James Leva is a multi-instrumentalist, singer, and songwriter whose music is deeply rooted in Appalachian tradition. He learned much of his fiddle, banjo and vocal repertoire from great traditional masters such as Tommy Jarrell and Doug Wallin. Throughout the 1970s and 1980s he performed with seminal traditionally focused groups that were exploring the boundaries of Appalachian music. Bands such at Plank Road (with Al Tharp and Michael James Kott), Ace Weems and the Fat Meat Boys (with David Winston and Chad Crumm), and the Hellbenders.(with Bruce Molsky and Dave Grant) performed throughout the US and Europe and their recordings were widely influential.
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Riley Baugess has performed throughout the United States, as well as in Canada, Ireland, Scotland, and England. He has played with several old-time string bands, including The Farmer's Daughters, The Konnarock Critters, The Red Hots, Backstep, and the Old Hollow Stringband and regularly tours with Dirk Powell and Tim O'Brien. Baugess sang on the soundtrack to the 2003 film Cold Mountain and has recorded with Robert Plant, Alison Krauss, Willie Nelson, Dirk Powell, and Martha Scanlan. He has taught banjo at the Augusta Heritage Center's Old Time Week in Elkins, West Virginia and at the Midwest Banjo Camp in Olivet, Michigan. Baugus released his first album, Life of Riley, in 2001. A second album, Long Steel Rail, was released in 2006. He lives in Walkertown, NC.
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Carol Coulter, Co-founder & former-Executive Director of Blue Ridge Women in Agriculture - New York native, Carol moved to Ashe County in North Carolina in 1995, after having worked in outdoor/leadership programs at UNC Charlotte and the NC Outward Bound School. Previously, Carol served as an administrator for the Ashe County Partnership for Children and as operations manager for the National Committee for the New River. Carol co-owns Heritage Homestead Goat Dairy with her husband Lon.
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Dr. Chyi Lyi (Kathleen) Liang, Director of Center for Environmental Farming Systems (CEFS) at North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University - Dr. Liang was born and raised in Taiwan. She came to the US in 1988 to complete her M.S. and Ph.D. in Agricultural Economics at Purdue University. Dr. Liang worked for the University of Nebraska Panhandle Research and Extension Center at Scottsbluff, Nebraska between 1996 and 1998 as an Extension Economist, where her projects covered small grains, livestock, sunflower, dry edible beans, buffalo, prairie dogs, and turf grass. Dr. Liang joined the University of Vermont in 1998 and started working on topics such as agritourism and rural entrepreneurship. She joined A&T in 2016 and her research, teaching, and outreach focus on entrepreneurship, applied economics, youth development, and community network analysis.
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Rita Gale Cruise, Organizer of Piedmont Women in Agriculture - Rita Gale owns and operates Jessees Garden and Farms, a 200 year-old sustainable practice farm in Quaker Gap, NC and sustainable forest in Patrick County, Va. For this last 30 years, Rita Gale has worked in leadership nonprofit positions at: Winston Salem Sustainability Resource Center, Conservation Fund (NCIF), Self Help Credit Union and Community Development, Stokes Partnership for Children, and Wake Forest Medical School. She is also a passionate volunteer with the Sawtooth School for Visual Design, the Genetics Fund, a Master Gardener with Urban Ag/Small Farms, the Native Plant Society, the Hillsborough Arts Council (Patrick Doughtery Project), and various other organizations. Rita Gale is an avid and self-taught Woodworker, Mason, Builder, and Artist (Mixed Media), Poet and Author and enjoys spending time with her family.
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Mary Jac Brennan, Horticulture Agent for Small Farms and Local Food for NC Cooperative Extension, Forsyth County - Mary Jac has over twenty years experience as landscape designer, horticulture educator, and public speaker. She facilitated the development of a community garden in Kernersville, N.C. in 2009. At Extension, Mary Jac developed the Forsyth Community Gardening Program which she led until 2013. In 2015, she developed the Urban Farm School program, teaching it each spring. She has ten years experience as a high school environmental science & vocational horticulture teacher where she developed curriculum for a campus garden project. In 2008, Mary Jac attended the NOAA symposium 'Climate Change and the Plant Sector' as a visiting educator. She is committed to community service and educating the general public about environmental horticulture.
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Robert (Andrew) Branan, Assistant Extension Professor with the Agricultural and Resource Economics Department in the College of Agricultural and Life Sciences, North Carolina State University - Andrew is a lawyer who concentrates in agriculture, real property, and natural resource law, with a focus on farm and land succession. He has managed a solo law practice that has served farmers, landowners and food entrepreneurs across North Carolina and Virginia on matters of business planning and management and asset transfer. He has also served as legal counsel to various food distribution and processing companies that create production opportunities for farmers. He has a particular interest in counseling new and beginning farmers and inheritors of farmland, authoring the workbook Planning the Future of Your Farm for farm owners and Getting Started in Farming workbook for beginning farmers. Andrew graduated from Hampden-Sydney College in Virginia and Wake Forest University Law School, and lives with his family just north of Hillsborough, North Carolina.
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Shannon Carroll, High Country Food Hub Coordinator at Blue Ridge Women in Agriculture - Shannon grew up in the Piedmont area of NC and moved to Boone in 1983 after spending a year teaching Biology on the Navajo Reservation in Arizona. She has 30+ years of experience providing leadership and support for instructional technology for Watauga County Schools. She retired from Watauga County Schools in 2013 and is currently dividing her time between three part-time positions - being the High Country Food Hub Coordinator, the Lettuce Learn garden coordinator for Parkway School, and helping her husband, Terry, with his SunCatcher Passive Solar Greenhouse business. She also recently earned her Master Gardener certification. In her free time, she enjoys gardening, traveling to visit her sons, and going for long walks.
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Dave Walker, Programs Director at Blue Ridge Women in Agriculture - Dave directs BRWIA's farmer programs and emerging projects. He holds a MA in Appalachian Studies and Graduate Certificate in Geographic Information Sciences from AppState and a BA in American Studies from Sewanee: The University of the South. Dave's Masters Thesis concerned how first-generation farmers become successful in Blue Ridge Appalachia, and he counts himself amongst them as he started Daffodil Spring Farm, in the spring of 2017. Dave also held an internship with AppState's Edible Schoolyard where, he mapped Watauga County's community gardens and encouraged a network amongst the shared growing spaces.
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How We BeganPiedmont Women In Agriculture developed earlier this year at the statewide Women in Agritourism workshop held in March 2017. At this workshop in the Piedmont Group, we learned about the role of Blue Ridge Women in Agriculture in the NC High Country. In June 2017, we made a site visit to Boone to meet with Blue Ridge Women in Agriculture to learn more about how they started and what they were able to accomplish on behalf of women in agriculture. Their programs were started to share knowledge, encourage business development and profitability, galvanize resources and increase community markets for local food throughout their Blue Ridge service area.
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