Download or read book Faith of a Farmer God Family and Life in America s Heartland written by Bryan Dee Kirkpatrick and published by Kudu Publishing. This book was released on 2015-10-23 with total page 154 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Born into a family of farmers in America's heartland, Bryan Dee Kirkpatrick's journey is anything but typical. From hitting home runs at Randy Hundley's baseball camps to traveling to Europe and exchanging agricultural ideas with French farmers, Bryan has experienced a life as unpredictable as the summer storms of his home state. In his autobiography, the Indiana farmer, businessman and community leader shares with readers the joys and struggles of raising a family, expanding his farm and facing love and loss. Both humorous and poignant, Bryan explores the principles that he has learned along the way which have guided him in his relationships, church life and interactions with friends and family. Bryan's love for God is infectious, and his commitment to stewardship of the resources under his care is inspiring to readers, regardless of their vocations. Bryan Dee Kirkpatrick was born October 3, 1951. He attended the Purdue University Farm Short Course in 1971 and served in the Indiana National Guard from 1971 to 1977. He has been married to his wife, Susan, since 1974, and they have three daughters, Laura, Andrea and Jenna, and two granddaughters. Bryan and Susan are faithful members of their home church, First United Methodist in Greentown, Indiana.

Download or read book American Harvest written by Marie Mutsuki Mockett and published by Graywolf Press. This book was released on 2020-04-07 with total page 416 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An epic story of the American wheat harvest, the politics of food, and the culture of the Great Plains For over one hundred years, the Mockett family has owned a seven-thousand-acre wheat farm in the panhandle of Nebraska, where Marie Mutsuki Mockett’s father was raised. Mockett, who grew up in bohemian Carmel, California, with her father and her Japanese mother, knew little about farming when she inherited this land. Her father had all but forsworn it. In American Harvest, Mockett accompanies a group of evangelical Christian wheat harvesters through the heartland at the invitation of Eric Wolgemuth, the conservative farmer who has cut her family’s fields for decades. As Mockett follows Wolgemuth’s crew on the trail of ripening wheat from Texas to Idaho, they contemplate what Wolgemuth refers to as “the divide,” inadvertently peeling back layers of the American story to expose its contradictions and unhealed wounds. She joins the crew in the fields, attends church, and struggles to adapt to the rhythms of rural life, all the while continually reminded of her own status as a person who signals “not white,” but who people she encounters can’t quite categorize. American Harvest is an extraordinary evocation of the land and a thoughtful exploration of ingrained beliefs, from evangelical skepticism of evolution to cosmopolitan assumptions about food production and farming. With exquisite lyricism and humanity, this astonishing book attempts to reconcile competing versions of our national story.

Download or read book Nothing Short of a Miracle written by Lisa Short and published by . This book was released on 2020-04-10 with total page 290 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Shortly after a young couple vow to love each other through sickness and health, their commitment is tested when a tragic farm accident destroys their world. Surviving the insurmountable damage seems impossible, but when a community comes together and profoundly demonstrates what can be done through prayer and support-and a Kansas farm family puts all their trust and faith in God-lives are inspired by results that are nothing short of miracle.For some, farming is a calling more than an occupation, and to those who participate in the time-honored production of America's food supply, the challenge of staying solvent through the generations is a continual concern. And when tragedy strikes at the heart of a farming family, the repercussions demand the best of individuals and community, calling forth that spirit and resolve so essential to those who live and grow on the land. This mother's account of her adult son's shocking experience with loss and the subsequent struggle to maintain life as a husband and father, and regain his role within the rural landscape of the Kansas heartland, is a heartfelt tribute to the qualities that made and keep America's precious farm families doing what they do best.

Download or read book Hard Living in America s Heartland written by Paula vW. Dáil and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2015-03-02 with total page 277 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Despite living hard, endlessly challenging lives, the rural poor remain tirelessly optimistic, believing things will get better next year. As one struggling farmer explained, "Sometimes I feel like a jackass in a hailstorm--I just have to stand here and take it...but what the hell--it'll stop hailing sooner or later." The struggle to survive on the richest farmland in America has produced some of the nation's poorest people. However, rural poverty is not the same as urban poverty: the usual definitions and criteria do not always apply, the known predictors do not necessarily hold up, and again and again the rural poor save themselves because they know no one else will. This book refutes the common image of the poor as lazy slackers averse to work. In reality, fiercely independent, politically astute, hard-working men and women who possess a wide array of useful skills populate the rural heartland--and they struggle to stay afloat in small-town economies that rise and fall on the whims of remote farm policy decisions, a volatile world marketplace and Mother Nature, who is a fickle, wildly unpredictable business partner.

Download or read book Life on the Family Farm written by Tom Heck and published by Aneko Press. This book was released on 2017-12-07 with total page 233 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “You are the most God-gifted writer I’ve ever had,” Tom’s college professor told him. However, Tom quit college; his love of farming drew him back to the farm. Thirty years later, Tom picked up the pen again, drawing readers into farming adventures with him. In these exciting and uplifting true stories, he shares his love of farming, family, and God. His unique writing style brings the reader right alongside him and his family as they work on their northern Wisconsin dairy farm. Tom’s stories have spread like wildfire from his hometown newspaper to papers across America. Readers tell him, “Please don’t quit writing.” Others ask him, “When are you going to make it a book?” Due to popular demand here it is. From quotes like “Dad, I really enjoyed fixing that with you” to “She’s a dead cow don’t call me anymore,” these engaging stories will keep you turning the pages to read one story, then another. As you do, you will be blessed as so many others have been. Come, read, and enjoy our farm life with us.

Download or read book Rooted Resistance written by Ross Singer and published by University of Arkansas Press. This book was released on 2020-09-01 with total page 319 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From farm-to-table restaurants and farmers markets, to support for fair trade and food sovereignty, movements for food-system change hold the promise for deeper transformations. Yet Americans continue to live the paradox of caring passionately about healthy eating while demanding the convenience of fast food. Rooted Resistance explores this fraught but promising food scene. More than a retelling of the origin story of a democracy born from an intimate connection with the land, this book wagers that socially responsible agrarian mythmaking should be a vital part of a food ethic of resistance if we are to rectify the destructive tendencies in our contemporary food system. Through a careful examination of several case studies, Rooted Resistance traverses the ground of agrarian myth in modern America. The authors investigate key figures and movements in the history of modern agrarianism, including the World War I victory garden efforts, the postwar Country Life movement for the vindication of farmers’ rights, the Southern Agrarian critique of industrialism, and the practical and spiritual prophecy of organic farming put forth by J. I. Rodale. This critical history is then brought up to date with recent examples such as the contested South Central Farm in urban Los Angeles and the spectacular rise and fall of the Chipotle “Food with Integrity” branding campaign. By examining a range of case studies, Singer, Grey, and Motter aim for a deeper critical understanding of the many applications of agrarian myth and reveal why it can help provide a pathway for positive systemic change in the food system.

Download or read book Meatpacking America written by Kristy Nabhan-Warren and published by UNC Press Books. This book was released on 2021-08-09 with total page 280 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Whether valorized as the heartland or derided as flyover country, the Midwest became instantly notorious when COVID-19 infections skyrocketed among workers in meatpacking plants—and Americans feared for their meat supply. But the Midwest is not simply the place where animals are fed corn and then butchered. Native midwesterner Kristy Nabhan-Warren spent years interviewing Iowans who work in the meatpacking industry, both native-born residents and recent migrants from Latin America, Africa, and Asia. In Meatpacking America, she digs deep below the stereotype and reveals the grit and grace of a heartland that is a major global hub of migration and food production—and also, it turns out, of religion. Across the flatlands, Protestants, Catholics, and Muslims share space every day as worshippers, employees, and employers. On the bloody floors of meatpacking plants, in bustling places of worship, and in modest family homes, longtime and newly arrived Iowans spoke to Nabhan-Warren about their passion for religious faith and desire to work hard for their families. Their stories expose how faith-based aspirations for mutual understanding blend uneasily with rampant economic exploitation and racial biases. Still, these new and old midwesterners say that a mutual language of faith and morals brings them together more than any of them would have ever expected.

Download or read book Red State Religion written by Robert Wuthnow and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2012 with total page 502 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What Kansas really tells us about red state America No state has voted Republican more consistently or widely or for longer than Kansas. To understand red state politics, Kansas is the place. It is also the place to understand red state religion. The Kansas Board of Education has repeatedly challenged the teaching of evolution, Kansas voters overwhelmingly passed a constitutional ban on gay marriage, the state is a hotbed of antiabortion protest—and churches have been involved in all of these efforts. Yet in 1867 suffragist Lucy Stone could plausibly proclaim that, in the cause of universal suffrage, "Kansas leads the world!" How did Kansas go from being a progressive state to one of the most conservative? In Red State Religion, Robert Wuthnow tells the story of religiously motivated political activism in Kansas from territorial days to the present. He examines how faith mixed with politics as both ordinary Kansans and leaders such as John Brown, Carrie Nation, William Allen White, and Dwight Eisenhower struggled over the pivotal issues of their times, from slavery and Prohibition to populism and anti-communism. Beyond providing surprising new explanations of why Kansas became a conservative stronghold, the book sheds new light on the role of religion in red states across the Midwest and the United States. Contrary to recent influential accounts, Wuthnow argues that Kansas conservatism is largely pragmatic, not ideological, and that religion in the state has less to do with politics and contentious moral activism than with relationships between neighbors, friends, and fellow churchgoers. This is an important book for anyone who wants to understand the role of religion in American political conservatism.

Download or read book In the Blood written by Robert Wuthnow and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2020-08-04 with total page 236 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A vivid and moving portrait of America's farm families Farming is essential to the American economy and our daily lives, yet few of us have much contact with farmers except through the food we eat. Who are America's farmers? Why is farming important to them? How are they coping with dramatic changes to their way of life? In the Blood paints a vivid and moving portrait of America’s farm families, shedding new light on their beliefs, values, and complicated relationship with the land. Drawing on more than two hundred in-depth interviews, Robert Wuthnow presents farmers in their own voices as they speak candidly about their family traditions, aspirations for their children, business arrangements, and conflicts with family members. They describe their changing relationships with neighbors, their shifting views about religion, and the subtle ways they defend their personal independence. Wuthnow shares the stories of farmers who operate dairies, raise livestock, and grow our fruit and vegetables. We hear from corn and soybean farmers, wheat-belt farmers, and cotton growers. We gain new insights into how farmers assign meaning to the land, and how they grapple with the increasingly difficult challenges of biotechnology and global markets. In the Blood reveals how, despite profound changes in modern agriculture, farming remains an enduring commitment that runs deeply in the veins of today’s farm families.

Download or read book Heartland written by Sarah Smarsh and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2018-09-18 with total page 320 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: *Finalist for the National Book Award* *Finalist for the Kirkus Prize* *Instant New York Times Bestseller* *Named a Best Book of the Year by NPR, New York Post, BuzzFeed, Shelf Awareness, Bustle, and Publishers Weekly* An essential read for our times: an eye-opening memoir of working-class poverty in America that will deepen our understanding of the ways in which class shapes our country and “a deeply humane memoir that crackles with clarifying insight”.* Sarah Smarsh was born a fifth generation Kansas wheat farmer on her paternal side, and the product of generations of teen mothers on her maternal side. Through her experiences growing up on a farm thirty miles west of Wichita, we are given a unique and essential look into the lives of poor and working class Americans living in the heartland. During Sarah’s turbulent childhood in Kansas in the 1980s and 1990s, she enjoyed the freedom of a country childhood, but observed the painful challenges of the poverty around her; untreated medical conditions for lack of insurance or consistent care, unsafe job conditions, abusive relationships, and limited resources and information that would provide for the upward mobility that is the American Dream. By telling the story of her life and the lives of the people she loves with clarity and precision but without judgement, Smarsh challenges us to look more closely at the class divide in our country. Beautifully written, in a distinctive voice, Heartland combines personal narrative with powerful analysis and cultural commentary, challenging the myths about people thought to be less because they earn less. “Heartland is one of a growing number of important works—including Matthew Desmond’s Evicted and Amy Goldstein’s Janesville—that together merit their own section in nonfiction aisles across the country: America’s postindustrial decline...Smarsh shows how the false promise of the ‘American dream’ was used to subjugate the poor. It’s a powerful mantra” *(The New York Times Book Review).

Download or read book The Most Amazing Harvest written by Pam Bates and published by Morgan James Publishing. This book was released on 2020-06-02 with total page 115 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The heartwarming true story of a farmer’s unwavering faith in the face of a tragic prognosis—and how a community came together to help a neighbor in need. In the summer of 2015, Carl Bates and his wife Pam received the devastating news that he had metastatic cancer. The doctors have him just three months to live. As farmers in Galva, Illinois, they were dealing not only with the profound grief of Carl’s illness, but a serious practical concern: who would harvest the crops? Despite the crisis he faced, Carl never lost his faith in God. When word of his situation got out, a group of fellow farmers gathered organized to harvest Carl’s crops themselves. Someone observed that “a farmer can ask for no better crop than a bountiful harvest of friends.” The event was covered by the news and became a viral phenomenon. Now, in The Most Amazing Harvest, Pam Bates and Paula Patty tell the full story of the remarkable farmer who kept his faith, and the small town community whose selfless act of kindness was nothing short of a miracle.

Download or read book God Land written by Lyz Lenz and published by Indiana University Press. This book was released on 2019-07-19 with total page 142 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “Will resonate with any readers interested in understanding American landscapes where white, evangelical Christianity dominates both politics and culture.” —Publishers Weekly In the wake of the 2016 election, Lyz Lenz watched as her country and her marriage were torn apart by the competing forces of faith and politics. A mother of two, a Christian, and a lifelong resident of middle America, Lenz was bewildered by the pain and loss around her—the empty churches and the broken hearts. What was happening to faith in the heartland? From drugstores in Sydney, Iowa, to skeet shooting in rural Illinois, to the mega churches of Minneapolis, Lenz set out to discover the changing forces of faith and tradition in God’s country. Part journalism, part memoir, God Land is a journey into the heart of a deeply divided America. Lenz visits places of worship across the heartland and speaks to the everyday people who often struggle to keep their churches afloat and to cope in a land of instability. Through a thoughtful interrogation of the effects of faith and religion on our lives, our relationships, and our country, God Land investigates whether our divides can ever be bridged and if America can ever come together. “God Land, Lyz Lenz’s much-anticipated debut book, is a marvel. Not only is it a window into the middle America so many like to stereotype but fail to fully understand in all of its complexity, but it mixes reportage, memoir, and gorgeous prose so seamlessly I wanted to know how she did it.” —Sarah Weinman, author of The Real Lolita

Download or read book To Serve God and Wal Mart written by Bethany Moreton and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2009-05-31 with total page 391 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This extraordinary biography of Wal-Mart's world shows how a Christian pro-business movement grew from the bottom up as well as the top down, bolstering an economic vision that sanctifies corporate globalization.

Download or read book The Farm Life written by Joseph Estes and published by Createspace Independent Publishing Platform. This book was released on 2017-02-17 with total page 48 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Farm Life is the second book in my series Faith's Right Hand. It tells a war bride's story; from the loss of a husband and restoration through years filled with God's promises. We follow the Warrens as they continue to farm their homestead while raising their family in Missouri. Tragedy once again befalls the Warrens, but again they preserve through it all under God's providence. Sit back, relax, and read along as we embark on Rose's life through the Faith's Right Hand series. I invite you to read my other books in this series. Thank you and God Bless. Joseph P. Estes

Download or read book A Prayer for the Prairie written by Raylene Frankhauser Nickel and published by Fiver Penny Press. This book was released on 2003-04-01 with total page 176 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "This book is a collection of spiritual essays. It describes the author's life on a small farm and ranch on the Northern Plains. It discusses the economic challenges facing these small farms and ranches. It provides historical context through some description of past agriculture economics and life styles. The author weaves this material with spiritual insights to suggest agricultural practices and economics, and rural lifestyles that could help sustain small farms and rural communities."

Download or read book Reflections of Fall A Story of Love War and Faith written by Ray "Tony" Miranda and published by Lulu.com. This book was released on 2017-07-13 with total page 194 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Although World War II has been over for some time, Sam Mcguire is still struggling with his memories of the brutalities of battle. Despite his pain, Sam is attempting to move forward in life. But that task is more challenging than he ever imagined as demons of the past continue to haunt him. As Sam finally gains the strength and insight to emerge from the darkness, he returns home to Indiana where he continues healing with help from family, God, and friends. After he marries his love, Sam builds a new life for himself, made complete with the birth of his children. As his son, Sammy, grows into a rebellious and headstrong young man, he too eventually makes his way to war-this time in Vietnam. Now he must find a way to survive, in his own way, in his own time, just as his father did. Reflections of Fall follows the paths of father and son as each is led from war back home where faith, family, and love strengthen their spirits to overcome pain and obstacles.

Download or read book Healing the Heartland written by Marvin Emil Ceynar and published by . This book was released on 1991 with total page 194 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: