During 2023, Suttons Bay resident Rebecca Gearing Carlson has researched and written a series of narrative historical pieces about Leelanau County farming families, which we have published in the Glen Arbor Sun. Read those stories here.
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With all the prodigious natural benefits the honey bee affords the world at large, it is not surprising that honey bees play such an integral role in the world of farming for Julius Kolarik. Click here to read Part 10 of Rebecca Carlson’s Leelanau Farming Family series.
John Houdek arrived in the Leelanau area in the 1860s with wife Barbara and brother Wenzel, all from Bohemia, writes Rebecca Carlson in the latest installment in her series about the legacy of Leelanau farming families. The brothers settled and homesteaded in the area north of Leland and south of the Gills Pier Saw Mill, owning around 400 acres of land, according to the 1880 plat map. The farms and acreage of these two brothers got passed down through the next three generations. John and his wife Barbara were parents to nine children who became integral parts to the family farm and Gills Pier community.
Julius Kolarik’s sage farming and local knowledge are legend, even amongst his fellow farmers and neighbors. However, when Rebecca Carlson called him to set up an interview back in May with this treasure trove of Leelanau County farming wisdom, he said “no.” He was too busy. The farm was getting ready for planting, fertilizing and the upcoming summer harvest. What was she thinking asking him, or any of the farmers, for interviews during the early summer months, she writes in part eight of the Glen Arbor Sun’s Leelanau Farming Family Series? They are crazy, crazy busy from sun up to sun down. “I will talk to you in December,” Kolarik told her.
Martin Korson’s great-grandfather, Martin, was one of the Bohemian families who settled the Gill’s Pier area, writes Rebecca Gearing Carlson in installment seven of our Leelanau Farming Family Series. Korson, pronounced Keer-shan, first settled and worked in Leland at the charcoal foundry that fueled the steam ships running Lake Michigan. Then the work became about clearing the land for homes and farms. Thus, timbering and the saw mill at Gill’s Pier gained importance as the community grew.
Spending a moment in the shade with Nic Theisen is a treat. It doesn’t take long into our interview before I start wishing I could be one of Loma Farm’s privileged 50 CSA shareholders, to be invited to private farm gatherings, receive personalized typeset pressed thank-you notes, and follow more closely the agricultural calendar as visually and deliciously evoked by his wit and craft.
As they elaborate on their goals and farm structure, I am struck by the planning and intellectual effort that went into the purchase and creation of this new farm. John and Bailey have researched and taken advantage of seemingly every grant and loan available to them as young farmers.
“I feel I’ve been aiming in this direction all along, though it didn’t seem like it at times,” shared Gaia Nesvacil as we sipped a cup of coffee and watched the end of a summer storm approach from the west, wind and rain drops gathering force. “On and off these past three years I’ve been working towards the budding of a flower operation. This is my first year leasing a half acre in Leelanau County to grow cut flowers to take to the farmers market.”
“I didn’t grow up farming. Farming wasn’t even on my radar, though we always had a garden where we lived in the suburbs,” begins Michelle Ferrarese, owner, farmer and prime motivator of Birch Point Farm, located between Lake Leelanau and Bugai Road, northwest of Traverse City.
With a face as weathered as one of the boulders from his fields, and a blunt demeanor to match, Glen Noonan presents a formidable figure in the complex social and geographical landscapes of Leelanau County. This farmer, businessman, political fixture and quiet benefactor to many has plowed his fields, herded cattle, shaken cherries and picked apples, mined gravel, raised seven children with his late wife Ella, been the backbone of some key local government boards, and helped shape virtually every realm of life for the region’s residents for over six decades.