Truck Farm

Pete-IN

Member

Location

Waterloo, IN

• Sep 8, 2023

• #1

A truck farm is defined as a vegetable farm that sells produce as opposed to a garden. I am 75 and I guess this is no longer a well known term. I was having a discussion today with a guy about 50 and he never heard the term. I have also mentioned it in the past to another younger person and had to explain myself. Anyone else familiar with this term or am I the only dinosaur around?

 

B

Buckhammer

Member

• Sep 8, 2023

• #2

I have never heard the term

 

G

Glenn F.

Member

• Sep 8, 2023

• #3

I have definitely heard and use the term. Im about ten years younger than you.

Glenn F.
NEWI

 

showcrop

Well-known Member

• Sep 8, 2023

• #4

I remember it being in common use years ago, but then I am your age. I haven't heard it used in probably 50 years.

 

B

boler76

Member

• Sep 8, 2023

• #5

probably just as popular a word as supper nowadays!!

 

W

WESnIL

Member

• Sep 8, 2023

• #6

A common term when I was younger. Truck garden, truck farm, truck gardening, etc. meant the same thing back in the day.

 

R

rrlund

Well-known Member

• Sep 8, 2023

• #7

Ya, they don't still call it that?

 

T

Traditional Farmer

Well-known Member

Location

Virginia

• Sep 8, 2023

• #8

A lot of truck farmers in my area when I was young (71 now)and the owners would take the produce to sell in town were called Peddlers.

 

A

Al Baker(pumpman)

Member

• Sep 8, 2023

• #9

My parents had a Truck Farm, so I grew up using the term. Folks raised veggies as Mom called them for over 50 years

 

A

Adrian Billheimer

Well-known Member

• Sep 8, 2023

• #10

You're not the only dino, my farm was a truck farm when my Dad and Uncle were growing up, (40's and early 50's), was also small dairy. I'm 55, so a young dino. :>)

 

Bruce from Can.

Well-known Member

Location

Woodville, Ontario, Canada

• Sep 8, 2023

• #11

I remember older folks talking about truck farms. Generally meant a farm that grew produce and trucked it into the city to wholesale markets.

 

Loosehandle

Well-known Member

Location

Wisconsin

• Sep 8, 2023

• #12

Im familiar with truck farm probably because my dad used that term, he would even call what he picked from our garden truck. This is in Wisconsin so maybe its regional?

 

DoubleO7

Well-known Member

Location

Crystal River, FL

• Sep 8, 2023

• #13

I am from southwest Michigan.
Home to the Benton Harbor Fruit Market, established in 1860 https://www.bhfm.com/

Nearly every farm within 10 miles of the estern shore of Lake Michigan is or was a "Truck Farm".
Growing fruit and veggies for shipment to Chicago, Detroit, Indy etc.

Farmers pick, pack and haul their bounty to the market early every morning. Get inline and the wholesale buyers would bid on the produce one truck at a time.

My grandfather started selling there when some where still using horse and wagon.

This post was edited by DoubleO7 on 09/08/2023 at 05:34 pm.

 

F

flying belgian

Well-known Member

• Sep 8, 2023

• #14

Real common in my area 50 to 100 yrs.ago. Usually a small irregular farm not conducive to raising row crops. Many times down in the iver vally. They would sell to the local mom and pop grocery stores tomatoes, cukes, pumpkins,lettuce, you name it.
That marginal land is all in crp or some other onservation program now. I suppose you could call the vendors at the farmers market todays truck farmers except they do it as a hobby whereas yesterday they made living at it.

 

Goose

Well-known Member

• Sep 8, 2023

• #15

When I was a kid, my parents would devote an acre or so to grow vegetables, sweet corn, etc. They referred to it as the 'truck patch'.

 

N

Northvale PA

Member

• Sep 8, 2023

• #16

Back in the mid 70s, my uncle grew sweet corn. The cousins and I would pick and fill up the bed of his F150. Drive to my grandfathers store and sell dozens out the back of the truck all day long. The very definition of truck farm.

 

M

Mark-Mi

Well-known Member

Location

S.E. Mi.

• Sep 8, 2023

• #17

Sure, the term truck farm is common use around here. Many farms here in SE Michigan truck farmed up till about 1940-50's and trucked to the Eastern Market in Detroit. My family did.
Eastern Market Estalished in 1841

 

E

EFV

Member

• Sep 8, 2023

• #18

What do you have when you had a good year of truck farming ? A bumper crop !

 

P

PJH

Well-known Member

• Sep 8, 2023

• #19

Dad was a truck farmer. He had a 5 acre patch and a 4 acre patch and then what we called the house garden, which was probably an acre or two. Plowed and disked it with a JD BO. Everything else was hand work. Sold the produce to the local grocery stores. Southern Illinois. I remember hoeing in the house garden. The hoe was taller than I was and the rows stretched over the hill and the ends were out of sight. We were never hungry.

 

P

Plant Doc

Member

• Sep 9, 2023

• #20

I was taught that the word Truck Farm came from the French word Troquer meaning to Barter. It supposedly started back in the middle 1800s.