||||||||||||||
 It's been dishrag hot today, so I thought I would post a picture of our dog, Bear's, solution. He stood out into the pond, just playing the statue of a dog in the water, and I thought, "will I be able to go all the way upstairs, get the camera, and snap that picture?" There's the answer. Good boy. This next picture is of the farm's back side, or what we call the Lulacop ranch. There are quite a few brushy, dry hills on that side, but down in the bottom of the canyon, you can see how dense the trees are. It's a very pretty, cool little valley.
|
|||||||||||||||
| July 21, 2006 4:44 PM | |||||||||||||||
|
A group of La Quinta moms, dads, and
toddlers beat the heat today with an old
fashioned bucket brigade, carrying water across the farm green.
I even ushered a couple of ladies over to the Zinnia patch for picking,
and they were going to stop by and say hello to Grandma Bea.
The heirloom orchard has been clipped back and looks good; the
pumpkins are all coming up; the corn got attacked by some worms,
which we are beating off with a spanking and a good lecture, (Rileys
are good at giving lectures). I sojourned in Redlands
today for a short time and it was 104 when I got off the freeway, coming
home, in Cherry Valley and about 96 here, more proof that Oak Glen is not
cool, but cooler. Asher and
Mario have the farm looking nice right now, weeds beat back, flowers being
colorful, raspberries storing up sugar for their summer "crimsoning."
It will be nice, someday, when this Riley's Farm land use controversy is over, because I will finally be able to get back to brainstorming about what people might like to do in the country. We know they like to pick fruit; we know they like some level of participatory living history; we know they like to do a little shopping, and we know they like to sit down in the shade in the summer and throw snow balls in the winter. (One teacher last night took very eloquent exception to the notion that field trips should not take place in the winter; she said that her students learned more about Valley Forge here, in February, than they ever could have learned from a book.) Adam Smith, a creature of my favorite century--the 18th--opined about the market quite a bit, and in my own feeble way, I think about it a lot too. One of the reasons our legal system favors the development of new tract homes--as opposed to, say, living history farms--is that everyone needs a place to sleep at night. Even golf courses are a known commodity. Business people smarter than your correspondent know just about how many golfers there are in any given zip code and the likelihood of sunny providence shining upon a new country club. Even wine agritourism is a more known commodity than apple agritourism. I believe--profoundly--that people NEED a little farming, a little history, in their souls once a season. I can't prove this, but I'm anxious to get back to making the attempt. |
|||||||||||||||
| July 21, 2006 7:18 AM | |||||||||||||||
|
We should make note that our
attorneys have put in countless pro bono (free) hours because they believe
in our cause, and when they found out that many of the complaining
competitors are doing business without permits, they have promised
to pursue equal enforcement in Oak Glen very aggressively. If
any of you think you can sign false and misleading petitions about Riley's
Farm and then hope the "dust will settle," forget it.
Better start saving your pennies.
Cecilia, a teacher from Montebello, writes:
Riley's Farm is an invaluable gem and
teaching tool. This past school year, I took my fifth grade class to
participate in the Revolutionary and Civil War day programs at Riley's
Farm. The impact made on them is immeasurable. My students come from a
low-income inner city background. They were awed by the vast, quaint, and
quiet surroundings of Oak Glen en route to Riley's Farm. The programs were
very well organized and reinforced their knowledge and deepened their
understanding of U.S. history as well as pique their interest even more.
From the moment my students stepped off the bus and were divided into
townships of loyalists and patriots, they were transported to the 1800s.
To this day they still remember their trips to Riley's Farm and how it
made the social studies book come to life. They tell other students how
cool and lucky they were to be able to go. Please preserve Riley's Farm.
Thanks, Cecilia!
|
|||||||||||||||
| July 20, 2006 11:36 AM | |||||||||||||||
|
Marie, a fan of the farm writes this
morning: All the ideas you present, made me want to visit and to make sure my friends and family know how awesome a trip to Oak Glen would be. As a city dweller if I am not blessed to live in Oak Glen, I would want to experience it most especially the "rural" way. It brings a sense of nostalgia and a return to the "good ole' days." With a background in sales, the ideas you pitch are 100% great marketing strategies, and only someone stuck in a rut without passion for what they do couldn't see the forest for the trees. Thanks, Marie! An anonymous friendly critic, and
supporter of the farm, wanted me to be sure I knew that most of Oak Glen
supports us and that the critics are very few in number.
We appreciate that, but I believe the saber-rattling of a few members of
the Oak Glen Complaint Squad have scared off some of the reasonable
members of the community. One dear old friend
said, "I'll go to the meeting because I believe in what you're doing, but
a certain someone is going to make it very difficult for me."
Another friend told me he was very peeved to get a fire "safe" council
reminder that carried with it an extra bonus: a reminder to
come out to our conditional use permit hearing at the county next week.
Question for the Oak Glen Fire "Safe" Council: are you in the
practice, normally, of reminding the community to weigh in on every
building application in Oak Glen? Did you remind
the members of the fire "safe" council that Peter Brierty, the San
Bernardino County Fire Marshall, has publicly stated we have agreed to
"meet and exceed" the county's fire requirements?
|
|||||||||||||||
| July 18, 2006 11:08 PM | |||||||||||||||
| July 18, 2006 7:20 AM | |||||||||||||||
|
We planted more corn yesterday,
spruced up the grass parade grounds, cleaned up the cider shed, and
Krystle and Mallory made nearly 70 jars of fresh apple butter.
People keep talking about a heat wave, but it didn't seem like a scorcher
here to me yesterday, a little more humid than usual, but otherwise fairly
pleasant. The cherry crop is now over for the year, according to Scott, but we are just beginning to look forward to the rest of the harvest here and at the Mile High Farm. The apples look strong, as do the pears, and we have a mighty pumpkin crop planted. Next week, this time, we will be heading down to the county seat to hear what the board of supervisors will do with our conditional use permit application. It's been a long, brutal journey, these last three years, and we appreciate all of the support, both emotional and financial, we have received from our guests. Let me tell you something about land use policy. Our entire process is designed, almost exclusively, for the construction of new homes. Even some of our opponents have told us, flat out, they would prefer new homes to a living history farm. If you want to see continued apple farming and living history in Oak Glen, consider holding July 25th, 2006 at 9:00 AM open on your calendar to attend the San Bernardino County Board of Supervisors meeting. We could use your help! |
|||||||||||||||
| July 17, 2006 7:39 AM | |||||||||||||||
|
There are lots of zinnias out there
today. If you are patient enough to look for them, we have a
fair amount of blackberries as well, and I actually succeeded in eating a
dozen raspberries out there yesterday morning.
Logan Creighton will be leading tomahawk,
archery, craft tours today at 10:00 AM, as well as a farm walk tour.
The general store and the farm grill (hamburgers & hot dogs) will be open
today up at the old packing shed, starting at 9:00 AM. Come on up! Spend a summer Monday with us! |
|||||||||||||||
| July 16, 2006 7:09 AM | |||||||||||||||
|
We had another fine audience last
night for an Evening in the Colonies with Patrick
Henry, including a guy who is "in the know" about the next generation
of Canon HD video cameras, (really exciting stuff coming up), a
Greek-American high school teacher and his family, and some very nice
Yucaipa and Redlands families. One poor guy--very
genial fellow--caught a rainbow trout and suffered your host, in his
ineptitude, to let a fish flap around on the line and tail-swipe him on
top of his head. We had a hint of a rain last night, though I don't think it was enough to snuff out the Millard fire. The air is sort of a light, filmy dijon mustard this morning, but the smoke smell seems to be trailing away. (Throughout this fire, we haven't smelled too much of the fire, just seen the Sawtooth plumes over Wilshire Peak; this morning's fire  information
says 10% containment and still moving away from us, towards the North
east.) At any rate, the fire, and the heat, seems to
have kept most of the customers home yesterday. I walked
the farm at about noon, testing the predictions of intolerable heat, but
it didn't seem bad to me, actually pleasant. The general
store was warmer than the outside temperature, but that didn't stop
Chelsea and Krystle from bagging candy and making strawberry preserves.
They are mighty workers, those two.I think the berries will be a little thin (but not gone!) for a day or so, but you can pick a country bouquet of flowers this week, with a fair amount of ease. The zinnias, baby's breath, and bachelor buttons are out in force. |
|||||||||||||||
| July 15, 2006 7:44 AM | |||||||||||||||
|
We seem to be right between berry
crops today; it's the sort of picking, where if you want berries,
you can find them, but it won't be the ridiculously easy picking of last
Saturday. We have easy picking on Zinnias, Baby's
Breath, and Bachelor Buttons today, the general store will be open.
Remember, during the summer especially, pies have to
be pre-ordered, at least 3 hours before you expect to pick them up. This morning, the information line reported 40% containment of the Millard/Sawtooth fire, with no winds and the direction northeast (away from us). Praise be to the Almighty. I had a nice chat with Terry Fox of Oak Tree Village and we both lamented a similar problem. She has a two month dip in her trade in the winter months and we have the same sort of dip in the summer months. Some people--including my wife!--say just enjoy the fall off in trade. That would be fine--except we want to keep building up the great Riley's Farm staff and keep improving the farm--new trees, new row crops, new places to rest in the shade. Growth is good. It's downright American. And this isn't ugly, urban sprawl. It's carrots! It's onions! It's a potter throwing clay on the wheel. It's a New England pastor up at the pulpit, giving a real sermon from history. Those dreams and a summer "dip" are your correspondent's challenge, dear reader. A word or two about balance. I have as much problem with people who are skinny, humorless ascetics as I do with gorging, jolly gluttons. (That's an unfair comparison; everyone prefers the gorging, jolly glutton; let's change that to gorging, pushy gluttons.) I have as much of a problem with heavenly, air-headed mystics as I do with cynical, miserly hyper-realists. I have as much of a problem with peace-at-all-costs pacifists as I do with put-up-your-dukes carpet-bombers. My reading of the colonial New England militia is that they looked upon war as a sobering enterprise, not to be entered into lightly, but to be prosecuted will full vigor if their rights were threatened. I suppose that's at the heart of my problem with mega-Church pastors like John MacArthur who would tell Rosa Parks the Christian thing to do is sit at the back of the bus, or the Concord minutemen they should let the British troops burn their church, or--this is inevitable--that Polish Catholics should have given up their Jews to the SS. American, reformed Christianity has never been this silly, or this stupid, in its interpretation of our relationship to tyranny. A correct understanding of Biblical truth understands, as Ecclesiastes tells us, that there is a "time for all things," a time to obey and a time to disobey, that, indeed, the very bulk of Christian martyrdom results from knowing how to make this choice. |
|||||||||||||||
| July 14, 2006 12:36 PM | |||||||||||||||
|
Heah, did you hear me on KTIE today,
pitching tomorrow night's Evening in the Colonies
with Patrick Henry and The Riley's Old Time Radio Show?
Radio advertising works. It's incredible.
The phone actually rang--at least, what, six or seven times in two hours.
(Believe me, this is good; when we appeared on National network
television, we didn't get as many phone calls.) If you are interested in the prominent Religious personage who thought the framers were disobedient to God, check below.
We've been watching the fire, of
course, very closely, particularly the Millard Canyon fire, which is
located, roughly, in the hills above Cabazon, about 11 miles from us.
The last report I heard was that it had merged in an easterly fashion with
the Sawtooth fire, near Yucca Valley and Pioneer town about 25 miles away.
We've been through fires before and we know that a cloud in the distance
can be very deceptive, so--in addition to saying a few prayers and making
sure our water tanks are kept high--we have not been affected by them so
far, but we appreciate your concern! |
|||||||||||||||
| July 13, 2006 5:17 PM | |||||||||||||||
 Krystle
went out and picked this bouquet from the flower patch today, which means
you can too! A few zinnias, baby's breath, and bachelor
buttons are ready to pick. Come on up! It is a
weedy patch, but you can actually pick flowers.Thanks for thinking of us and the fire, but so far, it seems to be staying pretty far away from us--25 miles or so. Don't miss this week's Riley's Old Time Radio Show.
We will be featuring the
Mill Creek
Boys, an interview with Terry Fox of
Oak Tree Village, and we
will be reviewing our side of the
Riley's Farm Conditional Use permit, as
well. Don't miss it! KTIE 590 AM, 5:30 PM,
Saturday.
|
|||||||||||||||
| July 12, 2006 4:05 PM | |||||||||||||||
| Some of you are worried about us and fire. Thanks for worrying, but the fire's a long way off--25 miles away in Pioneer Town, over several ridges, and still--according to the local Yucaipa fire station--on the desert floor. The black berries are thinning down to the normal production level, but you can still get them if you get up here and look. We saw nice, full baskets coming in all day. Come on up! | |||||||||||||||
| July 11, 2006 7:33 PM | |||||||||||||||
|
I was doing a little radio show
editing tonight and some of the Mill Creek Boys music got my toes to
tapping and my arms swinging and my head bobbing. I'm at
that age where any appreciation for music inspires fear in my children. "Stop it, Dad, you're scaring me." |
|||||||||||||||
| July 11, 2006 8:22 AM | |||||||||||||||
|
We taped the radio show yesterday,
and a very telling proof text for agritourism was discussed, at least
briefly. This year, (and last year), we have spared no
expense nurturing and marketing a great berry crop. We
have increased the water supply at great expense, paid for fertilizing,
and we have even done the unthinkable--pay for radio time to pitch berry
picking! (Most of the time, people who are smarter than
I am save advertising for their more expensive products;
there's a reason you hear, and see, so much automobile advertising.)
Well, to make a long story short, we sold about $200 in berries yesterday,
not bad for a summer weekday, but not enough to pay the farm's property
taxes, let alone pay for insurance, wages, and a reasonable lease to the
landlord. The Revolutionary War Adventure, very
literally, is paying for the maintenance of our crops. To the people who say you can make a living just on your own farm's produce sales in Southern California, I say: stop smoking the funny smelling weed. |
|||||||||||||||
| July 10, 2006 10:47 AM | |||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||
| July 10, 2006 7:19 AM | |||||||||||||||
|
Bright, clear, and bushes brimming
with blackberries. Hint, hint.
We will be open from 9AM to 4PM, or by evening
appointment for pay ahead blackberry picking. I can't get
over how much cooler it's been up here than it has been in the valleys
below, as I had to make several trips. It was 104 in San
Bernardino and 88 up here, 102 in Redlands and 86 up here, on two
different trips. Cool off. Berry up.
Remember, if you want a pie during the summer, you need to order on the bakery page before you come up. We don't believe in making a lot of fresh pies to sit around on these sleepy summer days, and we do make an honest apple pie, so order ahead!
Different subject.
Here's a theory I have: most of us are, figuratively, something like young would-be
marines. We think we're in shape, but then we go
to boot camp and we find out we're hopelessly unfit for the task and we
need to be yelled at--yelled and slapped silly--just to reach mere
competency. In high school, I thought I was a reasonably good
writer, until I met Mrs. Jean Driver, who handed out exactly 3 As in her
twenty years of teaching at Arcadia High School, (that was the legend
anyway). If you received a C from Mrs. Driver, you were
a reasonably clear communicator. An "A" really meant what it
was supposed to mean--outstanding. (I believe I received
a B+, and I think I cried about it.) As a nation, the more sloppy we are in our thinking, the more self-justifying, the less competitive we are, the more we start buying goods and services from people who really are hungry, who really need to be the best at what they do. Years of belittling the Puritan work ethic, and ignoring history, hasn't served us very well as a nation. |
|||||||||||||||
| July 9, 2006 8:33 AM | |||||||||||||||
|
Sunday. Time for a
Sermon. Watch out. A friend of mine called yesterday. He's a Mustang Marine officer (ret.), served in Vietnam, has a successful business, and is now dabbling in western real estate. He's discouraged--for several reasons--about the state of our nation, and during the course of the conversation, he blamed some of the troubles on pastors like John MacArthur of Grace Community church in Sun Valley, California. I did a little sleuthing on the internet, and I discovered this John MacArthur quote, from a book he wrote called Why Government Can't Save You*: Over the past several centuries, people have mistakenly linked democracy and political freedom to Christianity. That's why many contemporary evangelicals believe that the American Revolution was completely justified, both politically and scripturally. They follow the argumentation of the Declaration of Independence, which declares that life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness are divinely endowed rights. . . . But such a position is contrary to the clear teachings and commands of Romans 13: 1-7. So the United States was actually born out of a violation of New Testament principles, and any blessings that God has bestowed on America have come in spite of that disobedience of the Founding Fathers. I couldn't help but compare that to elements of a an actual sermon given by the Pastor William Emerson, to the town of Concord, just prior to the Revolutionary War: "Behold, God himself is with us for our Captain...let not the adversaries of American Freedom dare to fasten.. the character of rebels upon [us]...because we would prevent one part of the Empire from enslaving another!....the enemies of ...our constitution are already in arms against us... Arise my injured countrymen and plead even with the sword, the firelock, and the bayonet...the Birthright of [free men]! Banish from your minds the fear of man...with the fear of God! Strive for the Graces and virtues of of the Soldier of Jesus Christ! Amen! Something very strange has happened to the American Christian church. In the quest to build air-conditioned sanctuaries, book and tape ministries, well paid ministry staffs, world-class praise bands, and congregations content with their own apathy, something is being left behind: the gospel. At the outset,
pastor MacArthur shows a startling ignorance of Romans 13.
The New Testament boldly declares that "rulers" (Greek: "diakonos",
deacons, ministers) are to be a "minister of God to thee for good."
By definition, unless you believe God a liar, someone who is not a
"minister of God to thee for good" is not a ruler, not a deacon,
certainly not "diakonos." The pastors of New England
correctly interpreted the passage and knew that King George and some of
the abusing, riotous troops he sent to Boston were by no means "ministers
of God for good." Rebellion was the sin of the British
ministry, not the properly constituted and chartered governments of New
England, and this was not an individual act of defiance, but a collective
reminder that any king who abused the rights of God's children was failing
his duty both to God and to God's children. Shame on you, John MacArthur. * Take note of that precious title, Why Government Can't Save You. Mr. MacArthur insults a Christian audience by attacking a proposition no one shares by opposing it with a notion that no thinking Christian should share: obey government leaders whether they are "diakonos" (ministers of God)--or not!
Come to think of it--I think I know
why book-and-tape quacks like MacArthur do this sort of thing.
They believe--in their own twisted fashion--they are proving their service
to Christ by skewering cultural sacred cows. Americans
celebrate July 4th. MacArthur sees himself as somehow more
"pure" than merely American Christianity. He sees
himself as something he is not--a pastor, a protector of the flock.
(In truth, he's more of a meat broker than a pastor.
He doesn't lay down his life for the flock. He prepares
it for slaughter, the way the Lutheran pastors of Germany prepared their
flocks for the depredations of the Nazis.)
A book-and-tape man doesn't want his flock actually taking Deuteronomy 28
or Proverbs 24 or "take up your cross" seriously. That
would make for a better world, a more democratic world, a more engaged
congregation. It would also divide the wheat from
the chaff, and you can't have that in a seeker friendly church.
A sleepy congregation, on the other hand, needs the book-and-tape salesman
to keep them comfortable with the distance we all feel between the world
as the Lord would have it and the world that our own corruption creates.
Engaged, New England, 18th century style Christianity takes the word out
to the culture and changes it for the better, but that makes for
congregants less dependent on their book and tape salesman.
MacArthur rebukes true Christians like Patrick Henry and their ilk because
he can't have the congregation revering anyone but himself.
It's something like taking Mother Theresa down a peg, just to show the
customers how bold you really are.
It's a cheap trick.
-------------------------------- |
|||||||||||||||
| July 8, 2006 7:17 AM | |||||||||||||||
|
Last night we took the family to see
the Redlands Bowl and the Civil
War Americus Brass Band. We were delighted to see
two long time farm regulars, Mr. & Mrs. Michael Hicks, up there on stage
waltzing. We had a heah-we-know-them! moment.
It's hard enough dancing when you have a full compliment of waltzing
couples all around you, but these two did it gracefully up there on stage,
with the bowl at capacity and a full orchestra behind them.
Well done, Hicks family! We have a STUPENDOUS blackberry crop, and you had better come up here TODAY to do some picking. That's an order from Uncle Jim. You can go down to the local Vons and look just above the freezer case (ice cream section in our town), and there's a whole compliment of canning jars.  Don't
just buy a little half-pint of blackberries either. Come
winter, you'll be glad you purchased, oh, let's say 5 gallons at least.
Real Riley's Farm Blackberries. Need I say more?Tonight we have some great music on the Riley's Old Time Radio Show, (590 AM KTIE, 5:30 PM). Freeman House and Kathy von Arx will be playing, along with Katie Chenault and Daniel Miliken. Ralph Ervi does some singing, and we'll be trying out some new farm commercials on you. Our Resurrected Melodies section includes a great 1774 tune--"Collin's Success." Don't miss it!
|
|||||||||||||||
| July 7, 2006 7:53 AM | |||||||||||||||
 Chelsea and
Krystle picked that whopping basket of blackberries (right) yesterday in
10 minutes. That's what you call "Easy Pickin'."
They won't last long, this easy, so make plans
to come on up! (Last night, a display of raspberries
caught my eye in the local super-market. They were something
like $4.95 for 5 ounces!) We're even price competitive this
year, and that's a bit scandalous. We are--by unapologetic
design--not a discount destination. I was very proud of
a feuding relative this year, (we don't disagree on everything), for
putting an absolute premium price on his apples. Does
Sooper_Gigantic Foods let you pick from the tree or the vine???
Nooooo.This didn't get much press, but I guess some of the neighborhood malcontents want Dennis Hansberger recalled from the county board of supervisors for--get this--giving us preferential treatment. If $150,000 in fees and engineering is preferential treatment, I'd hate to see what selective persecution looks like. Now some of these folks have to play by the rules and they are belly-aching big time. Their complaints? Dennis Hansburger is accused of helping the Royal Rangers get a camp for kids and an educational living history facility for school children here. (To this day, he's been utterly objective about our application.) Golly! If Dennis Hansberger isn't careful, he might get labeled a friend of youth, education, history, and apple orchards. (Solid material for a recall campaign?) In truth, what the neighbors are angry about is that the county administration did not shut us down on demand. They wanted county government to act as their personal attack dog, and ignore the complaining neighbors' flagrant code violations. Sorry, friends, it doesn't work that way. You should spend this energy tending to your business, and serving your customers. It's worked for us.
|
|||||||||||||||
| July 6, 2006 4:46 PM | |||||||||||||||
 |
|||||||||||||||
| July 6, 2006 6:43 AM | |||||||||||||||
|
Well, we attended another meeting of
the Oak Glen Community plan committee last night, where, among other
things, we spent a great deal of time trying to determine if an
"Agricultural Heritage Museum" would fit properly under the definition of
agritourism within the Rural Living zone.
Your correspondent excepted, the committee didn't seem to think so, but
food service, tours, retail sales, festivals, barn dances, farm equipment
displays all seemed to fit, so it would appear that some good will is
breaking out in Oak Glen with respect to the Rural Living zone and
Agritourism. (A motion to ban Ag/Heritage
museums from the very definition of Agritourism failed, so I suppose it's
a mixed result on that single front.)
I note, with some degree of amused bewilderment, that a retail shop
selling gift items promotes "the products of the farm" but a small
agricultural museum does not. Consider these two sales
pitches: "Visit Brown's dairy farm and see the museum of milking!" "Visit Brown's dairy farm and get a good deal on a stuffed toy cow import!" It's also
intriguing to see how we have moved, as a community, from the Crayola
democracy stage, where county consultants drew pretty pictures of farm
scenes on butcher paper--in nervous pursuit of a community plan--to a
small committee that insists on motions, seconds, discussion and a show of
ayes or nays. It's all business now!
|
|||||||||||||||
| July 5, 2006 8:02 AM | |||||||||||||||
 Baby's
Breath alert. I was inspecting the boys work on weeding the
flower field, and I discovered a whole row of Baby's Breath ready to pick,
fifty cents per stem. We're open today for blackberries,
so come on up! Ever want to see the farm on a day when you can almost have it all to yourself? Today will be one of those sleepy summer days, when you can just watch things growing. You can visit the general store, buy yourself a cool, old fashioned Coca Cola in a glass bottle and watch the grass grow! |
|||||||||||||||
| July 4, 2006 4:09 PM | |||||||||||||||
| Happy Independence Day! Here's a few new Riley's Farm Radio Commercials. (MP3) Give a hear! | |||||||||||||||
| July 1, 2006 7:06 AM | |||||||||||||||
 We had a
small, steady flow of
olallie berry pickers yesterday and an absolutely fantastic group of
guests for "Evening in the Colonies with Patrick
Henry" last night. It's a joy to "live the colonies"
for people who appreciate history. Thanks to you all.The country store has been re-arranged a bit, to give us some more floor space and we have a lot more chairs all around the old packing shed for you to take a load off. The flower field is still pretty weedy, but the rows themselves (below) are in good shape, and we should have flowers to pick, just about the time most of you start thinking about apples. We have an ongoing problem with u-pick fruit loss in this respect: some people pull an apple off a tree, look at it, decide that it's not quite the one they want, and then drop it on the ground.  Other
people just sort of dive right into the orchard and start munching.
We think we will put a gate on the orchards this year and then have
all the guests go through a short "farm college" before entering the
picking areas. (We won't issue
graduation gowns, though, for picking.) If you are
a long time u-picker here in Oak Glen, your
thoughts, would be appreciated. On the pumpkin front, our patch is going to be bigger than it ever has, this year, with a new field added to the old one, above the big shade tree in the middle of the farm's saddle meadow. Finally, we are getting something
of a mighty goat herd started here, with the spike-headed fellow and his
mates, below, doing their part to create more of nature's weed-wackers
Goats will eat down anything, but they will also de-bark trees, so I'm
trying to figure out how we can put these critters into the employ of the
farm without damaging the trees. A wonderful,
Adventist vegetarian friend of ours told this story of an old ram she
owned who was so ornery no one could get near him. (He was
head-butting cars, climbing on the roof, being a really, creepy, surly
beast to put it mildly.)
|
|||||||||||||||
|
More Farm Journal Entries
|
|||||||||||||||
Special
thanks to both Kathryn and Tami,
She
didn't want to give him away to a farmer who would eat him, so she gave
him away to a place that had a lot of she goats and no papa.
Within a week or two, he was gentle as a kitten and his tribe was on
the increase.