A Giraffe's been sighted in NY

Manhattan multimedia developer Wendy Dubit had a dream—she wanted to connect fellow New Yorkers with a rapidly disappearing part of America: small farms.

Dubit went into action when she learned that a lot of city kids don’t know where the things they eat and wear come from. Many think tomatoes, zucchinis, squash and the like originate in grocery stores. Some thought wool and cotton just appears somehow as sweaters, ponchos and tube socks. To Dubit, such ignorance was cultural illiteracy on a grand and insidious scale.

In 1986 she threw all of her time, energy and money into founding Farm Hands/City Hands, a unique nonprofit organization with a simple mission: keep small-scale agriculture alive by linking farm and city for the enrichment of both. Her method was equally simple: put urbanites to work on the many small farms dotting the Hudson River Valley.

Over the years since, Farm Hands/City Hands has bussed thousands of city kids and adults from all walks of life out to the country to work for farmers who need extra help, but can’t afford to pay regular wages.

The farmers offer up room, board, and the experience of farming, first hand. The city hands get acquainted with onion patches, herb gardens, and the business end of a dairy cow. They breathe clean air and eat foods minutes after they’re picked, instead of days or months.

Dubit expanded Farm Hands/City Hands by inventing a program she calls Project OnGrowing which trains homeless people and those living in shelters to do farm work and food services like catering. Participants eat the produce they grow; excess crops are sold and the profits rolled back into training and recreation programs. Every week, participants go to work planting, tending and harvesting their own crops in a large garden that grows out at Green Chimneys FarmCenter in Brewster, NY—a full- service nonprofit agency that is home to Farm Hands/City Hands and Project OnGrowing, and numerous programs for children and families.

While Dubit isn’t telling anyone to pull up stakes and go live off the land, she knows the vital importance of small farms to everyone’s well-being and she’s sure that, “There’s a farmer inside every one of us.” Wendy Dubit is determined to save small farms by outing all those inner-farmers.