Put “East Lyme” and “family farm” in the same sentence and just about everyone comes up with Scott’s. The question is, which one, which generation, and what was their first name? And for good reason.
There have been a lot of Scott brothers over the years. Most of their names begin with W. Many are still actively involved in Connecticut agriculture, growing or selling fruits and vegetables.
East Lyme’s Web Scott specializes in growing raspberries, strawberries and vegetables. The eighth of nine children of Woodrow, or “Woody” Scott, now 91 years old, Web has Scott’s Orchard Farm Market, with seasonal farm stands in Old Saybrook and in Haddam.
From apples to bulk mulch, many of the other Scott’s farm stands around the region, especially west of the Connecticut River, are owned by one of Web’s brothers, whose names all begin with W.
“It was a great way to grow up, with six brothers and a family farm,” said Web, who grew up working with his brothers in his father’s wholesale apple business. “It was a real blessing growing up like that. There was always plenty to do and a lot of adventure.”
The brothers who have remained in the business have independent, but co-dependent operations, often selling what each other produces. The apples at Web’s stand are produced by a brother with orchards in Deep River and Glastonbury.
“If one of us plants a large amount of something, the other ones won’t,” Web said. “It allows us to have a broad range of products without everyone trying to have a little of everything.”
Web and his wife, Lisa, have six children. They are familiar faces around the Lyme Farmers Market every weekend at Ashlawn Farm, selling everything from spinach and lettuce to tomatoes, watermelon, peppers, squash, corn and berries.
Daughter Lydia, 17, is a respected buyer at the regional wholesale farmers market in Hartford, Web said, having accompanied him for years on early morning runs up there. It’s not exactly a gentile place. Lydia has started her own cut flower business, planting and caring for annuals at Ashlawn. She plans to study horticulture at the University of Connecticut.
Even four-year-old Laura had her first garden this summer. She won first prize for yellow and green squash at the Hamburg Fair and has delighted her grandfather with deliveries from her garden.
The Roots of the Scott Family
The Scott farming legacy started with Michael Scott, an England weaver who came here in the 1880s to work in the textile mills. He had to leave his wife, Clara, and family behind until he raised enough money to bring them over. Arriving family members came to work in the mills and farmed on the side. As the mills shut down, farming took over.
The W’s started with Michael’s and Clara’s offspring, including sons Walter, who is Web’s grandfather, Wilbur, who Web credits for developing “butter and sugar” sweet corn, Wilfred, a state legislator, who got into apples, and a sister named Dot. Wilfred’s offspring include Allen Scott, retired pastor of the Flanders Baptist Church, and his son, Allen, the current pastor.
“We have a really good immigrant history of what it was like to earn enough money to send for the rest of the family and establish them over here,” said Web. One of Walter’s sons, Wainright, wrote articles about the changing seasons for The Day. Web credits him and his siblings for putting together a detailed family history in the 1960s.
Wainright, or “Bun,” and Audrey Scott started their family farm in the 1960s. Their son, Tom, and his wife, Karen, are owners of Scott’s Yankee Farmer at 436 Boston Post Road in East Lyme. They have four children. Daughter Allison is deeply involved in the family business.
During the spring months through the late December the Yankee Farmer offer a variety of native produce, about 85 percent of it grown on the farm. Corn is the longest season, running from July through September. They also sell eggs, honey, fruit pies and cut flowers, plus run a busy you-pick season for strawberries, raspberries and blueberries.
Fall brings peaches, apples, pumpkins and mums and a steady stream of families and school field trips for hay rack rides into the pumpkin fields and apple orchards. Tom and Karen give the kids an entertaining education on how the crops are grown and harvested.
With the high cost of land and development pressures, farming is one of those fields that a person has to either be born into or marry into these days.
“Everyone in our circle of friends were farmers,” Web said. “Up until about 20 years ago, many left farming, looking to make a better living.”
Both he and Tom see the exodus from farming to other fields as leveling off. The survivors who have made it this far are committed to it. Those who are successful have to continually innovate, and going into retail operations is often part of the equation.
Karen Scott has found success with her version of Community Supported Agriculture, or CSA. The typical model is for people to buy shares early in the season, supporting a farmer who provides them with produce through the growing season.
“Ours works very differently than most,” she explained. For a $90 share, members get $100 of credit and came come into the shop to pick out produce at any time in the season. This works well, she said, with teachers who have the summer off, or people who travel.
“People are loving it; they can walk in, not worry if they brought cash or the checkbook, we add it up and keep track of their balance,” she said.
The number of CSA shares has almost doubled this year since Scotts opened for the season in April.
“People are more conscious of wanting to know where their food comes from,” she said. “They also are very supportive of local farmers. They want to support a local person, and don’t want to see them gone.”
With higher food and energy prices, Karen said she is seeing consumers act differently. There’s more interest in “putting up,” or preserving fresh produce. Some years ago, she said, they couldn’t give away the stacks of pickling cucumbers; home canning was a lost art.
“Now I have more and more people looking for baskets of cucumbers for pickling,” she said. “They are freezing peaches, too.”
U-pick crops are more popular, too. Scott was amazed with the numbers of people who came to pick blueberries, not a quick task. Lots of families came out to pick fruit this year.
“We ran out of blueberries this year,” Karen said.
Both farmers reported more people buying vegetable seedlings last spring, too, as more people decided to try growing their own vegetables, either to save money or as a hobby.
“I’d like to see how many of them were successful at it,” Tom said.
For more information about Scott’s Yankee Farmer, go to www.scottsyankeefarmer.net
Deborah Beckwith contributed to this article.