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Teenagers picking cherries: a migrant farmworker’s memoir

Here’s an excerpt from Robert “Carlos” Fuentes’ self-published book, “The Vacation: a Teenage Migrant Farmworker’s Experience Picking Cherries in Michigan”—a coming-of-age story that intertwines the bonds of family and friends, emphasizes the importance of heritage, captures the sweetness of first love, and showcases the quiet dignity of hard work. According to Rubén O. Martinez, professor emeritis at Michigan State University’s Julia Samora Research Institute, Fuentes’ story, which is set in 1969 not long before the introduction of the mechanized cherry shaker, “provides a window to family, religion, race relations, and short-term community life among migrant farm working families through the experiences of an adolescent boy who is coming of age in a migrant camp and the orchards of cherry growers.” Fuentes’ book “The Vacation” is available at Leelanau County bookstores.

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Leelanau’s newest cherry farmers laud farm diversification

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First generation cherry farmers are an anomaly in Leelanau these days. As far as Sarah and Phil Hallstedt are aware, the Hallstedt Homestead Cherries was the “last in before doors slammed and prices dropped.” They knew most of the challenges involved with cherry farming in the early 2000s, when they began to look for the right piece of property to start their retirement career as farmers, but at the time it did not deter them. They performed a business case with MSU extension, local growers and fruit distributors from around Michigan. As Phil put it, “We felt we had a good business plan, but that was in 2006. We fell in love with the fruit and the community, and we are just stubborn.” Click here to read Abby Chatfield’s story, which appeared in our April 11 print edition.

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